GMAT CLUB OLYMPICS: Any successful entrepreneur is both self-motivated

Question

Any successful entrepreneur is both self-motivated and independent, characteristics that are lacking in individuals who have a marketable idea but who lack an entrepreneurial spirit. Furthermore, since a successful entrepreneur must be well-known within his or her industry, no one who is unknown in an industry will become a successful entrepreneur.

If the statements above are true, which of the following can most reasonably be inferred.

A. Anyone who is well-known within his or her industry can become a successful entrepreneur.

B. Someone with a marketable idea must have an entrepreneurial spirit to fully maximize its potential.

C. Any individual in a lesser-known industry cannot become a successful entrepreneur without raising the profile of the entire industry

D. A marketable idea is not sufficient to guarantee individual success in every industry.

E. Self-motivation and independence are the most defining characteristics of the entrepreneurial spirit.

V33-18

Bunuel · Accepted Answer

Explanation

Choice A: No. This answer choice is a reversal of the statements, since it is only known that  no one who is unknown in an industry will become a successful entrepreneur  not that being well-known guarantees that one can become a successful entrepreneur.

Choice B: No. This answer choice is only possible based upon the statements, but not certain, since it is reasonable to deduce that  someone with a marketable idea  could maximize its potential in some way other than by becoming an entrepreneur.

Choice C: No. This answer choice introduces a variable outside of the scope of the prompt in  the profile of the entire industry .

Choice D: Yes.  This answer choice must be reasonably inferred based on the statements, since someone who has a marketable idea, but is not self-motivated or independent is described as lacking an entrepreneurial spirit, implying that there are some who are incapable of becoming successful entrepreneurs who do have marketable ideas.

Choice E: No. This answer choice introduces a variable outside of the scope of the prompt of  the most defining characteristics of the entrepreneurial spirit .

The correct answer is choice D.

cs15811581 · Answer

Any successful entrepreneur is both self-motivated and independent, characteristics that are lacking in individuals who have a marketable idea but who lack an entrepreneurial spirit. Furthermore, since a successful entrepreneur must be well-known within his or her industry, no one who is unknown in an industry will become a successful entrepreneur.

If the statements above are true, which of the following can most reasonably be inferred.

A. Anyone who is well-known within his or her industry can become a successful entrepreneur. 
 Incorrect. Well known is a MUST for becoming successful, but it is not sufficient on its own to guarantee success.

B. Someone with a marketable idea must have an entrepreneurial spirit to fully maximize its potential.
 Out of context, as potential is not spoken about

C. Any individual in a lesser-known industry cannot become a successful entrepreneur without raising the profile of the entire industry
 That's wrong as we are talking about well known within HIS or HER industry, and not about industry being well known.

D. A marketable idea is not sufficient to guarantee individual success in every industry.
 Correct. There are other requirements too.

E. Self-motivation and independence are the most defining characteristics of the entrepreneurial spirit.
 Out of context, as characteristics are not spoken about

D

JonShukhrat · Answer

From the stem we know that any successful entrepreneur needs to be self-motivated and independent. 
However, these characteristics themselves don’t make a good entrepreneur. 
We also know that a marketable idea is not enough to be a successful entrepreneur, but this doesn’t mean that such idea is not enough to become a successful individual.

A. Anyone who is well-known within his or her industry can become a successful entrepreneur.

Correct choice as far as I know. “can become” doesn’t necessarily mean “will become”. It means “can or might not become”. If a person is unknown, then we surely know that he or she cannot become an entrepreneur. However, if he or she is well-known, then he or she has the potential to become a successful entrepreneur.

B. Someone with a marketable idea must have an entrepreneurial spirit to fully maximize its potential.

“fully maximize its potential” is a totally new information. What is required to fully maximize the potential of a marketable idea isn’t given above.

C. Any individual in a lesser-known industry cannot become a successful entrepreneur without raising the profile of the entire industry

The argument says “must be well-known WITHIN his or her industry”. Even if the industry itself not widely acknowledged, a person can be a successful entrepreneur provided that he is well-known within even unknown industry.
So incorrect.

D. A marketable idea is not sufficient to guarantee individual success in every industry.

From the stem we know that any successful entrepreneur needs to be self-motivated and independent. However, these characteristics themselves don’t make a good entrepreneur. We also know that a marketable idea is not enough to be a successful entrepreneur, but this doesn’t mean that such idea is not enough to become a successful individual. An individual can be successful in many ways except for entrepreneurship.
So, nothing in the passage implies that “a marketable idea is insufficient to guarantee individual success in every industry”. 
So incorrect choice.

E. Self-motivation and independence are the most defining characteristics of the entrepreneurial spirit.

We know that entrepreneurs posses these qualities, but nothing in the passage alludes that these are the most defining. 
These can be necessary but not the most important in the hierarchy of entrepreneurial traits.
So incorrect.

So A

JonShukhrat · Answer

Dear  IanStewart

I had a foreboding that the answer I choose will be wrong and that the one I dislike a lot will be correct.
I am actually writing this post before the official answer is revealed.
I am pretty sure OA will be D (now I can see I was right). However, I chose A. 
Could you please help?

From the passage, we know that a marketable idea is not enough to become  a successful entrepreneur.  
However, are “individual success” and “successful entrepreneur” the same things?
Or is everybody in an industry an entrepreneur? 
Probably, answer choice D assumes so. 
What is that “individual success” in D? Nothing is clarified. 
I think “individual success in every industry” can be assigned to a successful designer, marketer, security staff, driver, or whoever. Not necessarily an entrepreneur.

Once again, just to make my point crystal clear: the stem says that a marketable idea is not enough to be  a successful entrepreneur .
And the language of D is not clear enough to choose it on the basis of the stem. The reverse of D may very well be true.
So D is wrong.

Choice A says: Anyone who is well-known within his or her industry CAN become a successful entrepreneur.
That CAN doesn’t mean WILL
From the stem, we know that an unknown person within his or her industry CANNOT be a successful entrepreneur.
However, if he or she is well-known, then he or she has a chance.
So, I think A must be the answer.

Many thanks beforehand.

IanStewart · Answer

Yes, I agree with you. I think there are actually two issues with the question. First, as you point out, the stem only tells us about the qualities of a "successful entrepreneur". One can be successful without being a "successful entrepreneur", so we can't infer answer D here. I don't even know what "individual success" means in answer D (it could mean almost anything - making money? earning recognition? contributing to your community? being fulfilled with your work?) but if it simply means making money, D can very well be false. Maybe everyone with a marketable idea is able to sell it to an entrepreneur for billions of dollars, and everyone with a marketable idea is able to achieve "individual success" even with no "entrepreneurial spirit".

There's a second issue, not relevant to answer D, with the last sentence of the stem. It doesn't make logical sense: "no one who is unknown in an industry will become a successful entrepreneur." If that were true, successful entrepreneurs could not exist, unless there are a lot of well-known four year olds. If you assume that infants and toddlers are all unknown, and if it is true that people who are now unknown can never be successful entrepreneurs in the future, then there will be no successful entrepreneurs in the future. The question does not seem to be accounting for the fact that the quality of being "well-known" is one that can change over time. Even if one needed to be well-known first to become successful as an entrepreneur, a now-unknown person could become well-known first, then become a successful entrepreneur later. So that sentence doesn't seem well thought-out.

The question is really an LSAT type of question anyway, so it won't resemble something you'll see on the GMAT.

samkelvin · Answer

it is a inference based question so if passage is true then answer choice must be true. So as far as i know option B is good to go with.

A. Anyone who is well-known within his or her industry can become a successful entrepreneur.

Incorrect: The statement says that a successful entrepreneur must be well-known, but it does not say that being well-known is sufficient for becoming a successful entrepreneur.
B. Someone with a marketable idea must have an entrepreneurial spirit to fully maximize its potential.

Correct: This aligns with the first statement, which says individuals with a marketable idea but lacking an entrepreneurial spirit are not successful entrepreneurs. Hence, to fully maximize the potential of a marketable idea, one needs an entrepreneurial spirit.
C. Any individual in a lesser-known industry cannot become a successful entrepreneur without raising the profile of the entire industry.

Incorrect: The statement says a successful entrepreneur must be well-known in their industry, but it does not state that the entire industry's profile needs to be raised.
D. A marketable idea is not sufficient to guarantee individual success in every industry.

Incorrect: This statement might seem true, but it is not a direct inference. The focus is on individual qualities rather than the sufficiency of a marketable idea in different industries.
E. Self-motivation and independence are the most defining characteristics of the entrepreneurial spirit.

Incorrect: While self-motivation and independence are important, the passage does not claim these are the most defining characteristics of the entrepreneurial spirit.

Invincible_147 · Answer

The issue with option D is that its talking about "individual success" and the passage is talking about "successful entrepreneurship" so it was not a straight forward choice for me.But it was the best if compared to the other options.

VerbalBot · Answer

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