Test Yourself: What Is Your Entrepreneur Quotient?

You’ve heard it before: Successful entrepreneurs are driven, outgoing, confident, assertive, resilient. That doesn’t mean a shy person can’t run a successful startup. But most entrepreneurs share common traits. We’ve compiled a totally unscientific quiz to help you determine your entrepreneur quotient—or at least to prompt a chuckle.

1. Who is your mentor?

• a. Charlie at the He’s Not Here bar and  grill
• b. Jack Betterway, serial entrepreneur, who quit his widget-making job after designing the Betterway Widget Maker and selling it to Facebook for $1 bazillion
• c. Ron Upright, head of engineering, who took you out to lunch last week
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2. The glass is…

• a. Half-empty
• b. Half-full
• c. Drained
• d. I don’t know, but I see suds on it
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3. I am most afraid of:

• a. Bankruptcy
• b. Airplane flights
• c. Highway overpasses
• d. Snakes on a plane
• e. Support groups
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4. A friend just gave you a gift certificate for a hot-air balloon ride. What do you do with it?

• a. Buy a jacket because it might be chilly up there
• b. Secretly re-gift it to Ron Upright
• c. Allow your mother to talk you out of it
• d. Borrow a parachute so you can experience skydiving as well
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5. Your biggest client just rejected your latest presentation. What do you do?

• a. Pull an all-nighter, totally reworking your pitch based on the client’s comments
• b. Visit Charlie at the He’s Not Here bar and grill
• c. Call engineering chief Ron Upright for some new ideas
• d. Work on your script for Modern Family
• e. a and c
• f. b and d
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6. Your friends describe you as a:

• a. Workaholic
• b. Perpetual student
• c. Night owl
• d. Carlos Danger
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Give yourself 10 points each for these answers: 1. c, 2. b, 3. any answer but a., 4.d., 5.e., 6.a. Give yourself 40 points for being a good sport and taking this quiz. If your total is 100 points, you need to get started right away; anything less and maybe you should keep that day job.

We’re testing for the characteristics of a successful entrepreneur as outlined by Mike Allan, associate director of Livingstones Australia, an employment advisory firm: resilience, openness to new ideas, assertiveness or extraversion, conscientiousness, self-discipline and deliberation combined with the ability to take action.

Check out a more serious quiz to assess your entrepreneurial mettle.