I've spent a couple of days in the past week reviewing the entry nominations for the 2016 EY Entrepreneur of the Year Awards, preparing to contribute to the deliberations of the judging panel as we select the 24 finalists for the awards programme. The judging panel of 12 comprises former winners of these awards and senior executives from the sponsoring organisations Enterprise Ireland and Invest Northern Ireland.

When selected, the 24 finalists will engage further in the coming months. They will take part in an executive education retreat in Boston in May, meet the judges on several occasions, and join 1,500 guests at the televised gala awards night to in October. Now in its 18th year, it is a credible and highly regarded awards programme which helps establish a close community of the best of Ireland’s entrepreneurs (over half actually now do business with one another) as well as providing world-class educational opportunities, raising the profile of the finalists and their businesses, and painting a very positive picture of Irish business in the national media.

Common traits

As we read through these nominations, the judging panel seek to get behind the written word and the financial analysis of their progress. The very best of these nominated entrepreneurs, like many of the 400 finalists of the EY awards in previous years, share some common traits. Many of them have had previous experience as an entrepreneur; some hugely successful financially, some gaining painful and valuable lessons from failure.

Their stories are, without exception, engaging and inspirational.

As I read these nominations, I ask why they often suspend their personal lives and dedicate an extraordinary amount of time and effort to create or build a business. Why do they take such risks, often signing personal guarantees for bank loans, risking their reputation and the possibility of an embarrassing and financially ruinous failure? For some, its all about an attempt to generate a good standard of living for themselves and their families. Many are hugely motivated by the drive to provide livelihoods for their colleagues and employees.

However, for a number of successful, serial entrepreneurs, the drive to make more money is overshadowed by other motivations. In the past few weeks, I’ve asked some of the former winners of the EY awards, why they continue to start or build businesses. Often they don’t need to financially – some have already made more money than they could ever spend. Mostly they are highly confident of their own ability to be successful, with a blind sense of self belief that they can build something out of nothing, an almost alchemistic creation of equity value.

They all know that they can only succeed if they “have a go”, and a few versions of the US basketball slogan, “you’ll always miss 100 per cent of the shots you don’t take”, seems to be a commonly shared motto. They share an almost child-like excitement about the thrill of creating something new; these entrepreneurs truly love their job.

But they also show contradictions; the most confident entrepreneurs seem to share a sense of concern that they need to prove, to themselves and others, that their last success was not just a bit of luck. A serial entrepreneur is often driven by a desire to prove that she had in fact earned her success, that she is not “a one trick pony” and that her financial success was not like a euro lottery win.

The best of the entrepreneurs I’ve come across also share a high degree of self awareness; they know their own strengths and, more importantly, their own shortcomings. I don’t believe I have ever met an entrepreneur who’s success was due entirely to his own ability alone. The most successful entrepreneurs build a close and highly-talented team of colleagues with complimentary skills. The entrepreneur’s flaws are more than compensated by the strength of their team.

Positive social impact

Some of the best entrepreneurs also seek to ensure that their business make a meaningful positive social impact. Just like dedicated nurses, teachers and public servants, the pay cheque is not what gets them up in the morning.

I have no doubt that the 24 finalists that are chosen for this year’s EY awards will share many of these traits. The judges consider each nominee in great detail, with evaluative criteria such as vision, innovation, as well as their financial success and their contribution to society. These are some of the things that distinguish the great Irish entrepreneurial leaders from the rest.

Michael Carey is managing director of East Coast Bakehouse, and a judge for the EY Entrepreneur of the Year Awards.