Entrepreneurs Are Born and Not Nurtured

In my point of view every debate has to sides, and “what born an entrepreneur” but according to the arguments from previous many decades neither side capable to finally prove their case. According to many people entrepreneur must possess personality traits like vision, drive and passion that are inborn and cannot be taught. Others discuss that skills of operating a business, motivating a people and evaluating opportunities are easily passed on to excited or eager students to be entrepreneurs. The fact is that both types of arguments are right and it is time for compromise, “entrepreneurs are born and can be trained”. Some people immediately start a business due to their inherent entrepreneur qualities, others will have trained and studied hard and long before doing so, and both enjoy success.

The need to comprehend entrepreneurship has been gained a great importance to get success in corporate business (Dess et.all,2003). Entrepreneurs pursue and identify solutions among problems, opportunities among challenges and possibilities among needs (Byers, Dorf, and Nelson, 2001). The entrepreneur is an imaginative, bold deviator from commenced business practices and methods who regularly tries the opportunity to introduce new technologies, products, arrangements and processes in the entire world. Successful entrepreneur must have the basic internal capabilities to cope with challenges that are aroused during a startup. The most vital personal characteristics of entrepreneurs are reasonable intelligence, optimistic disposition, good health, perseverance, lengthy attention span and love of people.

Entrepreneurship has critical importance with respect to change in entire aspects of society. It empowers individuals to attempt opportunities to resolve insurmountable problems and issues. From previous century, the role of entrepreneurs have been increased in the creation of enterprises that lead to improved productivity, job creation, higher quality of life and increased prosperity. Now it is contributing to solutions of society’s huge challenges like environment, energy, health, education and security. They use technology and innovation to foster activity and positive impact in entire facets of life. The capable and successful entrepreneur learns to select, identify, describe and communicate the essence of opportunity that has a great potential or role to become a successful venture. The entrepreneur is capable to explain the potential contributions of a venture and develop the business design that leads to sustainability and competitive advantage (Byers, Dorf, and Nelson, 2001).

Entrepreneurs born or made: The initial concept is that entrepreneurs are born and also they can be trained. Now I want to explain my views with the arguments of various researchers and scholars. Various researchers and scholars have various views about the current topic but all has emphasized the importance of entrepreneurship. According to author entrepreneurs are born and cannot be made or trained. They differentiated on the basis of insatiable desire for an inherent love and success of entire things entrepreneurial. They have built in qualities for developing long lasting business by dealing with various risks, challenges and hazardous issues. They have strong positive behavior toward initiation of new things or innovations (Ericksen, 2002). Ericksen had strong hard views regarding the current topic. In 2001, three authors gave contrast views regarding entrepreneurs. They said entrepreneurs can be trained. According to author attitude of entrepreneur impacts the initial success of venture and the same attitude require to show with employees of organization to continue the power of entrepreneur that develops competitive advantage. Authors say “you can hire attitude, and everything can be trained to get a success (Byers, Dorf, and Nelson, 2001).

Professor of psychology, Alan Jacobowitz did interview over 500 entrepreneurs and concluded that entrepreneurs are innate and cannot be trained. He tells the common personality traits of entrepreneurs like independence, restlessness, high self-confidence and tendency to be a loner. Professor was adopted static approach and many other researchers were also support the view of professor (McFadzean, O’Loughlin, and Shaw, 2005). Further authors said that tells the motivation, desires, ability to project their schemes or ideas into future, turn their ideas into reality and backing their judgments into persistence and action are some basis and unique qualities of entrepreneurs. They are also opportunity seekers. There is no any difficulty to find the entrepreneurs because two are not the same so it is easy to point out who is entrepreneur. Some entrepreneurs are introverts and some are extroverts, some have family background of entrepreneurship while other do not have, some start from wealth and other begins with poverty, some are old and some are young.

The question regarding “entrepreneurs are born no can be trained” is main point of focus for many researchers and academic scholars. Regarding this issue many scholars have divergent views. Frakes, author of instinct believe that entrepreneurs are born and DNA of entrepreneurs, their genetics and personality play a pivotal role in whether they become a good entrepreneur or not. To become a successful entrepreneurs five big personality traits are required that include emotional stability, extraversion, conscientiousness, agreeableness and openness to change. These traits cannot be created through training. But in the contrary, Professor Neal Thornberry said that entrepreneurs are not only born but can be trained to become successful through creating and learning the specific inherits characteristics. Thornberry also give the examples of Fred smith (founder of Fedral Express) and Herb Kelleher (southwest Airlines co-founder) and said both entrepreneurs got success after long term commitment and many years of diligent preparation (Thornberry, 2003).

Herb Kelleher replied in his interview taken by Thornberry on the issue of whether entrepreneurs are born or not. He said six inborn traits cannot be trained into entrepreneurs include good health, reasonable intelligence, lengthy attention, optimistic disposition, love of people and perseverance. These six traits further classified into three basic points of health, attitude and intelligence. Herb gave the more importance to attitude from all personal characteristics and it only the one that cannot be trained or made. He reflects the right attitude to be crucial and it cannot be trained. On the other hand, several teachable capabilities that can increase chances of success like ability to set goals and listening (Thornberry, 2003).

Herb tell that other than innate skills there are many skills that can be learnt and taught, that better contribute for entrepreneur’s success. These skills include broad education and knowledge, capability to play enthusiastic advocate, listening skills, capability to focus on goals and set priorities, capability to screen out the vital ideas and things from unimportant and pleasant skepticism. According to herb, lucid vision and ability to communicate it deliberately to others are most vital skills and capabilities required by successful entrepreneurs. Therefore, entrepreneurs are trained and born, and need a blend of these two to become successful. The entrepreneur’s natural born characteristics are foundations or building blocks on which they can build upon (Thornberry, 2003). Modern entrepreneurs require range of various skills like strong ability to communicate in complex and abstract situations effectively (Ericksen, 2002).

From previous two decades many efforts has been made to establish programs to teach ambitious and eager people to realize their entrepreneur potential and start their own business effectively. This is a good notion with a long term goal. But some proficiency like find funding sources or developing a business plan can be learned or taught while basic profile of entrepreneur is imbedded in the structure of personality. There are two fundamental needs that recognized the importance of entrepreneur, they are recognition and control. Most entrepreneurs starts their own businesses because cannot do business in others control. They like to run independent business where they can show their extra ordinary efforts and abilities to gain more and more profits and productivity. They are self-sufficient and self-confident people who have courage to take initiation and deal haphazard or hazardous issues effectively for the best interest of their enterprise (Laser, 2007).

It has been long standing discussed all over the world whether entrepreneurs are born or is it mandatory for them to study and work hard to become entrepreneurs. It has been found that some people became good entrepreneurs with a single amount so it was their luck to gain the potential position. There are some characteristic which is necessary for entrepreneurs to adopt them and become a good entrepreneurs (McCubbrey, 2009): The main characteristics of entrepreneurs are depicted below:

Vision: entrepreneur must able to communicate and create a lucid vision and easily comprehend able mission for the new venture in order to launch a novel business successfully. This can be accomplished through great and extra ordinary qualities of leadership. It is necessary to extra ordinary influence people to accomplish vision and mission of enterprise. Leadership qualities have great importance for entrepreneurs. Successful entrepreneurs are good leaders. Leadership is the ability to influence other to accomplish organizational goals (Robbins and Coulter, 2007). Leaders give the clear direction to their followers toward the goals. They give the motivation to their followers so that followers can ready to accomplish the extra and targeted tasks for the best completion of organizational goals and objectives. Further, vision tells the entrepreneurs what they want to become and mission tells that what is their business or what they want to accomplish in the larger business environment.

Creativity: It refers to the ability to inject uniqueness and imagination into a novel business venture. It also the ability of entrepreneur to create new products, ideas, processes, techniques to become a good and successful entrepreneur in the world. It enables the entrepreneur to offer new venture in the market with novel strategies to cope with stronger competition. Further, creativity leads to enhance the profitability of enterprise through offering and developing novel products or ideas. This profitability and productivity leads to get the competitive advantage in the market to maintain the position of sustainable market leadership. Leaders or entrepreneurs shape the culture of organization through their creative abilities. Therefore, creative mind entrepreneurs cannot get success for their enterprises.

Focus: It is the ability of entrepreneur to sustain the vision of enterprise with steadfast diligence and passion. So it is necessary for entrepreneurs to emphasis on their vision and mission to maintain the sustainable competitive advantage of their enterprises. It is easy for entrepreneurs to get diverted especially in case to accomplish their original vision. Paradoxically, many entrepreneurs get bored easily. Therefore, it is the need of current competitive era; entrepreneurs should emphasis on their goals and remain focus on them for long term basis instead the completion of single task. Passion: Desire to get success under their own initiation for business venture is also the quality of every entrepreneur. It is mandatory for leaders to maintain extra ordinary enthusiasm and passion to accomplish their goals and objectives. Leaders have the ability to create thrill and passion in their followers to accomplish the organizational goals with great zeal and enthusiasm. In this regard motivation has great role. Leaders give motivation to their followers which create the sense of accomplishment in followers toward their goals. Overall motivation has positive impact throughout organizational setting.

Drive: Entrepreneurs have an intrinsic energy to attain the goals of business even in the situation of adversity. They work through showing extra ordinary drive in the larger competitive environment to maintain the sustainability of their enterprises. Strong drive to get success enables the entrepreneurs to cope with unique problems and situations which ultimately support for organizational success. Perseverance: It is the ability of entrepreneurs to remain faced or keep going when faced with insurmountable obstacles. This tendency of entrepreneurs shows their great commitment and zeal toward organizational goals. Opportunistic nature: Ability to see the possibilities before their occurrence or existence. It enables the entrepreneurs to take the advantage of upcoming trends or combine unrelated processes to develop an innovative business venture. This quality can lead to get competitive advantage in the market with comparative innovations related to products, ideas, processes and methods. Today there is era of global competition so it is mandatory for entrepreneurs to create the competitive advantage for their enterprises in the market with their great nature to find the new opportunities. Ability to solve problems: Successful entrepreneurs have thrives on going on exact solutions to complex or abstract problems or issues. It is very necessary ability to cope with haphazard situations.

Frugality: Ability to know about how to stretch every single dollar so that expenditures keep as low as possible. Empathy: It is the capability to put you in front of others and so able to show understanding and sensitivity of what other are communicating or wants in the beginning environment. Social Responsibility: The today’s entrepreneur’s common characteristics are caring, ethics and humanitarianism. Spirituality: It has been found that all successful entrepreneurs devote their time to develop spirituality. Positive affirmations and meditation are two basic examples of spirituality. Good Timing: Ability to identify a better market opportunity and knowledge about the optimum time to introduce a novel venture or expand existing enterprise. This quality has great importance in today’s business environment. The last characteristic entrepreneurs are luck which has great contribution in their success. In the world, luck has vital role in every field of life. If there is no luck, there is no success.

Examples of Entrepreneurs: Bill Gates, a founder of Microsoft is an innate or inborn entrepreneur of the world and also he is the richest person of the world. He became entrepreneurs in the age of 13 years by developing software. Bill Gates change world of computer. He is the most teen ager billionaire of the world.

Another example of inborn entrepreneur is Mark Zukurburg, a founder of Facebook. He also got the position of billionaire from the age of 20 as Bill Gates. Zukerburg change the world of internet and provide a platform for people through largest social media.

Owner of Chick N’ Friends Inc., Rhodney Lloyd, done MBS from U.C. Berkeley. It was initial step for him to become a trained entrepreneur. After education he started his advertising agency in Oakland, Calif. He got entrepreneurships after got training.

Entrepreneur’s challenges: The problems and needs of entire population are enormous. From organizational inadequacies to corruption, environmental sustainability to security, transportation to communication and overloaded information to disease, the opportunities for people to develop a positive differential impact are vast. But entrepreneurs are persons who pursue and identify tremendous possibilities among needs, viable solutions among problems, and creative opportunities among challenges (Byers, Dorf, and Nelson, 2001). It is the quality of entrepreneurs to better cope with potential challenges for the long term success of their enterprises.

In concussion, entrepreneurs struggle to show a difference in entire world and support to its wellbeing. They mobilize resources, identify opportunities, and relentlessly committed on their visions and missions. Further, it is concluded from above discussion that good and successful entrepreneurs have both composition, innate qualities of entrepreneurship that help them to drive the any process to success, also they can learned these qualities through experience and training. For this reason it is concluded that “entrepreneurs are born and can be trained”. Many entrepreneurs have God gifted qualities to become good entrepreneurs while others enhance their qualities and skills through various types of learning and training. To develop experimental knowledge in entrepreneurs has great importance as incremental process during the entire working life. It means that tries to stimulate “actual life” experience via various modes of training and education are have a strong impact or influence on the creation or development of entrepreneurs (Higgins and Elliott, 2011)

Further, to learn the qualities of successful entrepreneur it is necessary for them to have good leadership qualities. These qualities support the entrepreneurs to accomplish the various difficult tasks and mission of enterprise. It is a challenge for entrepreneur to respond various difficult tasks and remain committed to undertake the needed enterprise. Therefore, I strongly recommended that training and formal education for entrepreneurs create positive differential impact in the field of entrepreneurship.

References

Byers, T. H., Dorf, R. C., and Nelson, A. J. (2001), “Technology Ventures from Idea to Enterprise”, New   York: The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.

Dess, G. G., Ireland, R. D., Zahra, S. A., Floyd, S. W., Janney, J. J., and Lane, P. J. (2003), “Emerging issues in corporate entrepreneurship”, Journal of Management, 29(3), pp. 351-378.

Ericksen, G. K. (2002), “The Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award Insights from the Winners’ Circle”, the Earnest and Young,

Higgins, D., and Elliott, C. (2011), “Learning to make sense: what works in entrepreneurial education?”, Journal of European Industrial Training, 35(4), pp.345-367

Laser, S. A. (2007), “Are Entrepreneurs Made or Born?”, Stephen A. Laser Associates 200 South Wacker Drive,

McCubbrey, D. J. (2009), “Business Fundamentals”, Zurich, Switzerland: The Global Text,

McFadzean, E., O’Loughlin, A., and Shaw, E. (2005), “Corporate entrepreneurship and innovation part 1: the missing link”, European Journal of Innovation Management, 8(3), pp.350-372

Robbins, S., and Coulter, M. (2007), “Principles of Management”, 9th edition, Prentice Hall Inc,

Thornberry, N. E. (2003), “Corporate entrepreneurship: teaching managers to be entrepreneurs”, Journal of Management Development, 22(4), pp.329-344

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