What is entrepreneurship?
When people think ‘entrepreneur’, many think inventing or dreaming up a new idea. That’s not entrepreneurship, that’s creativity! Sure, someone has to come up with the good ideas, but there have been countless good ideas in the world that have gone nowhere.
Entrepreneurship is about getting new business rolling and that means action and implementation. Unless a new business starts up and becomes profitable, there is no increase in competitive advantage, there are no new jobs, no additional tax revenue available, and no contribution to GDP or the standard of living.
Getting products and services to market is the only thing that matters in the end. And this can only be achieved by people collaborating and cooperating commercially with each other. So connections are vital. Finding people who access the right business channels is an entrepreneurial art in itself.
Commercial innovation is another entrepreneurial art. This means working with existing technology and know-how and creating new applications. As Andrew Hargadon, Senior Fellow at the Kansas City based Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation says, “Most innovative leaps come from the collective creativity and entrepreneurial spirit of many businesses actively learning-by-doing and learning-by-using”.
Arguably the real entrepreneurs are the well connected private investors of the world. These people are experienced business promoters who have access to both money and quality business connections. Although they fund less than 5% of proposals put to them, they can identify ‘diamonds in the mud’ and get innovation to market.
Until next time!
Gary