
Giorgio Armani didn't accomplish anything until his forties - kareemm
http://www.gq.com/style/celebrities/201506/giorgio-armani-interview
======
jegea
Most of the commenters focus on a stronger financial position and/or industry
knowledge as reasons to be a successful entrepreneur beyond the barrier of
40s.

But the man himself provides reasons which I find much more profound (and that
being in midforties myself, I'm glad to relate to:

> Your forties are the moment when you start to become aware. It's just the
> beginning. I've always believed that to confirm your way of thinking takes
> time. It takes experimenting. You have to confront different chapters of
> your life

Touched me deep enough to create an HN account just to comment.

~~~
nosuchthing
Aware of what?

I often find people in their 40s' to be deeply troubled, tired, and grappling
for power or ego.

Anecdotally I have encountered more people in the 50s-90s range with a calmer,
wiser, and altruistic awareness of self and others. I imagine it has something
to do with the thought of mortality nullifying their materialistic or egoistic
pursuits, and some sort of realization that we're all here together on a big
rock hurdling through space so maybe baking a batch of cookies for friends is
a good idea worth spending time on.

~~~
jegea
Of course, there's plenty of people in their 40s experiencing the struggles
you describe. But, as a matter of fact, I've met as many of them in the 20s
and 30s range with the same problems (maybe not so tired, but troubled and
egomaniac nonetheless).

In the context of entrepreneurship, however, I find that those traits are much
less prominent, regardless of the age.

In my case, today I just sold my part of the company I founded 10 years ago to
my cofounding partner. Not a big, glorious exit, BTW. Just the opportunity to
try again, and get better results this time.

Being 46, I do feel much more aware now that I felt 10 years ago. Aware of my
strengths and aware of my limits. And aware of my motivations.

However, I must confess that, ten years ago, I had the same image that you
describe about fortysomethings. That's why I decided to start my own company
then, to avoid becoming one of them.

------
insulanian
This gives me the hope that with 35 I still have a chance to break the chains,
get out of employee role and start my own business, because I feel so ready
for it... But then again, there are mouths to feed at home, so... shut up and
back to reading this feature requirement...

~~~
unoti
It wasn't until my kids were adults that I was able to make the jump into my
lifelong dream of self employment. But I spent a lot of time training myself
and laying the groundwork before that day. Keep pushing for your dream. The
fight isn't over until you quit fighting! Age isn't a big deal unless you
allow it to. If you keep learning and keep striving and keep exercising that
will keep you young in all the ways that matter.

------
kstenerud
I just turned 40 this year. I have 7 failed businesses behind me and one that
is still alive, doing well.

One thing I have noticed is that a better understanding of how the world
ACTUALLY works has been a huge help in avoiding the many pitfalls that await
the intrepid explorer. And since there is no manual that explains all of this,
you can only really get it through hard experience. And to make matters worse,
once it's internalized, it just becomes part of your background thought
process, making it difficult to explain to others because you hardly even
notice it's there until you see someone about to make a huge mistake.

------
danso
I've always wanted to write a quickie script that collected famous people
pages (such as Nobel Prize winners) from Wikipedia and subtracted their
birthdate from the year of their first major accomplishment...I suspect in
something like Nobel Prize winners, the ages would skew middle-aged to older,
but of course, such people would've been working hard in their field prior to
the award.

~~~
pcrh
"...the mean age of Nobel Prize winning achievements since 1980 is 48 y."

[http://www.pnas.org/content/108/47/18910.full](http://www.pnas.org/content/108/47/18910.full)

------
teddyh
See also: _5 Famous People Who Succeeded Long After They Should 've Quit_

[http://www.cracked.com/article_19655_5-famous-late-
bloomers....](http://www.cracked.com/article_19655_5-famous-late-
bloomers.html)

Lists: Alan Rickman, Peter Roget, Joseph Conrad, Kathryn Joosten and Harland
“Colonel” Sanders.

------
hahamrfunnyguy
A lot of people don't accomplish anything until their forties. Easy to
understand why too: you're wiser, have more money and built up a network of
connections over the years.

The edge younger people have I think is a drive, higher energy=levels and an
optimism that comes from not being jaded from years of full-time work.

------
b_emery
Good summary of a 'hack' of human nature:

>A well-maintained physique is a great business card. Ideas and intelligence
are what matters, but if you have a well-maintained physique, it's better.
People are always more willing when it comes to beauty; there's not much to be
done about it. It's a classic ideal: healthy mind, healthy body.

------
wellpast
Related, Malcom Gladwell on "Late Bloomers":

[http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2008/10/20/late-
bloomers-2](http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2008/10/20/late-bloomers-2)
(2008)

~~~
vonklaus
I like Gladwell from a pop-sci point of view. After he retroactively tried to
medically diagnose Goliath using the King James Bible and a few anecdotes, I
really tuned him out.

------
beat
I totally feel this article. I decided to create a startup in my late 40s, 20
years into a steady, safe career of enterprise IT. I finally feel _ready_.

------
weinzierl
Somewhat related:

    
    
        What's the average age of people you fund?
    
        About 29. A lot of people think it's younger because 
        the press especially like to write about young founders.
    

[http://www.ycombinator.com/faq/#q42](http://www.ycombinator.com/faq/#q42)

~~~
nl
Yeah, but a normal distribution centered on 29, with a lower bound of ~18
doesn't actually imply all that many 40+ year olds.

(on mobile, someone else can reply with the math for an upvote)

~~~
danieltillett
Not that I am a mathematician, but I am pretty sure that you can't actually
calculate how many 40+ people there are just from these values since you can't
assume the distribution is normal.

~~~
Xophmeister
The central limit theorem might have something to say about that...

~~~
dagw
I doubt they have funded a Sufficiently Large Number of people.

~~~
nl
It's well over 1600 people funded.

I'd find it surprising if we didn't see a skewed normal distribution (skewed
because of the lower bound).

------
jeremysmyth
Headline is a bit misleading.

By 40 he had already significant experience in the industry, as a menswear
buyer for a department store and through his 30s a menswear designer, both
employed and freelance. Then he (the creative) and his partner (the business
guy) created a startup leading to where he is today.

This isn't too unusual a story in the world of startups (not to minimize the
achievement of his or any self-sacrificing startup), and doesn't reflect the
title's premise at all.

~~~
iamben
I don't know - I think it's more akin to spending 20 years as a dev in various
companies, then one day saying "I'm finally going to take a chance on that
start-up idea".

We'd probably be saying pretty much the same thing (regardless as to whether
some of what she/he'd done had made a real difference to those companies) -
"she/he spent 20 years writing code, but XXX was her/his first real
accomplishment/success..."

As I've been told many, many times - overnight success is usually preceded by
10 years of hard work.

