The Process of Entrepreneurship Defined & Explained
What is the process of entrepreneurship? It is a challenging yet deeply rewarding journey that involves smart decisions about management, finances and communication. The entrepreneurial process will teach you a lot about yourself and everything from setting up your business to generating revenue, to marketing your products or services, to dealing with legal issues and managing people.
Whether you like it or not, you have to be the CEO and think of yourself as the leader. Most new entrepreneurs have a habit of focusing on specific skills they have (e.g., technology, design) they believe will grow the business. In the long run this is not ideal as you will need to have a holistic view of all aspects of running the company.
The Entrepreneurial Process and Decision-Making In Business
The qualities of successful entrepreneurs include their work ethic, dedication and the ability to see things that others can’t see. One of the most important qualities however, is your ability to make good decisions. These entrepreneur characteristics are very important and a time will come when you have to make complex decisions about the direction of your business.
The process of entrepreneurship is such that you will have to decide whether to build a team or carry on doing everything yourself. You will also need to choose between profitability or more investment in the business to grow it. And you will need to balance the many needs and desires of employees, investors, vendors and partners.
When making decisions, keep this principle in mind. The only criteria for your entrepreneurial decision process is to always choose what is best for the business. This should be the standard principle throughout your company and it should be communicated effectively to your team.
By setting this standard and always putting the business first, you will ensure that it is always set up for success and you will make clear to everyone involved that this will be the only reason you decide to do anything – this is what the process of entrepreneurship is all about.
Another important decision you have to make is whether to figure everything out yourself or seek advice. You might think that your problems are unique to your business and no one else will understand. This is completely wrong.
Through our wild experience in the trenches building the first health rewards company, we learned that while our businesses are different, our problems are not. This is reinforced every day through our entrepreneur community where entrepreneurs of all shapes and sizes, with very different businesses, learn that we are all fighting the same fights.
Regardless of all the different types of entrepreneurs, every business has sales and marketing, product, people and finance, and the decision-making process for your business will be very similar to others, regardless of the industry.
The day-to-day problems that entrepreneurs encounter are not unique. Someone else has already experienced them and this is why we created the lonely entrepreneur learning community. It is a chance to get the best knowledge and learn from other experienced entrepreneurs! This gives us all a great opportunity to come together to help each other solve them.
Entrepreneurial Innovation Process
You do not have to come up with the most technologically advanced methods of doing something to be considered an innovator. Simply being able to communicate how your business is different to others is an example of entrepreneurial innovation.
In fact, many times, positioning is actually more important than the product or service you offer. Many times your biggest competitor is “clutter” and not your largest foe.
Our course about differentiating your offering explains how this works in further detail. And you will quickly learn that “playgrounds” may be the key to winning versus your competition. You may have a great product but you will still need to find the best way to position your offering to ensure you are the only game in town.
Good entrepreneurs have the ability to think differently about problems that others are trying to solve. Remember, the technology for the iPhone actually existed for a decade before a certain innovator decided to think about how to use that technology in a different way.
We all know him as Steve Jobs, one of the greatest innovators of our time and a huge part of his innovation was his marketing prowess and how to position technology that already existed.
Innovation is all about your ability to look at a problem and think about how to solve it differently. It is about taking a look around and finding new ways to provide real value to potential customers. And as entrepreneurs, we lack capital and resources but we don’t lack the ability to think differently.
The Process of Entrepreneurship
Every successful businessman knows that there are steps to becoming a successful entrepreneur. Little things like knowing when to build a team or how to raise money will set you apart from the competition.
Using your knowledge of the product is simply not enough to convince someone to buy your product or service. You have to be able to communicate effectively, not just to customers, but also to your team.
Starting a business is no easy feat, it requires good decision-making and the ability to think differently. When you set up a business, you should always make decisions that put the business first.
Here is a summary of the steps to entrepreneurship we discussed above:
- Think like a CEO instead of just a founder or someone with a skill.
- Start building a team when your customer base begins growing.
- Always make decisions that are in the best interests of the business.
- Differentiate your offering by creating a place where only you are playing.
- Communicate effectively with your team.
If you want to learn more about the process of entrepreneurship and join a community of great entrepreneurs, check out our learning community.