Am I an Entrepreneur - Essay Example

of the of the Number Am I an Entrepreneur? Executive Summary The life of human being is directed by education, social influence, lessons learned from trainers and teachers, activities of friends and family members as well as the interests, desire and intuition of parents to a great extent. After passing through all these interventions, an individual ultimately reaches at a certain stage of life where he has gained knowledge, skills and expertise to become a working professional. The profession chosen by an individual becomes the ultimate prism through which an individual sees the world around him. Thus, the lessons learned at the early age become the foundation for an individual’s growth in the professional life. In addition, the experience gained in life within a shorter period of time is also imperative towards shaping the professional life of an individual. In my case, it was engineering and for Mr. Ramsay’s case it was the field of sports. Such decisions are taken at so early age, that there is hardly any self- knowledge or experience to support, whatever the decision has been made is the best and justifies the background to which an individual belongs. Thus, the best thing in this aspect is to expect that the future will be bright and will offer loads of opportunities. This study aims to shed light on the qualities of an entrepreneur and evaluate whether I posses those qualities or not. In order to verify it, the study will pursue different techniques. Once the characteristics and definition of entrepreneurship is being identified, a known entrepreneur will be chosen and his qualities will be compared with mine. A General Enterprising Tendency (GET) Test will be also carried out. Furthermore, interview session will be also held to get deeper insights. On the basis of the findings, a conclusion to the study will be drawn. Introduction – What Entrepreneurship Means to Me From the childhood days, I had a fascination on technology and as a result of that I have always been enthralled with new technological innovations. It is the interest in technology, which made me feel that innovation and discovery has been the fuel of comprehensive development of the society. My early role model was Charles Babbage, who is also known as the father of computers and the inventor of computers. However, with the course of time it shifted from an inventor to an entrepreneur. As I came to know about the life story of Bill Gates and understood the contribution made by him in the society, I contentedly considered him to be my role model. In addition, I also consider the recent sensation, Mark Zuckerberg to be one of my role models. When I slowly started to gain knowledge on social science, my perception of an entrepreneur was a person who has the ability to take risk and open a new firm. Although, the meaning of entrepreneurship, which I identified later, was much broader, this definition was not fully impractical. Rather, it was supported by a renowned scholar, where he states that entrepreneurs are the person who undertakes the risk of new enterprise (Mohanty 1). However, later I realized entrepreneur to be someone who has the ability to make correct judgmental decision pertaining to the coordination of sparse resources. In addition, I have also identified that an entrepreneur is an individual and not a committee, team or an organization. With deeper thought, I have been also able to identify that there are two types of entrepreneur namely successful entrepreneur and unsuccessful entrepreneur. Now, when I compare myself with successful entrepreneurs, I found that I also have the tendency to become self-suffice. However, I do not consider myself to be entrepreneur as I am yet to develop a firm which is self sustaining. Moreover, I also believe that a huge different exists between “thinking of becoming an entrepreneur” and ultimately “becoming a successful entrepreneur”. The challenge for every potential successful entrepreneur therefore lies in their ability to cross the numerous hurdles, which they will face in the course of the action. Who are the Entrepreneurs? There have been huge debates over the nature of entrepreneurship primarily because of the lack of agreed theory. May researchers simply describes functionally and puts emphasis on the different characteristics such as the psychological abilities and traits (Elfring 12). Some of them also perceive entrepreneurship to be a simple a functional activity or a type of profession. An entrepreneur is simply defined as one who organizes, manages, and assumes the risks of a business or enterprise (“Nelson”). In other words, an entrepreneur is also regarded as an individual who, manages a small business and takes the responsibility of all the reward and risks of the business venture; rather than working as an employee in some other organization. Entrepreneurs are often considered as a business innovator and leader who brings new ideas for the business processes. However, for this study, I will be using the definition of an entrepreneur as an innovative person, who owns and manages a business, embraces the ‘entrepreneurial tendencies’ and takes calculated risks. However, it must be taken into account that every owner and manager is not an entrepreneur. Explaining the Entrepreneurs The success of an entrepreneur is dependent upon the nature work done, but should have the ability to navigate through a complex set of events. A minor flaw or inability to navigate through one of those issues may disrupt the entire venture. If we move through the pages of history, a number of successful entrepreneurs can be identified, but the names of unsuccessful entrepreneurs can be hardly found. Hence, from this statement it is evident that entrepreneurial qualities are present in numerous people; however among them, some fails to plot the route or follow the map, resulting in a failure. Apart from large number of failures, there are also cases which are termed as accidental entrepreneurship. It is about a person accidentally becoming a successful entrepreneur. Some even defines it, as company founder who started his or her small businesses out of pure necessity rather than a lifelong dream of ‘being their own boss (“Lesonsky”). For example, the case of Patrick Hull of Phull Holdings can be best described as accidental entrepreneurship. He was supposed to be a part of a real estate company, but his teachers have always suggested his name when it came to critical path method scheduling. Even without realizing, he became a logistics consultant. However, he always has the aptitude of becoming self employed and the desire fulfilled two decades later when he transfigured and brought revolution in the logistics industry. Freight-matching service for long-haul truckers and were the two revolutionized products. Presently, this entrepreneur has shares in more than 30 companies of the world. In the meantime, I have also witnessed inferior innovation which often led to success. As a result of that I have also stated to acknowledge the importance of activities such as marketing, proper utilization of the resources, timely execution, and the need to manage of both external and internal forces. Therefore it is evident from the discussion that there is a long journey between entrepreneurial orientations to ultimately becoming a successful entrepreneur. Literally, endless hurdles need to be crossed before finally reaching the desired stage. The General Enterprising Tendency Test (GET) The 21st century is characterized by comprehensive psychometric tests to underpin the characteristics of an entrepreneur. Despite, immense complexities in understanding the traits and nature of an entrepreneur, such tests continued until a new and innovative measurement framework came into light. It is the General Enterprising Tendency (GET) Test proposed by Caird in the year 1991. The test has been principally designed to bring together and quantify a number of ‘tendencies’ commonly allied to an enterprising person. In general, this test has 5 dimensions namely need for achievement, creative tendency, need for autonomy, risk taking and drive and determination (“Introduction”). Meet the Entrepreneur Mr. Ramsay is the owner of Elite Sports Management Company, a business which he started in the year 2006. The company is involved in manufacturing and marketing of sports items. The company has employee strength of 33 and has three branches across the city of New York. However, the company is also in the process of expansion to other US segments. Mr. Ramsay has previously worked for Nike as a brand manager. He completed bachelor of sports management from one of the renewed universities of US. However, later he also opted for masters from university of Massachusetts. There his specialization was again sports management. Early Influences Mr. Ramsay was the only child of his parents and has grown up in an environment which fosters entrepreneurial activities. While exploring his early influence of being an entrepreneur, it was identified that it was his father who was also a successful businessman always persuaded him to carry out entrepreneurial activities. In addition, it was also identified that the locality in which he used to stay in the early days were mostly filled with business people and as a result of that he used to get influenced by the entrepreneurial activities. This is the reason why he opted to pursue course on business administration. Starting the Venture He was placed at Nike during the last year of his masters. Initially, he was extremely happy to have cracked a job in a company such as Nike, but his eagerness to be an entrepreneur always pressed him. During that period, his role model was the owners of sporting equipment companies. In the meantime, his father further persuaded him to consider entrepreneurial activity. The support from the father and the desire of early childhood gave him more confidence and at last in the year 2006 he managed to start a new venture. He named the company as Elite Sports Management Company which is now one of the successful sports equipment companies of USA. GET Score Results GET Score Results. Dimension Entrepreneurs Average MBA Students Average GET Average MR. Ramsay Myself Achievement 10.02 9.34 9 9 8 Autonomy 4.05 3.71 4 8 6 Creativity 9.36 8.63 8 7 9 Risk Taking 9.30 8.25 8 10 10 Locus Control 10 9.48 8 7 10 Total 43.05 38.41 37 41 43 (Table1: GET Result Comparisaon) Analysis In the theories of marketing, important frameworks such as PESTEL is not well supported empirically. However, it is strongly argued that it has practical significance as a framework of understanding and getting deeper insights into the external business environment. This framework doe not have the ability to let the company know about the threats of the company, rather it only tenders a scenario of the probable threats of the company. In the similar way GET scores are not the result that accurately predicts who will become an entrepreneur in the future, but provide insights into the entrepreneurial potential and orientation. Hence, analysis of the GET scores is important in studying the entrepreneurial behavioral qualities of individuals. The above figure denotes the average score of chosen entrepreneur and mine. Along with that, the table is also representing the average scores of an entrepreneur and an MBA student. The scores were simply surprising my score was 43 which were more in comparison with the GET score of MR. Ramsay’s 41. Most of my scores were more than average or near to the average. Interestingly, our risk taking score was equal, which reflected that risk taking is one of the common and vital characteristics of an entrepreneur. I will now be combing the results of the analysis into the five dimensions of entrepreneurship with pertinent point of discussion obtained in the interview. Need for Achievement: - Need for Achievement uncovers the attributes such as motivation, initiative, planning ability and determination (Johnson 4). Mr. Ramsay has scored below the average However, his business directly deals with the end users and perhaps this score can be positive. In the similar way, my score is below the average and this is due to learning I got from my superiors. This can be further reinforced by creative behavior. Need for Autonomy: - This dimension is about the aspiration to gain independence and being able to remain self directed (May 100). The score of Mr. Ramsay in this context was 8, which was nearly double the average score. A number of scholars suggested that most of the entrepreneurs favor autonomy. In the interview, he also mentioned that the lack of sovereignty in the sporting industry fostered him in starting the venture. Ironically, again I scored less in this dimension and this because I have worked in a company previously which affected my nature. Creative Tendency: - This dimension mainly sheds light on the ability of a person to observe challenges in different ways, generate ideas and take measures to solve those issues with ease (Remenyi 132). Mr. Ramsay scored 7 in the context and I scored 9. However, his score was near to the average. I believe his low score is due to the lack of opportunity to showcase creativity. On the contrary, my field offered plenty of opportunity to showcase my creative skills. Calculated Risk-taking: -This relates to the ability of an individual to take calculative risk. In this dimension, Mr. Ramsay and I have similar score (Kuratko 34). The risk taking ability of Mr. Ramsay can be justified by his decision to quit the job of Nike and pursue own business for the sake of gaining sovereignty. However, in the interview he mentioned about his backup plan, if this venture would have failed. In addition, he also notified in the interview session, that with proper planning and execution, he mitigated the risks he faced in the time being. Drive and Determination (internal locus of control): - This is defined as an individual’s belief about certain events (Molnar 23). In this case, he scored 7, while mine was 10. It was surprising that with such a sound academic background he scored below the average. On the other hand, my scores clearly points out to my strong determination, discipline and tenacity to achieve what I intend to. Conclusion The study tried to assesses what actually entrepreneurship means and their importance in the society. In addition, I also tries to assess the extent to which I posses entrepreneurial qualities. The theories of entrepreneurship and comprehensive review of literature has made it evident that entrepreneurs are not born; rather it is the result of being influenced by others. The literature review also delineates several cases, models and frame works, but due to the unavailability of encompassing or having a unified framework to discuss entrepreneurship, the concept of entrepreneurship is yet to be explored. From my own experience, I would like to shed light on the fact that culture and family background also plays a crucial role in the career of an individual. In my case, most of my family members are employed in service or manufacturing sector and there is no one who has previously carried out any kind of entrepreneurial activities. As a result of that, my parents and other family members always wanted me to choose a safer option i.e. to indulge myself into service sector. Despite, negative correlating between me and a new business, I always dreamt of being self employed. Hence, I can conclude that motivation to become self employed is the driving factor towards transforming me as an entrepreneur. Now, finally to answer the question whether I am an entrepreneur or not, I will probably say no, at least at this point of time. However, I believe that I have the qualities as well as the skills that an entrepreneur needs to have. Although, I have handful experience in different fields and still playing the role of innovator and director, I will restrain myself from calling entrepreneur as I am not the one who is running the business and making strategic decisions. Additionally, the business is also not rung on my vision. Hence, there is a difference between thinking of being an entrepreneur and becoming a successful entrepreneur and I reside between the two states. Works Cited Elfring, Tom. Corporate Entrepreneurship and Venturing. Berlin: Springer, 2005. Print. “Introduction.” Palgrave. Macmillan Publishers Ltd., 2003. Web. 18 June 2013. Johnson, Angel. The Influence of Need for Achievement, Need for Affiliation, Leadership Support, and Organizational Culture on Organizational Citizenship Behavior. Michigan: ProQuest, 2008. Print. Kuratko, Donald F. Entrepreneurship: Theory, Process, Practice. 8th ed. Connecticut: Cengage Learning, 2008. Print. Lesonsky, Rieva. “Accidental Entrepreneurs: Meet the New Breed of Startup Founders.” Readwrite. Say Media Inc., 2012. Web. 18 June 2013. May, Hope. Aristotles Ethics: Moral Development and Human Nature. New York: Continuum, 2010. Print. Mohanty, Sangram Keshari. Fundamentals of Entrepreneurship. New Delhi: PHI Learning Pvt. Ltd., 2005. Print. Molnar, Kathleen. A Peer Collaborative Instructional Design for Increasing Teaching Efficacy in Pre-service Education Majors. Michigan: ProQuest, 2008. Print. Nelson, Brett. “The Real Definition Of Entrepreneur---And Why It Matters.” Forbes. Forbes.com LLC., 2012. Web. 18 June 2013. Remenyi, Dan. Proceedings of the 2nd European Conference on Entrepreneurship and Innovation. Reading: Academic Conferences Limited, 2007. Print. Appendix – Interview Questions 1. Rate yourself in a scale of 1-15 in terms of your achievement? 2. What according to you is the importance of autonomy for an individual? 3. Do you consider lack of independence in your field to be one of the drivers? 4. What was your plan to deal with risk and did you had any backups? 5. What drove you to undertake entrepreneurial activities? Read More