I think it is important to define
the term entrepreneur before going further in this write up especially since it
will be appearing quite often as the flow progresses. In order to put a
definition to the word entrepreneur, we can say an entrepreneur is any
individual who organizes, manages and control a business enterprise.
In other
words, we may say entrepreneurs are innovators and creators of new commercial
ventures because they identify new business opportunities and then develops it
and models it in such a way as to serve the purposes of fulfilling their own
dreams, meeting the needs of others, creating employment opportunities and
boosting the economic viability of their immediate environment.
One of the things I have come to
realize is that the words "work" and "job" are similar but
both have slightly different meanings. According to the dictionary, a job is a
regular and official activity that you do or partakes in and for which you
receive a salary for at the end of a specified period while a work on the other
hand refers to general efforts and activities done to accomplish a goal. This
simply means that when you are an entrepreneur, you are working and when you
are working for someone else, you are jobbing. This analogy between the two
words is especially important because I have come to discover that work brings
a higher level of satisfaction and self actualization than when you are
jobbing. The reason for this is certainly not farfetched; when you are working
for yourself you are more innovative and more meticulous than when you are
working for someone else.
Ideas rule the world. The human
mind is both creative and innovative, but the creativity of the mind at times
is often tamed by the kinds of work we do. An employee seeking for new ways of
getting things done in his present organization may be stifled by the level of
bureaucracy and hierarchy his ideas may be subjected to and at the long last
his proposal may be rejected simply because of a boss who simply has a personal
grudge against him therefore bringing personal issues to bear on official
relationship and hence depriving the people of the chance of being served
better.
Apart from the fact that
entrepreneurship contributes to your personal happiness, recent studies have
successfully tried to establish a link between entrepreneurship and health.
Scientists believe there's a correlation between positive emotions (happiness,
hope, curiosity etc) and health. Infact, hope has been said to be an antidote
for some illnesses such as hypertension and high blood pressure while negative
emotions such as fear, anger and anxiety can speed up the wear and tear
mechanisms of the body and may even predispose the individual to more serious
health issues such as increase in body temperature, insomnia, heart attack,
high blood pressure, depression, stroke, diabetes and even inflammation of the
body etc. Working as an entrepreneur means you are your own boss; therefore you
can choose your working hours and adapt it in such a way to fit your health and
comfort needs. This is one luxury you may not get when working for someone
else, because it is their company therefore they make the rules and which you
must adhere to whether convenient or not is not an issue. The flexibility of
your working hours as an entrepreneur therefore affords you more time to
exercise, rest and generally look after yourself.
Whenever we are happy, a strong
amount of dopamine is released into the body. The brain consists of several
dopamine pathways which functions as routes that dopamine passes through from
the brain into our bodies. Dopamine in addition to the earlier stated point
also plays the role of a transmitter by sending signals to the nerve cells of
the body. As it has been earlier established that dopamine levels are boosted
when we are happy, the body gets a reward for the flow of dopamine into the
nerves of the body and the reward is that the psycho motor pathways of the body
are boosted and this will mean the body's reflexes are sharpened and therefore
the individual gets to work for longer without really getting much tired as he
would normally have done had the work not been his. Inadequate levels of
dopamine in the body have been found to be one of the likely causes of
Parkinson's disease and schizophrenia. The implication of this is that apart
from improving the agility and physical alertness of a person, adequate levels
of dopamine chemical in the body also seems to the mental capabilities of the
individual and because of the flexibility that entrepreneurship affords its
practitioners, it can be sufficiently argued that entrepreneurs tends to
naturally live a healthier and longer lives than non entrepreneurs.
Diversifying a bit from the
health benefits that entrepreneurship affords the individual. The other
benefits the individual stands to benefit from being an entrepreneur are quite
exhaustive but a few of the main ones will be discussed below;
Earning potentials: Working a regular day job comes with a number
of restrictions key among which is earning restrictions whereas when working
for oneself, there's no limit to what you can earn. Most of the time, there is
a limit to what you can earn with a regular company regardless of how
productive and effective you have been on the job. Someone else who does
considerably less than you may earn the same or even more than you do and there
may be very little you could do about it. Salaries most of the time is a
function of hierarchy in the organization, a trend which is not necessary pro
productivity i.e. not in support of productivity. The management of an
organization many times use their personal indiscretions in promoting members
of staff of the organization. For example, the lady who went out for dinner with
the director of the company may suddenly get promoted over those who were up
and doing while working their asses of on the job. Of course, this is just a
hypothetical scenario and may not exactly be the situation in all organizations
but it’s a fact that favoritism exists in one form or the other in some
organizations which certainly limits the earning potentials of its employees
and in some cases where there is no favoritism there exists some form of salary
cap which serves to specify the maximum amount an employee may earn.
Flexibility: This is perhaps the most enticing part of being an
entrepreneur. You get to choose your working hours and also your vacation
times. Many have argued that entrepreneurship may inherently be encouraging
laziness because of the freedom it affords its practitioners; I do think it is
not an issue except if the entrepreneur isn't really serious about his own
prospects because the business environment is already saturated, even with your
dedication and utmost seriousness you still face a lot of stiff competition
with your competitors seeking to outdo you, so where is the room for laxity?
There certainly isn't one. Infact, the flexibility that entrepreneurship
affords is more of strength than a weakness. You get to rest when you feel
like; therefore you are energized for the tasks that are coming ahead. Control
is everything, having control of your day goes a long way in improving your
professionalism on the job.
Decision Making: As an entrepreneur, you are the boss! You make all
the decisions. A huge part of the responsibilities of being an entrepreneur is
that you make all the decisions that directly and indirectly affect the
development of your business entity. You alone answer the basic economic
questions of what to produce, how to produce
it, for whom to produce and the allocation of scarce resources. In addition to
these, you also determine where to establish, how many employees to take on,
how many branches to be opened, marketing and promotional strategies to adopt
etc. All these certainly make
entrepreneurship a fun and enterprising venture to undertake.
Self Fulfillment and Personal Legacy: A good name they say is
better than much fine gold, entrepreneurship helps make your dreams come
through as well as building a good name for yourself and for your children
after you. You are not
inhibited and you can plan however direction or goal you want the business
entity to face or pursue. In a regular job, even though you are the brain box
working behind the scene to bring about the high level of success and renown
that the organization has come to be noted for, it is your boss or the
management staff that naturally gets the credit while little or no credit is
accrued to you. There is only one way of out of this conundrum and that way is
entrepreneurship. You get to break the jinx of lack of appreciation and
sufficient acknowledgement from your boss. As an entrepreneur, motivation is
high, you are encouraged to do research and read up on better ways of doing the
particular business you are currently engaged in which may not be the case if
you were working for someone else.
In conclusion, entrepreneurship
benefits both the individual and his immediate environment. The economy of the
country stands to gain more in terms of reduction in unemployment ratio
especially among the youths of the country. As individuals are recruited to
work for the business entity, more and more people have the chance of making
ends meet and meeting their own needs. The society also stands to benefit in
terms of infrastructure from entrepreneurship business concerns. New shops,
stalls and business offices are often erected which functions to improve the
infrastructural facilities of the areas the business concerns are situated. In
addition to these, the residents of the immediate environment of the business
stand to gain from the entrepreneurship in terms of corporate social
responsibility (projects or initiatives deliberately carried out by an
organization to benefit the residents of the immediate environment which it is
located). There is also the issue of favorable balance of payment for the
company due to reduction in dependence on foreign goods, products and services
which is occasioned by boom in entrepreneurship endeavors all around the place.
Governments earn more taxes from entrepreneurship concerns and therefore have
more money to take on capital intensive projects aimed at improving the quality
of life of the masses.
I believe the great roles that
entrepreneurship plays to the development of both the person and the society is
so great that it cannot be over emphasized therefore it needs to be encouraged.
Individuals would certainly be richer and nations' economies would be better
for it if more and more individuals begin to embrace and practice
entrepreneurship. I therefore hope that governments of nations' across the
world would deliberately propagate policies encouraging entrepreneurship in the
society, policies such as the formation and formulation of entrepreneurship as
a course and its inclusion in the curriculum of all institutions of higher
learning.
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