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Entrepreneurship and Entrepreneurs: The Path Worth Paving

The process of starting a new venture in the market, and bearing the risks of it while trying to make a profit eventually is called entrepreneurship, or at least that is how Google would define it. Various successful entrepreneurs would differ from the same. Peter Drucker, a renowned figure in the sector of modern management and the author of Innovation and Entrepreneurshipdefines an entrepreneur as “someone who always searches for change, responds to it, and exploits it as an opportunity.”

Entrepreneurship involves designing a business idea followed by launching and running a new business. Typically, it begins as a small business, such as a startup company. The business can involve offering a product, process, or sale service. The owners of such a venture are referred to as ‘entrepreneurs’. Given the pace of development in the country, positive political environment, and the myriad of opportunities; the draw of youth to entrepreneurship has become rather magnetic. The life of an entrepreneur is extremely challenging. One needs to be hard-working, persistent, networked, smart, creative, willing to take risks, and extremely good at managing relations.

There are no specific educational requirements for becoming an entrepreneur. Strong educational background and work experience make the probability of success slightly higher. While successful entrepreneurs are generally well trained & qualified in their field; specific education qualifications can vary.

We live in a world where we have the resources to know about anything under the sky. But it’s also one where innovation never sleeps, with over 300 million enterprises in the world and counting. A recent study suggests that 90% of the start-ups in India fail within 5 years of their inception, more often than not due to lack of uniqueness. Other reasons that they fail are –

Problems with Funding, Staffing Issues, Operational Mismanagement

On the brighter side, some start-ups changed the market dynamics like Zomato, PayTM, and OlaCabs. Now if you were to understand the steps of starting and maintaining a successful enterprise, they are rather simple

But if it were so simple, wouldn’t the success rate of start-ups be much higher than what it is today? Everyone has ideas every day – new ideas, great ideas, or terrible ideas that end up being successful ones because they may be the need of the hour somewhere. 

What makes entrepreneurs different from the common folk is their will to at least attempt to give shape to those ideas, after having meticulously calculated the cost it comes at. Before your idea takes the shape of a breathing organization, put it to the test – write down all the reasons why it could fail. Statisticians refer to this process as working from the null hypothesis. Scrutinize your idea and tear it apart critically until you’re left with either a green signal or one that says ‘idea still under construction.’

Rise In Self-Employment

Entrepreneurship
Entrepreneurship and Entrepreneurs: The Path Worth Paving

Technological progress is a crucial component of the boom in self-employment. We can credit it to technology advancement because, as long as someone has a smartphone, tablet, or laptop with an internet connection, he/ she can run an office online and communicate with billions of people at a faster rate with limited difficulties hence making business easy and cheap.

In India, sadly society plays a major role in determining your status. A change in mindsets is one of the major reasons that entrepreneurship is on the rise. We are not only realizing the importance but also encouraging new ideas.

Moreover, there is an entire global opportunity knocking on our doors. Across diverse sectors internationally, the “made in India” tag, much like the “made in China”, is now an increasingly respected brand, valued for quality, dependability, and competitiveness. The world is now our market and our opportunity.

We, humans, are happy to take faults out of everything. This could have been done differently to have the better outcome” or “I could have done this so much better, why don’t I get paid for this!” are statements we throw around all the time. But if it came to putting our skills to use, would we step out of our comfort zone to take that leap? Entrepreneurship is all about taking that risk. It is about believing in your idea, its worth, its reach, its importance, and overcoming obstacles on the way undeterred.

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Current Scenario of Entrepreneurial Ventures

In today’s time, one is not expected to follow the traditional ways of living. One does not have to do a 9 to 5 if they don’t wish to. We have the freedom and the resources to create what we wish to do if it does not already exist. It is thus our responsibility to put those resources and our capabilities to their best use.

An entrepreneurial venture does not necessarily have to be based on what the market needs – it can be the cultivation of your passion or interests in general. Some people like to keep their hobbies separate from their work because it’s an escape from work, a breather from something they have to do, to something they want to do, without the stress of making money from it. On the other hand, some people would rather make a living out of doing what they love so that work does not seem like an obligation.

Education in the Right Direction

Entrepreneurship
Entrepreneurship and Entrepreneurs: The Path Worth Paving

You can’t control everything about your business, and adaptation is vital to survival. Education imbibes these qualities in you. Attending a business school to be an entrepreneur can help you channelize your creativity, participate in business plan competitions, earn an MBA and launch a business.

An entrepreneurship degree is an academic degree awarded to students who have completed a college, university, or business school program related to entrepreneurship or small business management. In the two-year program, you’ll learn all strategically organizing factors of production and the process of maximizing profits.

There is also the constant stress of creating something new, something unique. Your business idea doesn’t necessarily have to be a unique one to be successful – it could also be a unique, more approachable take on it. Think of it from a consumer’s point of view. If you had to partake or use the product or service you want to create, how would you like it? What would your friends like? Would your family find it easy to use? The usability of your product or service becomes more important than the uniqueness of your idea. Take a look at OlaCabs for example.

They essentially provide the same services as Uber. How is the company still functional? They started with getting rickshaws on board as a part of their services, included postpaid as an option for payment, created a different portal for payment altogether, and more. How did they manage that? By understanding their market thoroughly, recognizing their needs, and then providing solutions for the same.

Conclusion

A business is more than just a great idea. It’s also more than just the amount of work you put in. Sure, there is a lot of hard work that goes into creating a successful organization, but it’s more than just that. It’s the quality of work you put in too. You need to work smart, not hard.

Entrepreneurs can think of new, better, and feasible ideas for business organization and management. They are business leaders and contributors to the economic development of a country. Entrepreneurs drive social innovation and transformation in various fields including education, health, human rights, workers’ rights, environment, and enterprise development.

So, finally, if you think you have an idea that has the potential to be more than just that, then take a deep breath and dive into the process headfirst. Succeeding as an entrepreneur takes passion, hard work, and persistence. If you think you can, you wouldn’t know unless you give it a go. Go ahead and start up your dream!

Rakhul Kumar
Rakhul Kumar
Project Associate at IIT Madras || Instrumentation Engineering from Anna University |

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