Individual Assignment (essay) What entrepreneurship means to you
NAME : BRENDA HANDERY NO I/C : 950914126718 NO MATRIC : 2013938721 COURSE CODE : ENT028 (BASIC ENTREPRENEURSHIP) LECTURER NAME : MDM. NUR HAZILAH OMAR GROUP : PDP1C V
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WHAT ENTREPRENEURSHIP MEANS TO YOU
For me, the entrepreneurial life might be draining, yet at the same time, it is often highly rewarding. There is a mixture of excitement, stress, hard-work and insecurity that provide a foundation for the eventual sense of disappointment or accomplishment when a project is completed. There is when a project is completed. There is no universal reason of why to do it, and no universal definitions of success. Everyone needs to answer the question for themselves. Everyone needs to weight the costs or benefits for oneself. What everyone should do is, to think. Think it through. Think what constitutes a reward? What constitutes a success? What is that you want to do with your life? With your time? With your creativity? There is a wide divergence of opinions on the topic. The most conventional reason to do it, is for the money; because the bottom line is perceived as the supreme objective. But there are other reasons for pursuing entrepreneurship. There is the rush, excitement and spirit of creativity. There is also the experience of being a part of the team, which shares the joy of achieving something together. Additionally, there is also the joy of being free and deciding what to do on your own; of being your own boss. It is not all easy, but its not rocket science either. At the end of the day you have to do something that somehow benefits others; everything else is just a side effect. The vast majority of entrepreneurs in New Zealand form 1-3 person companies, where the company is 100% owned by the employees. They simply work for themselves. Over 75% of all companies are like that. However, most of these companies will not be a huge financial success (as compared to inflated Silicon Valley like standards). So perhaps the freedom is the most compelling and exciting motivation for those small, family-like businesses. They get to decide where, when and how to employ their creative capacities. Entrepreneurship means different things to different people. During the industrial revolution, the conventional entrepreneurship entrepreneur was of a wealthy person who built a factory, then hired the ignorant and poor for their cheap labour to quickly produce mass quantities of a product at a much lower cost. The value added was distilled from the management skills, cheap-unskilled labour and time-to-market with commoditized products. That image still persists. But, the world is shrinking and information is more democratically distributed now.
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Nearly anyone can learn to succeed, if they expand the effort. The internet has made it possible for people to educate themselves in almost any skill they choose. Granted; the gaps between the wealthy and the poor are possibly wider than ever. But some barriers have fallen. Knowledge is more universally accessible now. In the knowledge based economy, for the niche products, that prototypical capital intensive industrial-revolution model no longer fits. How about inventors? Where they fit into the picture? It all boils down to the value you bring in. If you are a leader, who can organize a good skilled team, and motivate it to produce high-quality products, then this is what you should do. You should do what you are the best at, and hire people to do the product development, perhaps even hire inventors, programmers, etc. They then will build for you what you have dreamed up. If being a leader, and organizer, a manager drives you, fills you up with joy, and all the positive excitement, then go and do it. What if you are an inventor? What if youre a creative person yourself; someone who can envision an innovative product and then build it? Then go ahead and just do it! It is easier than ever before to invent and develop your own products, then sell and ship them to end- costumers. There are new distribution and media channels that will enable you to pursue these goals. You can even reach people from the mobile platform of your laptop. There is no single way of doing business. There is no single way of being an entrepreneur. The world is changing, and some of the old models are collapsing as we go. Invent your own way. Go and do it. Remember do not give in into status quo, and do not trade your heroes for ghosts. For me personally, yes, it is all about really hard work; but its also about tinkering, figuring things out, learning new things, challenging myself, doing what I love doing, building something real and helping others. Above all, its about my family and friends walking shoulder to shoulder with me as we pursue our common dreams.
Adnan Alias (1990). A Study of Entrepreneur Characteristics, Business Plans and Start-Up Capital of Successful and Unsuccessful New Ventures: Case of a Venture Creation Program. DBA dissertation, Nova University, USA UiTM Entrepreneurship Study Group, Fundamentals of Entrepreneurship, 2004 by person Malaysia.