August 22, 2007

What makes an Entrepreneur?

by Brian Turner

Entrepreneur is one of those funny words that can be difficult to define.

When I was younger, I imagined an entrepreneur to be some kind of swashbuckler of the business world.

And in a way, it’s right – unhindered by conventional restraints and bureaucracy, they become a kind of pioneer in their own right.

That doesn’t mean to say every entrepreneur has to be a pioneer of new business to be successful – and it doesn’t mean to say you have to be like Errol Flynn to develop a working business model.

However, over the past year I’ve managed to discover in myself and others something of the exact qualities that define an entrepreneur.

1. Dedication

Probably the biggest is dedication.

Life can seem so much easier if you just work for another company, do their bidding during the day, have your evenings and weekends off, your string of holidays, and a regular pay check to power it all. Easy, predictable, and little real effort required.

An entrepreneur, on the other hand, is someone dedicated to whatever they’re doing, beyond the norm.

That means evenings and weekends don’t qualify as time off, and holidays are something that happens to other people.

To an entrepreneur, their developing business needs constant attention, constant work, constant planning and administration. An entrepreneur has time off only when they have to – to remain sane, retain familial and personal relationships, and otherwise take an emotional break.

An entrepreneur absolutely never has a day off because it’s a bank holiday; absolutely never has the evening off because it’s the evening; and absolutely never takes weekends off when developing a business just because it’s the weekend.

An entrepreneur will put every effort into their business project that they can, devote as much time as possible, and find excuses to work, instead of excuses not to work.

2. Passion

An entrepreneur must have a real passion for their project.

And not simply passion for the end goals, but instead their passion is the subject matter of the business itself.

Often a entrepreneurial project can begin as a hobby or other similar interest – other times it can be based on long experience, and therefore knowledge, of an industry and similar, which allows for opportunities to be identified, planned for, and acted on.

A business project lacking passion is already dying – a person running a business in something they have no belief, experience, or original experience of, is already doomed.

Because running this business will take so much planning, so much work, so much time, so much dedication – you need a source of energy to get through these.

And this is what your passion provides – the strength to push harder when giving up could look so easy, the tenacity to try to solve seeming insolvable problems, and the self-belief in trying to reach end goals which can otherwise look so distant.

3. Problem solving

There are few skills an entrepreneur needs – but problem solving is definitely one.

You don’t need to be Einstein or a nuclear physicist, or a member of Mensa.

All you need is the ability to look at a problem relating to your business area, and seek a solution.

This is where industry experience and knowledge can be valuable, and beat any IQ score – through understanding the business environment of a business project, you are more likely to be able to see solutions to generic problems.

However, initiative to learn to solve new problems on new ground adds an extra edge that many people simply do not have.

In other words, you have to not expect answers on a plate, but instead be able to find ways to solve problems using your own noggin.

Sure, getting help, advice, and recommendations can work – heck, that’s why Platinax is here – but ultimately business problems and their required solutions tend to be business-specific.

And if this requires extra skills and technical understand beyond yourself, this is where the entrepreneur will have to either learn to do much of this themselves, or else discover ways to build a team who surmount these issues.

4. Risk-taking

All business is risk. I learnt that early on.

Many young businesses can be easily – and adversely – affected by the smallest change in market conditions. A great number of businesses probably fail on this one point.

You cannot negate that risk.

Any developing business project is exposed – vulnerable. It carries risks.

Tied too much to a single supplier, reliant too much on a single client. These are risks that sometimes cannot be avoided at some point, especially in the early days.

So the entrepreneur has to quickly be able to manage risk – learn what degree of risk is acceptable, what degree of risk is unacceptable, and minimise overall risks as much as possible.

Employees of other people’s companies usually have little risk to deal with.

Of course, the obvious risk for an entrepreneur is leaving stable income from employment at another company, and taking on board the financial risks of an uncertain income. This is probably the biggest risk any entrepreneur can take.

And all the more reason why you need to be as sure as you can be about making your business a success.

5. Endurance

Being an entrepreneur isn’t about solving the problem of starting a business.

It’s about facing continual problems in developing and running that business.

This is never easy, and often your patience will be tried and tested: poor service providers, products not delivered on time, relationship pressures, time pressure, money pressure, and 101 different little things which can go wrong and hinder your business development.

Under such circumstances it’s easy to feel like giving up. Especially when these pressures really build up.

Entrepreneurs are simply those who remain fixed on end goals and moving past all current problems to deal with the next wave of issues.

It’s a never ending process, but the successful entrepreneur will grin, bear it, and attempt to take all of these in their stride.

Without a sense of endurance, it would be impossible otherwise.

What if you don’t have these qualities?

Entrepreneurs without these qualities can call themselves entrepreneurs. More likely, they’ll carry the official title of “employee”.

That’s because they couldn’t stick at their business development, couldn’t face solving the problems, and just didn’t have the know-how to work within their sector.

And anyone starting in business who doesn’t have dedication or passion, has no degree of problem-solving ability, can’t accept risk, and can’t endure the whole process – is likely to fail.

Maybe that’s why entrepreneurs can be regarded as something of the swashbucklers of the business world.

It’s not because they themselves are individually amazing – simply that when few will even test themselves and their qualities in business, by comparison, entrepreneurs only then appear remarkable.

Questions? Discuss this in our Internet Business forums for help and advice

Story link: What makes an Entrepreneur?

Add to Bookmarks: