Personal Qualifications for Entrepreneurship
Personally, I do not believe I am qualified to start my own company. The reading identifies three main aspects of entrepreneurship: creativity, corporate management, and risk-taking.
Creativity
I consider myself to be an ambitious person because I am always looking for better ways to improve procedures and products/services, as well as exploring new ideas to solve problems.
Risk-Averse
However, I lack the confidence to run a company and am a risk-averse person. I dislike working in an unpredictable environment and prefer taking a direction where I am positive of the outcome of my choice. I do not trust my gut instinct. However, uncertainty is at the core of starting a business because one is not always certain of the outcome of the many decisions taken. Unless I can foresee the outcome with certainty, I find it difficult to start and the thought of dealing with uncertainty makes me uneasy. Also, I am not very good at making quick decisions under pressure because sometimes, I tend to overthink situations. As an entrepreneur, one will have to make quick decisions under pressure and I feel that I am not yet ready for that.
Corporate Management
Managing a business is not an easy task and I feel that my skills are not good enough. For instance, I am not a good planner and most of the times, I fail to accomplish tasks because I did not pay attention to the details. The reading has clearly pointed out that poor planning is one of the main reasons for business failure. Also, I still need to work on my emotional stamina because I get cranky and frustrated after working for long hours. Yet it is known that entrepreneurs work for long hours with little rest.
Importance of Risk-Taking
From the reading, the very definition of an entrepreneur as "someone who identifies a business opportunity and assumes the risk of creating and running a business to take advantage of it" had the greatest impact on me. I learnt that to be an entrepreneur, I must identify a viable business opportunity, and I have to be ready to take the risk to take advantage of it. Therefore, risk-taking is a must when starting a business, and while some individuals are naturally born risk-takers, I can also learn how to be a risk-taker.
