--- id: "pisquared:interview/aldrich-howard" type: "Pi-Squared interview" title: "Anita McGahan in conversation with Howard Aldrich" url: "https://pisquared.theburnescenter.org/interviews/aldrich-howard" date: "2025-07-10" people: ["Anita McGahan","Howard Aldrich"] summary: "Howard E. Aldrich is Kenan Professor of Sociology and Professor of Entrepreneurship at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is also a Faculty..." recording: "https://vimeo.com/1100405299" source: "Pi-Squared (pisquared.theburnescenter.org), The Burnes Center for Social Change" licence: "none stated" --- # Anita McGahan in conversation with Howard Aldrich Howard Aldrich, Kenan Professor of Sociology and Professor of Entrepreneurship at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill · 10 July 2025 ## About the guest Howard E. Aldrich is Kenan Professor of Sociology and Professor of Entrepreneurship at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is also a Faculty Research Associate at Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business, Fellow of Sidney Sussex College at Cambridge University, and Faculty Fellow of the Center for Study of Economy and Society at Cornell University. Howard’s main research interests are entrepreneurship, team formation, evolutionary theory, economic sociology and inequality, and gender issues in entrepreneurship. He is renowned for his contributions to our understanding of the evolution of organizations, and with nearing 100,000 citations, is among the most prolific and impactful scholars in our field. ## Reflections from the interview Howard, you have thought more than anyone in the world about entrepreneurial density – packing in a lot of entrepreneurial firms in a small geography – versus the singular heroic entrepreneur like Elon Musk or Steve Jobs or Bill Gates.    Where in this landscape do you see the greatest potential for breakthroughs that will solve big problems like global warming?   Howard distinguished “big end” entrepreneurs like Bill Gates and Warren Buffett from what he calls everyday entrepreneurs.  On the big end, the challenge is coaxing people into philanthropy.  But if we put that in a box and focus on the vast majority of everyday entrepreneurs, we’re looking at activity that is more likely to elevate communities and small groups than to solve big technical problems.    Yet it’s everyday entrepreneurs that constitute the majority of the labor force.  So what elevates the experience of small-scale entrepreneurship?   Howard described how most of us who buy one of the dozens of books on entrepreneurship off the airport bookstore shelves are seeking autonomy and independence.  We’re looking for the chance for our hard work to benefit our standard of living.   There are a ton of problems to overcome to make entrepreneurship easier, but they’re mostly not really new.  These are problems like access to credit, overcoming bias, and providing people with basic floors on their risk levels. Is entrepreneurship an ideology rather than a profession? Yes, in a sense, the media and our general ethos in business celebrates autonomy and independence.   There’s a strong ideology of the entrepreneur as a local hero. Anita asked Howard what he would do if he were in charge of federal agencies designed to support entrepreneurship.  His answer?   Perform the basic functions of government with stability and capability.   We know that state socialism doesn’t work.  Howard would not choose small-business investment.  What he would choose is creating stability in government.  Certainty around things like emergency protections, core regulatory constraints, banking, and better functioning of consumer product protections.   What doesn’t work are things like capricious standards and changing tariffs. We also need to come to grips with the fact that many small businesses will last 1-5 years.   10 years makes you a great success.   And most people come out the other end just fine.   They acquire contacts, skills, and relationships that they bring with them into healthy careers. Anita asked Howard if he would invest in science and education if he were in charge. His answer:   Science.  Yes.  More than anything, we need the general public to understand the value of the basic science that occurs in Universities with government funding.   Education. Maybe.   Gen AI is blowing the lid off the fact that much of what we teach in Universities is not well designed or developed.  We need to confront the miserable mess that Universities have created.   What makes Howard optimistic?  AI.  Howard hopes that AI compels Universities to change the way that we teach.  We need to support students in development a broader range of truly critical skills rather than spitball answers that AI can generate instantaneously. ## Related resources - [Howard’s website at UNC](https://www.linkedin.com/in/matt-harder/) - [Howard’s personal website](https://howardaldrich.org/) - [Howard’s blog](https://howardaldrich.org/blog-posts-2/) - Howard’s google scholar page ## Recording Video: https://vimeo.com/1100405299 ## Category [Where Do We Go From Here?](https://pisquared.theburnescenter.org/category/where-next) * * * Original page: https://pisquared.theburnescenter.org/interviews/aldrich-howard · Licence: none stated