We make heroes of entrepreneurial innovators. According to a recent YouGov survey, Microsoft founder Bill Gates is the most admired man on the planet; Alibaba founder Jack Ma placed 10th. A 2016Wired profile credited augmented-reality pioneer and Magic Leap founder Rony Abovitz with nothing less than “invent[ing] a superpower.”
Indeed, the cultural narrative that celebrates entrepreneurial inventiveness often views this creativity as happening in bubbles outside of the mainstream corporate world. The business press ascribes a level of magic to companies created by iconic founders, such as Amazon, Apple, and Pixar, holding them up as special and somehow different from other corporations.