Unit 1
Unit 1
Content
1.0 Aims and Objectives
1.1 Introduction
1.2 Historical Perspective of Entrepreneurship
1.3 Definition of Entrepreneurship and Entrepreneur
1.4 Forms of Entrepreneurship
1.5 Basic Concepts in Entrepreneurship
1.6 Wealth of the Entrepreneur
1.7 The Entrepreneur’s Task
1.8 The Role of the Entrepreneur
1.9 Entrepreneurial Skills
1.10 Who becomes an Entrepreneur?
1.11 Characteristics of Entrepreneurs
This unit is concerned with developing an overarching and integrated perspective of the
entrepreneur and entrepreneurship. It reviews the great variety of definitions given for the
word entrepreneurship and also the different activities performed by the entrepreneur.
By the time you finish this unit, you should be able to:
understand and define: entrepreneur, entrepreneurship and corporate innovation
explain the different types of ideas and opportunities
describe how the entrepreneur’s wealth is distributed
identify any five characteristics of entrepreneurs
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1.1 INTRODUCTION
The word ‘entrepreneur’ is widely used, both in everyday conversation and as a technical term
in management and economics. Its origin lies in seventieth century France, where an
entrepreneur was an individual commissioned to undertake a particular commercial project. A
number of concepts have been derived from the idea of the entrepreneur such as
entrepreneurial, entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial process. The idea that the entrepreneur
is someone who undertakes certain projects offers an opening to developing an understanding
of the nature of entrepreneurship. Undertaking particular projects demands that particular
tasks be engaged in with the objective of achieving specific outcomes and that an individual
take charge of the project. Entrepreneurship is then what the entrepreneur does.
Entrepreneurial is an adjective describing how the entrepreneur undertakes what he or she
does. The entrepreneurial process in which the entrepreneur engages is the means through
which new value is created as a result of the project: the entrepreneurial venture.
What is entrepreneurship? And who is an entrepreneur? These two questions are asked more
frequently reflecting the increasing demand in the field of entrepreneurship. Offering a
specific and unambiguous definition of the term entrepreneurship /entrepreneur presents a
challenge. This is not because definitions are not available, but because there are so many.
Here let us took in to the historical development of entrepreneurship so as to grasp the
meaning of the word entrepreneurship.
During the ancient period the word entrepreneur was used to refer to a person managing large
commercial projects through the resources provided to him.
In the 17th Century a person who has signed a contractual agreement with the government to
provide stipulated products or to perform service was considered as entrepreneur. In this case
the contract price is fixed so any resulting profit or loss reflects the effort of the entrepreneur.
In the 18th Century the first theory of entrepreneur has been developed by Richard Cantillon.
He said that an entrepreneur is a risk taker. If we consider the merchant, farmers and /or the
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professionals they all operate at risk. For example, the merchants buy products at a known
price and sell it at unknown price and this shows that they are operating at risk.
The other development during the 18th Century is the differentiation of the entrepreneurial role
from capital providing role. The later role is the base for today’s venture capitalist.
In the late 19th and early 20th Century an entrepreneur was viewed from an economic
perspectives. The entrepreneur organizes and operates an enterprise for personal gain.
In the middle of the 20th Century the notion of an entrepreneur as an inventor as established.
“The function of the entrepreneur is to reform or revolutionize the pattern of production by
exploiting an invention or more generally untried technological possibility for producing new
commodities or producing an old one in a new way or opening a new outlet for products by
reorganizing a new industry.”
The concept of innovation and newness are at the heart of the above definition. From the
historical development it is possible to understand the fact that the perception of the word
entrepreneur was evolved from managing commercial project to the application of innovation
(creativity) in the business idea.
Here we will see at least three definition of entrepreneurship because a single definition is
likely to result, in some cases at least, in a mismatch with out expectations. Intuitively, we
know that entrepreneurship is the process and entrepreneur is the person undertaking
entrepreneurial activity. Finally we will see the common attributes of the definitions of
entrepreneurship.
1. Entrepreneurship is the process of creating incremental wealth. The wealth is created by
those individuals who assume the major risk in terms of equity and time or providing
value for others.
2. Entrepreneurship can also be defined as the process of creating something different and
better with value by devoting the necessary time and effort by assuming the
accompanying financial, psychic and social risks and receiving the resulting monetary
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reward and personal satisfaction. In this case an individual should come up with
something different and better in order to the named as entrepreneur.
3. Our third definition views the term from three perspectives; i.e. from the economist,
psychologist and capitalist philosophers point of view.
To an economist an entrepreneur is one who brings resource, labor, materials, and other assets
into combination that makes their value greater than before and also one who introduces
changes innovations.
For the capitalist philosopher an entrepreneur is one who creates wealth for others as well,
who finds better way to utilize resources and reduce waste and who produce job others are
glad to get.
In general, the process of entrepreneurship includes five critical elements. They are:
1. The ability to perceive an opportunity.
2. The ability to commercialize the perceived opportunity i.e. innovation
3. The ability to pursue it on a sustainable basis.
4. The ability to pursue it through systematic means.
5. The acceptance of risk or failure.
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2. Intrapreneur
An Intrapreneur is a person who does entrepreneurial work within large organization.
The process by which an entrepreneur affects change is called Entrepreneurship.
There are two facts about entrepreneurship
a. The Intrapreneur’s context is often large and bureaucratic organization where as
the individual entrepreneur operates in the broader, more flexible economic market
place.
b. Intrapreneurs are individuals who often engage in the entrepreneurial actions in
large organizations without the blessing of their organizations.
3. The Entrepreneurial Organization
The entrepreneurial function need not be embodied in a physical person. Every social
environment has its own way of filling the entrepreneurial function.
Individuals working in organizations have the potential for being, as do those working
independently to start their own business. An organization can create an environment in
which all of its members can contribute in some function to the entrepreneurial function.
In order to apply the process of entrepreneurship the entrepreneur should identify or develop
business ideas.
A business idea is some one’s opinion regarding what may or may not be a good business.
There are three types of business ideas. They are:
1. Old idea – Here an individual copies an existing business idea from someone.
2. Old Idea with Modification – In this case the person accepts an old idea from
someone and then modify it in some way to fit a potential customers demand.
3. A new Idea – This one involves the invention of something new for the first time
The next concept is opportunity because the above business ideas are meaningless in the
absence of opportunity. An opportunity is the gap in the market which presents the possibility
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of new value being created. It is also the chance of doing things both differently from and
better than how they are being undertaken at the moment.
The last concept is innovation. Innovation is a way of doing something differently and better.
I.e. it is a means of exploiting a business opportunity. It is also a new combination of three
things (raw materials, labor and capital). In short innovation is invention (act of creating
something) plus commercialization (putting the new creativity into the market place. The
relationship between business idea and innovation is only new and modified ideas are
innovative. An old idea is not innovative because it is an imitation of existing business
concept.
The three types of business ideas might have a small value or big value opportunity.
A small value opportunity – A business idea is said to have small value opportunity when its
revenue potential is small but the associated risk and cost may be high.
Big value Opportunity – A business idea with big value opportunity has high revenue
potential but risk and costs are low.
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Areas of Innovation
The following are some of the major areas in which valuable innovation might be made.
A. New product
A new product can be developed through new or existing technology. The new product
may offer a radically new way of doing something or it may simply be an improvement on
an existing item.
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internal communication channels. These communication channels are guided by the
organization’s structure.
H. New Ways of Managing Relationships between Organizations
Organizations sit in a complex web of relationships to each other. The way they communicate
and relate to each other is very important.
Wealth is money and anything that money can buy. It includes money, knowledge and assets
of the entrepreneur. Wealth creates a number of possibilities for the entrepreneur and their
ventures to dispose of that wealth such as:
1. Reinvestment
If the entrepreneur wishes to grow the business they have initiated it will demand
continued investment. The best source of the investment is the profit of the business
itself. It also helps to invest in other ventures.
2. Rewarding Stakeholders
Entrepreneurs exist in a tight network of relationships with a number of other internal
and external stakeholders who are considered to give their support to the venture. They
may be asked to take risks on its behalf. In return they will expect to be properly
rewarded either financially or in other ways.
3. Personal Reward
The entrepreneur is taking risks and putting all the efforts for the success of the business.
One of the just rewards for this is founding a comfortable lifestyle. Besides he may be
keen to put his money into altruistic projects such as sponsorship of arts, sports and other
social and creative activities.
4. Keeping the Score
For many entrepreneurs money is not so important in itself. It is just a way of quantifying
what they have achieved a way of keeping the score on their performance as it were. The
money value of their venture is a measure of how good their insight was, how effective
their decision-making was and how they put their ideas in to action.
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As far as the entrepreneur is concerned money is more usually a means rather than an
end by itself.
No entrepreneur works in a vacuum. The venture they create touches the lives of many other
people. To drive his/her venture forward, the entrepreneur calls up on the support of a number
of different groups. In return for their support these groups expect to be rewarded from the
success of the venture. Peoples who have a part to play in the entrepreneurial venture
generally are called stakeholder. The stakeholder groups are; employees, investor, supplier,
customer, the local community and government. Let us look at the benefits of each
stakeholder.
Employees
They contribute physical and mental labor to the business. Success of the entrepreneurial
venture depends on their effort and motivation. Therefore, they are rewarded with:
- Money – their wage or salary
- The possibility of owning a part of the firm through share schemes.
- A stage of which they can develop social relationships.
- The possibility of personal development.
Investors
These are the peoples who provide the entrepreneur with the necessary money to start the
venture and keep it running. There are two main sorts of investors: stockholders and lenders.
Stockholders are those who buy the stock of the company and are true owners of the firm. The
actual return of the stockholders varies depending on how the business performs.
Lenders, on the other hand, are people who offer money to the venture on the basis of it being
a loan. They do not actually own a part of the firm and their return is independent of the
businesses performance. They also take priority for payment over shareholders and face lower
level of risk than the stockholders.
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Supplier
They are the individuals and organizations who provide the business with the materials,
productive assets and information it needs to produce its output. They are paid for providing
these inputs.
Customers
Customers may need to make an investment in using a particular supplier. Changing supplier
may involve switching costs and supplier, risk of quality and expenses incurred in changing
over to new inputs.
The entrepreneur may reward customers by offering quality products, fair prices, regular and
consistency of supply, loan arrangement etc.
Business have physical locations. The way they operate may affect the people who live and
other businesses which operates near by. A business has a number of responsibilities, which
may be defined or not in national laws, to this local community. Such as:
- Not polluting their shared environment
- Contributing and sponsoring local development activities
- Contribution for political and cultural stabilities and economic improvements
- Acting in an ethical way.
Government
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1.7 THE ENTREPRENEUR’S TASKS
We recognize entrepreneurs, first and foremost, by what they actually do – by the tasks they
undertake. A number of tasks have been associated with the entrepreneur. Some of the more
important are:
1. Owning Organizations
Ownership lies with those who invest in the business and own its stock – the principals,
while the actual running is delegated to professional agents or managers. Therefore, if an
entrepreneur actually owns the business then he is in fact undertaking two roles at the
same time that of an investor and that of a manager. Here we can also recognize many
people as entrepreneur even if they do not own the venture they are managing.
2. Founding New Organizations
The entrepreneur is recognized as the person who undertakes the task of bringing together
the different elements of the organization (people, property, productive resource, etc) and
giving them a separate legal entity. The entrepreneur makes major changes in their
organizational word.
3. Bringing Innovations to Market
The idea of innovation encompasses any new way of doing something so that value is
created. Innovation can mean a new product or service but it can also include a new way
of delivering an existing product or service, new methods of informing the consumer
about the product or new ways of organizing the company.
4. Identification of Market Opportunity
An opportunity is the gap in a market where the potential exists to do something better
and create value. New opportunities exist all the time but they do not necessarily present
themselves. If they are to be exploited they must be actively sought out. Note that
opportunity always take priority over innovation.
5. Application of Expertise
A slight more technical notion is that they have a special ability in deciding how to
allocate scarce resources in situations where information is limited. It is their expertise in
doing this that makes entrepreneurs valuable to investors.
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6. Provision of leadership
Entrepreneurs can rarely drive their innovation to market on their own. They need the
support of other people both from their organizations and from people outside such as
investor customer and supplier.
7. The entrepreneur as manager
At the end of the day the entrepreneur is a manager. The distinction between an
entrepreneur and ordinary manager may lie on what the entrepreneur manager manages,
how they manage, their effectiveness and the effect they have as a manager not by the
particular tasks they undertake.
Entrepreneurs play a critical role in maintaining and developing the economic order we live
under. Some important economic effects of entrepreneurial activity are listed below.
1. Combination of economic factors
All the products bought and sold in an economy are a mix of three primary economic factors
(the raw materials, nature offers up, the physical and mental labor people provide and capital
(money). Now value is created by combing these three things together in a way which
satisfies human needs.
3. Accepting Risk
Risk is the potential variation in terms of future outcomes. We do not know exactly what the
future will bring. This lack of knowledge creates uncertainty. No matter how we plan there is
always a possibility of adverse deviation from what we expect or hoped for. Here the primary
function of the entrepreneur is to accept risk on behalf of other people.
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4. Maximizing investor’s return
Entrepreneurs create and run organizations which maximize long-term profit on behalf of the
investors which in turn generates overall economic efficiency.
These are skills required to organize the physical and financial resources needed to run the
venture. Some of the most important general management business skills are:
Strategy Skills – An ability to consider the business as a whole, to understand how it fits
within its market place, how it can organize itself to deliver value to its customers, and the
ways in which it does this better than its competitors.
Planning Skills – An ability to consider what the future might offer, how it will impact on
the business and what needs to be done to prepare for it now.
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Marketing Skills – An ability to see past the firm’s offerings and their features, to be able
to see how they satisfy the customer’s needs and why the customer finds them attractive.
Financial Skills – An ability to manage money; to be able to keep track of expenditure and
to monitor cash-flow, but also an ability to assess investments in terms of their potential
and their risks.
Project Management Skills – An ability to organize projects, to set specific objectives, to
set schedules and to ensure that the necessary resources are in the right plat if the right
time.
Time Management Skills – An ability to use time productively, to be able to priorities
important jobs and to get things done to schedule.
Businesses are made by people. A business can only be successful if the peoples who make it
up are properly directed and are committed to make an effort on its behalf. An entrepreneurial
venture also needs the support of people from outside the organization such as customers,
suppliers and investors. To be effective, an entrepreneur needs to demonstrative a wide
variety of skills in the way he/she deals with other peoples. Some of the more important skills
we might include under this heading are:
Leadership Skills – An ability to inspire people to work in a specific way and to undertake
the tasks that are necessary for the success of the venture. Leadership is about more than
merely directing people; it is also about supporting them and helping them to achieve the
goals they have been set.
Motivation Skills – An ability to enthuse people and get them to give their full
commitment to the tasks in hand. Being able to motivate demands an understanding of
what drives people and what they expect from their jobs.
Delegation Skills – An ability to allocate tasks to different people. Effective delegation
involves more than instructing. It demands a full understanding of the skills that people
posses, how they use them and how they might be developed to fulfill future needs.
Communication Skills – An ability to use spoken and written language to express ideas
and inform others.
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Negotiation Skills – An ability to understand what is wanted from a siturations, what is
motivating others in that situation and recognize the possibilities of maximizing the
outcomes for all parties.
All these different people skills are interrelated. Here entrepreneurial performance results
from a combination of industry knowledge, general management skills, people skills and
personal motivation (see the figure shown below). The successful entrepreneur must not only
use these skills but learn to use them and to learn from using them. Entrepreneurs should
constantly avoid their abilities in these areas, recognize their strengths and weaknesses, and
plan how to develop these skills in the future.
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2. The Unfulfilled Manager
Life as a professional manager in an established organization brings many rewards. It
offers a stable income, intellectual stimulation, status and degree of security. For many
people though this still is not enough. The organization may not offer them a vehicle for
all their ambitions; for example, the desire to make a mark on the world, to leave a lasting
achievement, to stretch their existing managerial talents to their limit and to develop new
ones. If many simply not let them do things on their way. Such a manager confident in
their abilities and unsatisfied in their ambitions may decide to embark on an
entrepreneurial career.
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1.11 CHARACTERISTICS OF THE SUCCESSFUL ENTREPRENEUR
Although there does not seem to be a single entrepreneurial type there is a great deal of
consistency in the way in which entrepreneurs approach their task. Some of the
characteristics, which are exhibited by the successful entrepreneur, are discuss below.
However, distinction should be made between personality characteristics and the character
somebody displays when working. Some of these characteristics are discussed as follows:
1. Hard Work
Entrepreneur put a lot of physical and mental effort in to developing their venture. They
often work long and anti-social hours. Balancing the needs of the venture with other life
commitments such as family and friends is one of the great challenges which faces the
entrepreneur.
2. Self Starting
Entrepreneurs do not need to be told what to do. They identify tasks for themselves and
then follow them through without looking for encouragement or direction from others.
3. Setting of Personal Goals
Entrepreneurs tend to set themselves clear, and demanding, goals. They benchmark their
achievement against these personal goals. As a result, entrepreneur tend to work to
internal standards rather than look to others for assessment of their performance.
4. Resilience (Readily recovering from shock or depression)
Not everything goes right all the time. In fact, failure may be experienced more often
success. Must not only pick themselves up after things have gone wrong but must learn
positively from the experience and use that learning to increase the chances of success the
next time around.
5. Confidence
The entrepreneur must demonstrate that they not only believe in themselves but also in the
venture they are pursuing. After all if they don’t, who will?
6. Receptiveness to New Ideas
The entrepreneur must not be overly confident. They must recognize their own limitations
and the possibilities that they have to improve their skills. They must be willing to revise
their ideas in the light of new experience.
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7. Assertiveness
Entrepreneurs are usually clear as to what they want to gain from a situation and are not
frightened to express their wishes. Being assertive does not mean being aggressive.
Assertiveness means a commitment to outcomes, not means. True assertiveness relies on
mutual understanding and is founded on good communication skills.
8. Information Seeking
Entrepreneurs are not on average are more intelligent than any other group. They are
however characterized by inquisitiveness. They are never satisfied by the information they
have at any one time and constantly seek more. Good entrepreneurs tend to question more
than they make statements when communicating.
9. Eager to Learn
Good entrepreneurs are always aware that they could do things better. They are aware of
both the skills they have and their limitations, and are always receptive to a chance to
improve their skills and to develop new ones.
10. Attuned to Opportunity
The good entrepreneur is constantly searching for new opportunities. In effect, this means
that he or she is never really satisfied with the way things are any moment in time.
11. Receptive to Change
The entrepreneur is always willing to embrace change in a positive fashion, that is, to
actively embrace the possibilities presented by change rather than resist them.
12. Commitment to Others
Good entrepreneurs are not selfish. They cannot afford to be! they recognize the value that
other people bring to their venture and the importance of motivating those people to make
the best effort they can on its behalf. This means showing a commitment to them.
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