The Entrepreneurs Examen is a simple, powerful practice that invites founders to pause, notice, and realign their ventures with their deepest values, not just their latest metrics.

Setting the Stage: Georgetown, Jesuit Roots, and Entrepreneurship

At the 2025 Georgetown Entrepreneurship Summit, the Entrepreneurs Examen emerged as one of the most meaningful moments of the day, giving busy founders rare space to reflect on why they started in the first place. Rooted in Georgetown’s Jesuit heritage, the session connected entrepreneurial ambition with the centuries‑old Ignatian tradition of discernment, reflection, and “people for others.”

Father Quentin Dupont, S.J., who helped shape the Summit’s focus on purpose‑driven leadership, brought a distinctly spiritual yet practical lens to entrepreneurship by inviting participants to honestly examine both their impact and their intentions. In a day filled with keynotes, panels, and Bark Tank pitches, the Examen acted as a counterweight to constant forward motion, asking founders to slow down just long enough to ask, “Am I building in a way that is good for me, my team, and the world?”

What Is the Entrepreneur’s Examen?

The Entrepreneurs Examen adapts the Ignatian Examen (a daily practice of prayerful reflection on where one has experienced consolation and desolation) to the entrepreneurial journey. Instead of focusing only on revenue, traction, or fundraising milestones, it asks entrepreneurs to examine their purpose, relationships, and the ripple effects of their decisions on stakeholders and society.

At the Summit, this took shape as a guided reflective session where founders paused, listened, and shared stories about the highs and lows of building something from nothing. Through prompts and gentle questions, participants considered where they felt most alive in their work, where they felt drained or misaligned, and how they might move toward more mission‑consistent choices in the months ahead.

The Core Movements of the Examen for Founders

While every facilitator will shape it slightly differently, the Entrepreneurs Examen, as presented at Georgetown, followed the arc of the classic Ignatian Examen translated into entrepreneurial language: purpose, flourish, reflection, and gratitude.

• Remember Your Why  

Founders begin by thinking about what compelled them to start their entrepreneurial journey. Asking questions like what is the deeper purpose and why did you start your venture?

• • Reflect on Flourishing
    Entrepreneurs mentally walk through how their venture promotes good. Does their venture have a positive impact on customers, with employees, with partners and suppliers, within the community, for our shared environment, within themselves as they live their calling?
  • Review Your Day (or Week)
    Drawing from Ignatian language, participants are invited to name moments of “consolation” (energy, peace, alignment) and “desolation” (drain, anxiety, disconnection) in their work. For a founder, consolation might look like a team brainstorm that left everyone energized, while desolation might show up as a growth decision that conflicts with the company’s stated values.
  • Return to Gratitude Recall your purpose. Discernment: where am I aligned with my purpose? With those moments in view, the Examen turns to discernment: Where is my venture most aligned with the good I say I want to create, and where is it drifting? This is where the Jesuit concept of “magis”—doing more for others, not just doing more—becomes a practical question for product roadmaps, hiring, and business models.

Why This Matters for Modern Entrepreneurs

The Summit’s programming underscored that entrepreneurship, when grounded in values, can be a force for the common good rather than just a vehicle for personal gain. With ventures at Georgetown collectively raising hundreds of millions of dollars and creating jobs across sectors, the stakes of how leaders show up—ethically, relationally, and spiritually—are not abstract.

The Entrepreneurs Examen offers a countercultural practice in a startup world obsessed with speed: a rhythm of reflection that keeps founders connected to their original “why” and responsive to the communities they serve. In a landscape of constant pitch decks and performance metrics, this kind of examen can become a regular founder habit—weekly, monthly, or at key inflection points—to ensure that “success” is measured not only by exits and valuations, but also by integrity, impact, and inner freedom.

For those who weren’t in the room at Georgetown, the invitation still stands: build your own version of the Entrepreneurs Examen, gather a small circle of fellow founders, and create space to ask the deeper questions that rarely make it onto a dashboard—but quietly shape everything your venture becomes.