Entrepreneurial Mind

• Entrepreneurship was once considered simply as an applied trade, and not as an academic discipline
• Entrepreneurship

  An important area of study, as our economy was actually based upon entrepreneurship, it is the entrepreneurial drive and persistence of entrepreneurs that drives back an economic downturn
• Arnold C. Cooper, Karl A. Vesper, Donald L. Sexton, Robert C. Ronstadt, and Howard H. Stevenson initiated the idea that entrepreneurship be an academic field of scholarly pursuit
• As an academic discipline, various colleges and universities started offering courses in entrepreneurship, later on followed by academic journals that concentrated on issues and concerns on entrepreneurship
• Peter F. Drucker: 'Most of what you hear about entrepreneurship, is all wrong. It's not magic; it's not mysterious; and it has nothing to do with genes. It's a discipline, it can be learned'
• Entrepreneur


  One who undertakes to organize, manage, and assume the risks of a business
• Activities undertaken by entrepreneurs

  1. Spotting Opportunities

  2. Identifying and using resources in the environment

  3. Making use of these resources to produce products

  4. Making profit
• Entrepreneur


  • An innovator or developer who recognizes and seizes opportunities; converts those opportunities into workable/marketable ideas; adds value through time, effort, money, or skills; assumes the risks of the competitive marketplace to implement these ideas; and realizes the rewards from these efforts
• Idea


  Something an entrepreneur has already conceptualized or imagined, painting a more or less clear picture in his mind, giving him a clear plan of action
• Entrepreneur


  Also called adventurer, projector, and undertaker during the eighteenth century
• Cantillon's view of the entrepreneur

  • A specialist in taking on risk, 'insuring' workers by buying their output for resale before consumers have indicated how much they are willing to pay for it
• Cantillon's distinction of entrepreneurs

  • Entrepreneurs are distinct from landowners (financially independent) and hirelings (employees who do not partake in decision-making)
• Cantillon's view of entrepreneurs

  • Individuals who generated profits through exchanges, exercising business judgment in the face of uncertainty over future prices
• Reidel's view of entrepreneurs


  • Entrepreneurs take on uncertainty so others, namely income earners, do not have to be subject to the same uncertainty
• Knight's view of entrepreneurs

  • Entrepreneurs can't share the risk of loss by insuring themselves against uncertain events, so they bear these kinds of risks themselves, and profit is the reward that entrepreneurs get from assuming uninsurable risks
• Say's view of entrepreneurship

  • Entrepreneurship is essentially a form of management, with three distinct functions: scientific knowledge of the product; entrepreneurial industry – the application of knowledge to useful purpose; and productive industry – the manufacture of the item by manual labour
• Knight's distinction between entrepreneur and manager

  • An entrepreneur crosses the line when the exercise of his/her judgment is liable to error and s/he assumes the responsibility for its correctness
• Marshall's distinction between capitalist, entrepreneur, and manager

  • Capitalists commit capital and receive interest income, entrepreneurs take control of money provided by capitalists to create more money and receive profits, managers receive a salary and fulfill a different function than capitalists or entrepreneurs
• Amasa and Francis Walker's view of entrepreneurs

  • Entrepreneurs create wealth, and have the power of foresight and leadership qualities that enable them to organize resources and inject energy into activities that create wealth
• Adam Smith did not dwell on a particular class of individual, but was concerned with the overall economic system
• Entrepreneur


  A French word that means "to undertake"
• Richard Cantillon


  • Proposed that the entrepreneur is a specialist in taking on risk, 'insuring' workers by buying their output for resale before consumers have indicated how much they are willing to pay for it
• Adam Smith


  Concerned with studying how all people fit into the economic system and believed that the economy is propelled by self-interest
• Jean-Baptiste Say


  • Proposed that entrepreneurship was essentially a form of management and put the entrepreneur at the core of the entire process of production and distribution
• Carl Menger


  • Saw entrepreneurship as occurring because of economic progress
• Joseph Schumpeter


  • Proposed the Innovation Theory of Profit and saw economic activity or entrepreneurship as leading to economic development
• Schools of Thought in Entrepreneurship

  • Environmental School of Thought
  • Capital School of Thought
  • Entrepreneurial Trait School of Thought
  • Venture Opportunity School of Thought
  • Strategic Formulation School of Thought
• Environmental School of Thought

  Analyses the external factors that influence a potential entrepreneur's lifestyle
• Capital School of Thought


  Deals with the capital-seeking process and expresses the financial management standpoint
• Strategic Formulation School of Thought


  Emphasizes the planning process in successful venture development
• Entrepreneurs must be willing to accept failure as a possibility but also understand that success requires taking risks.
• Risk is an essential part of entrepreneurship, as it involves uncertainty about future outcomes.
• Entrepreneurs are risk-takers who have the ability to take calculated risks.
• The entrepreneur's ability to manage uncertainty and make informed decisions about potential outcomes is crucial.