By: Arther Hart
I have the great honor to introduce you to Kevin Harter, our March Entrepreneur of the Month. Kevin is an experienced healthcare and technology executive, board member, serial entrepreneur, and long-time volunteer for education-related initiatives.
Kevin has more than 35 years of experience in new life science and technology businesses. He has held more than two dozen board seats in healthcare, technology and financial companies. Kevin has served as chairman, president, and CEO of Saladax Biomedical Inc., a leader in personalized diagnostics. He co-founded the Life Sciences Greenhouse of Central Pennsylvania and Keystone Medical Systems.
In addition to being named as our Entrepreneur of the Month, Kevin has been the recipient of numerous awards for his professional and volunteer achievements. These awards include the Entrepreneur of the Year Award from Ernst & Young/Inc. Magazine, Outstanding Leadership in Technology Award from the Technology Council of Central PA, and the Alumni Fellow and Philip Philip Mitchell Service Award from the Pennsylvania State University.
Kevin has a passion for mentoring and teaching young entrepreneurs. He has taught classes for Penn State Harrisburg and continues to teach business skills through the Penn State Hershey College of Medicine. Entrepreneurs, and law students that are interested in representing entrepreneurs, can learn a great deal from Kevin’s experience.
What does it take to be an entrepreneur?
“It does take some level of courage to jump into the uncertainty and definitely takes a lot of hard work.”
When I asked Kevin what his greatest accomplishment was, I was surprised by his answer. It wasn’t about any of his great business deals or the impressive amount money he raised, it was having the courage to start in spite of the financial risks. Courage, according to Kevin, is an essential part of becoming a successful entrepreneur.
Click here to watch the interview.
The other absolutely essential part of becoming a successful entrepreneur is hard work. It is not enough to have the dream of becoming a successful entrepreneur, it takes a lot of hard work to get there. An entrepreneur should treat startups like they are training for a marathon.
Click here to hear Kevin elaborate.
Many businesses follow what Kevin calls “The Startup Curve.” At some point after the initial enthusiasm has worn off, there will be a period called the “Trough of Sorrow.” Hard work is absolutely necessary to pulling a startup out of the “Trough of Sorrow.”
Thinking like an Entrepreneur
“Don’t think of entrepreneurship as getting a job managing a business.”
Kevin emphasizes that entrepreneurs need to recognize that entrepreneurship is not the same as management. While it is true that entrepreneurs are managers, they are not confined to that role. Kevin explained the difference between the two is that entrepreneurship is identifying, creating, and acting upon an innovative opportunity to create value while management is the administration of an organization.
Entrepreneurs, according to Kevin, should have a 2-stage mental process. One side is very creative and optimistic while the other side is risk averse and pessimistic. An entrepreneur has to be very optimistic about the opportunities and where they are going to take the business while at the same time being careful and looking out for the things that can go wrong.
Watch the interview here.
Risk and Uncertainty
“You’re going to deal, in entrepreneurship, with a great deal of uncertainty. Your ability to manage that uncertainty is going to determine your level of success in entrepreneurship.”
During a lecture to Dickinson Law’s Company Creation class, Kevin made a surprising point about the relationship between entrepreneurs and risk. Contrary to popular belief, entrepreneurs are not, or at least should not be, chronic risk takers. Rather, successful entrepreneurs learn how to mitigate the risk involved by effectively dealing with uncertainty. To effectively manage the uncertainty, successful entrepreneurs learn to make good, informed judgment calls and not dwell on past mistakes.
For these and more entrepreneurial tips click here.
Startup Finance
“The first question I would ask myself is, do I need money?”
Kevin’s first bit of advice when it comes to raising capital is that an entrepreneur must ask whether they need money. There are a few things an entrepreneur needs to do before seeking money: clearly identify who your customer is, what they want, and what the value is that you can provide 
them. Then, if you are able to calculate how much money you need to create the business, you can look at raising it. According to Kevin, 79% of businesses fail because they haven’t properly identified their customer, and end up building or developing the wrong thing.
Customer discovery is key to avoiding this pitfall. During the early stages of a business, entrepreneurs should be spending as little as they can with the goal of testing a hypothesis. The hypothesis being that the entrepreneur has built a repeatable and profitable business loop. Once an entrepreneur has proven all of their hypotheses, they can begin to look for additional funding to grow their business.
Watch Kevin’s explanation here.
Advice for Law Students
“You are going to need to provide information in a way that entrepreneurs can make judgment calls that are very difficult and frequently wrong.”
The best startup lawyers become good partners with the entrepreneurs they represent. Entrepreneurs deal with a large amount of uncertainty and they often need the help of an attorney to make the best decisions they can. The best thing an attorney can do for entrepreneurs is give good advice, in context. They should learn to ask the question “why” and seek to understand their client’s motives as well as objectives.
Click here to hear Kevin elaborate.
Kevin’s Recommended Reading for Entrepreneurs
Talking to Humans
Business Model Generation
Value Proposition Design
The Startup Owner’s Manual
Videos containing Kevin Harter’s great advice and insights can be viewed through links in the above article.
Photo Source: Penn State Hershey College of Medicine
Arther Hart is a second-year law student at Penn State’s Dickinson Law. He is from Northern Utah and an interest in Health and Technology Law. He has a degree in biological engineering from Utah State University. Currently, Arther is interning at the Center for Medical Innovation.
