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All Big Five traits
Big Five Trait

Openness to Experience in Entrepreneurs

The innovation driver

Founders score significantly higher on openness to experience than the general population, a pattern documented across more than 100 studies and confirmed in large-scale samples of startup founders (Freiberg, Hisrich, et al., reviewed in Zhao & Seibert, Journal of Applied Psychology, 2006; Kerr, Kerr, & Xu, NBER 2017).

What is openness to experience?

Openness to experience captures intellectual curiosity, creativity, willingness to experiment, and tolerance for ambiguity. Founders consistently score higher on openness than non-entrepreneurs because high openness is the trait most closely associated with seeing market opportunities others miss.

16 famous founders ranked by openness to experience

Scores on a 0-100 scale. Higher score = more openness to experience.

RankFounderMBTICategoryScore
#1Steve JobsAppleENTJVisionary95
#2Elon MuskTesla / SpaceXINTJVisionary95
#3Brian CheskyAirbnbENFPBuilder95
#4Patrick CollisonStripeINTJBuilder95
#5Paul GrahamY CombinatorINTPContrarian95
#6Naval RavikantAngelListINTPContrarian95
#7Larry PageGoogle / AlphabetINTPBuilder95
#8Sergey BrinGoogle / AlphabetINTJBuilder95
#9Walt DisneyThe Walt Disney CompanyENFPVisionary95
#10Sam AltmanOpenAIENTJVisionary92
#11Marc AndreessenAndreessen Horowitz / NetscapeENTJContrarian92
#12Yvon ChouinardPatagoniaINFPVisionary92
#13Oprah WinfreyOWN / HarpoENFJConnector90
#14Reid HoffmanLinkedInENFPConnector90
#15Peter ThielPayPal / PalantirINTJContrarian90
#16Jack DorseyTwitter / BlockINFJContrarian88
#17Whitney Wolfe HerdBumbleENFPConnector85
#18Bill GatesMicrosoftINTJBuilder85
#19Daniel EkSpotifyINTJBuilder85
#20Reed HastingsNetflixINTJBuilder85
#21Melanie PerkinsCanvaENFJBuilder80
#22Queen Elizabeth IEnglandENTJVisionary78
#23Mark ZuckerbergMetaINTJBuilder78
#24Marc BenioffSalesforceENFJConnector78
#25Howard SchultzStarbucksENFJConnector78
#26Jeff BezosAmazonESTJOperator75
#27Jensen HuangNVIDIAISTJBuilder72
#28Katrina LakeStitch FixISTJOperator72
#29Travis KalanickUberESTPOperator70
#30Sara BlakelySpanxESFJOperator65

Where would you rank on openness to experience?

Take the Founder Mode entrepreneur personality test to find your openness to experience score on the same 0-100 scale used for the 16 founders above. Free, 10 minute survey.

Find your score

Top 5: highest openness to experience

  1. #1Steve Jobs (ENTJ)95
  2. #2Elon Musk (INTJ)95
  3. #3Brian Chesky (ENFP)95
  4. #4Patrick Collison (INTJ)95
  5. #5Paul Graham (INTP)95

Bottom 5: lowest openness to experience

  1. #30Sara Blakely (ESFJ)65
  2. #29Travis Kalanick (ESTP)70
  3. #28Katrina Lake (ISTJ)72
  4. #27Jensen Huang (ISTJ)72
  5. #26Jeff Bezos (ESTJ)75

Frequently asked questions

What is openness to experience in the Big Five model?

Openness to experience captures intellectual curiosity, creativity, willingness to experiment, and tolerance for ambiguity. Founders consistently score higher on openness than non-entrepreneurs because high openness is the trait most closely associated with seeing market opportunities others miss.

Do high-openness founders perform better?

Founders score significantly higher on openness to experience than the general population, a pattern documented across more than 100 studies and confirmed in large-scale samples of startup founders (Freiberg, Hisrich, et al., reviewed in Zhao & Seibert, Journal of Applied Psychology, 2006; Kerr, Kerr, & Xu, NBER 2017).

Which famous founder scores highest on openness to experience?

Based on our Big Five estimates, Steve Jobs (Apple, MBTI ENTJ) is the highest-scoring founder on openness to experience in our 16-founder dataset.

How are these scores estimated?

Big Five scores for each founder are estimated from publicly documented behavior, interviews, biographies, and shareholder letters. They are calibrated against academic research on founder personality. They are best treated as informed estimates for educational and comparative purposes, not clinical assessments. See the methodology page for full details.

Other Big Five traits

Conscientiousness

The execution engine

Extraversion

The distribution advantage

Agreeableness

Lower is often better

Neuroticism

The resilience factor

Where do you score on openness to experience?

Take the free founder personality test to find your Big Five profile.

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