We are all born to be entrepreneurs; we all have the potential to achieve amazing things, but that flame that burns so brightly inside every one of us at birth is all but extinguished by the society we live in, as we get older. Our education system for example - where we spend ten or more years of our childhood - does nothing to nourish our entrepreneurial spirit.
Its main aim is to produce wage slaves, people who will go from cradle to school to work to bus pass to grave without rocking the boat, without bucking the system.
Education without knowledge as it has been described.
It is not surprising to hear that the likes of Richard Branson did not do well at school. In addition, it is not surprising that Bill Gates left Harvard early and then went on to become the richest man in the world.
Interestingly, those who cannot or do not conform while at school often do not have the entrepreneurial spirit knocked out of them.
By the time most of us leave formal education however, we are conditioned to accepting our role in life as a wage slave.
In addition, of course once we sign up for a mortgage, credit cards, a car loan and all the other trappings of "wage slave success", we cling on to our wage packet for all we are worth.
The pressure on us to conform - even from well meaning friends and family - means that even the thought of an alternative way of life can seem daunting.
However, none of the above alters the fact that we were all born to be entrepreneurs.
The Characteristics of Entrepreneurs
Perhaps the most significant characteristic of entrepreneurs is their passionate attachment to their product or enterprise. They find it relatively easy to work long hours, often for less than they might earn in the corporate world. Corporations that have lost these individuals have lost the value of their successes as well as the value of their failures, which often drive them to work even harder.
Entrepreneur characteristics (personal attributes) are ingrained aspects of one's character distinguishing them from other people. Entrepreneurs tend to be independent, self-confident and resourceful, they believe in what they are doing and they can convey this confidence to others. They relish challenges, struggle to overcome obstacles and they are committed and determined in all the tasks they undertake.
Very often, they display initiative or business acumen at a young age such as doing jobs in the neighbourhood or undertaking enterprising ventures in sport or music while still in school. This apparent dynamism and need for achievement is often related to their position within the family, relationship with parents, and domestic environment.
The characteristics are evident in both those entrepreneurs that have been running their businesses for quite a number of years and those that started out more recently, the only difference is in the type of business that they are being applied to. So the same
Determination, strong self-belief and passion exhibited by Sir James Dyson when he started out with the manufacture of his vacuum cleaner is also exhibited today by a young
Entrepreneur in the manufacture of his computer software. The product is different but the characteristics are the same.
However there are some explicit behaviors that the entrepreneur has:
- Acting with integrity
- Strength from naïveté
- Passion bordering on obsession
- Self-belief born out of conviction
- Common sense and an uncommon sense
- Reflection, resourcefulness and resilience
Encouragement
The family can be one of the biggest influences for a young person starting their business. In a MORI survey of 11-16 year olds conducted on behalf of The Prince’s Trust it was found that parents were their biggest influence for major decisions such as determining career paths. However there was a range of other people who had influence:
Source: Prince’s Trust/MORI 2000
Encouragement from Schools
Very few of the young entrepreneurs had exposure to business at school. Those that did experience a business awareness initiative such as the ones run by Business Dynamics or Young Enterprise were praiseworthy of them. However it was felt that there were not enough of these and they relied on a teacher to take the initiative and try and squeeze it into an already overcrowded timetable.
Discourage Because of age
Occasionally young entrepreneurs cite the fact that, due to their age, they feel they are not regarded that seriously by other businesses. Indeed this issue was the biggest problem identified in a survey of young business managers undertaken by Barclays.
Problems experienced in the course of running a business
Source: Young Entrepreneurs. Tomorrow’s Business Leaders. Barclays 2001
The young entrepreneurs who felt that they were not taken seriously by more established businesses used this to their advantage, almost as a means of taking the other business off guard.
Starting funds
At the same time some of the issues that the entrepreneur faces are often quite sector specific and there are few advisory services orientated to particular business areas. A useful development has come with the establishment of a web site service (www.beyondbricks.com) for Internet entrepreneurs run by entrepreneurs. A consortium, headed by entrepreneur Charlie Houlton, developed the site and run it on behalf of the DTI. The site includes opportunities for networking, advice on issues ranging from legal affairs to business planning and software that enables an individual to find out the most suitable sources of funding for their business.
References from:
The majority of the entrepreneurs in this study did not require significant funding to get started. Just over a quarter of the forty-four required more than £10,000 for their initial start-up capital. This does reflect the fact that very few of the young entrepreneurs were running a manufacturing business and this in turn may have some bearing on the current status of manufacturing in the UK.
Most of the young entrepreneurs used a combination of funding means rather than one single source. The list below is presented in order of the most frequently cited sources for funding.
Sources of start up funding:
1. Foregoing salary
2. Personal savings
3. Loan from family and / or friends
4. Private company investment
5. Bank overdraft facility
6. Business angel investment
7. Princes Trust loan / grant
8. Venture capital investment
9. Short term enterprises
10. Bank loan
11. Credit card
12. Credit from debtor
13. Enterprise Allowance Scheme
14. Temporary work
An entrepreneur is unlikely to have the assets to provide a guarantee against a loan will not have a lot of their own capital to invest and will not have the track record to be an attractive proposition for funding. At the same time their business ideas can be quite innovative and as a consequence they are often viewed as risky. It is no surprise then that the entrepreneurs were quite entrepreneurial in the way that they financed the start-up of their business.
Made
Everyone who works for themselves are the same in one way - they have all made a courageous decision, most of which started by one single "Crazy Idea". Aircraft were first seen as a bizarre contraption with no future, even after the Wright Brothers proved that flight was possible - now it is a multi billion pound industry worldwide!
I think that the entrepreneurial spirit is best described as a creative force in people that combines ideas, action, and reality! I believe that people are partly made an entrepreneur, but without the right nurturing that talent will not reach fruition because an entrepreneur needs to have the self confidence to take that crazy idea that everyone else things will never work, and prove them all wrong.
Most people I would say do not enjoy going to work, but for entrepreneurs like me - the most enjoyable thing in a day is going to work! Our days do not start at 9am and finish at 5pm, at times I have woken up in the middle of the night with a dream thinking it was a good idea and have written it down, so you could say I even work in my sleep! Some of those ideas incidentally have proved quite profitable.
Some people are good at the initial ideas behind a business, some at acting on those ideas, some on making them real - building the final product for example. An entrepreneur needs to be good at all three things simultaneously and have the ability to see a project through to the end.
Most people aren't born entrepreneurs; they develop into them. The one prerequisite appears to be an individual decision that now is the time to take charge of one's life. At times the experience may be difficult and the entrepreneur may return to corporate life. Just as often, however, a difficult experience may serve to make the entrepreneur more determined to succeed.
Financial errors and Miscalculations
Entrepreneurs, like other managers, make financial errors and miscalculations, but they correct most of them before anyone notices. The process of correcting an error and of reacting to the consequences of a bad decision builds fiber in managerial character. It makes the entrepreneur a stronger force in the economy, as well as a more confident leader in the marketplace. True entrepreneurial courage grows through taking control of one's own future, and experiencing the survival of a vision through both successful and not so successful decision-making.
Invented
With the entire buzz about entrepreneurship these days, you would think the concept had just been invented. Not so. Entrepreneurial people have existed throughout human history, developing countless products and services, from plywood (3500 BC), to eyeglasses (13th century), to photography (1827). In fact, in early North America almost every home contained a business of some kind. Family businesses churned out axes, candles, furniture and butter. And long before Europeans arrived, Aboriginal entrepreneurs developed canoes, weirs (for catching fish), maple syrup and pottery.
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