What is an entrepreneur?
An entrepreneur is an individual who accepts financial risks and undertakes new financial ventures. The word derives from the French “entre” (to enter) and “prendre” (to take), and in a general sense applies to any person starting a new project or trying a new opportunity. Many societies place great value on the entrepreneur. To encourage their activity, they may be offered access to inexpensive capital, tax exemptions and management advice. An entrepreneur has the greatest chance of success by focusing on a market niche either too small or too new to have been noticed by established businesses. To help new technologies come to market, many universities establish business incubators for entrepreneurs hoping to turn leading edge research into marketable products. Characteristics of an entrepreneur include spontaneous creativity, the ability and willingness to make decisions in the absence of solid data, and a generally risk-taking personality. An entrepreneur may be driven by a need to
Simply put, an entrepreneur is a person – man or woman – who can take an idea for an innovation and as a product of their social or economic background, and are able to produce it on demand for the general public, the government or even the military. They possess the ability to organize multiple people and tasks on any given day. They are inventive, can organize resources, can organize others, can manage others’ time/needs/wants/money, etc., can perceive opportunities where others cannot, can perceive risk levels, are risk takers and are less put off by others’ opinions of their innovative ideas. Most of all, they are not fazed by rejection of their ideas, innovations, inventions or creations as they personally believe in what they are producing. However, the most successful type of entrepreneur can take constructive criticism of their business and make adaptions to achieve the best product possible with the lowest cost and the highest quality. They will stop at nothing to see their id
There are many differing views on what makes someone an entrepreneur and what an entrepreneurial venture is. In a sense the definition itself is evolving as the field itself comes into the mainstream of American business. While we speak of many of the originators of businesses in the past as entrepreneurs, it was not until the mid1970’s that the concept became a prevalent enough part of our economy that definitions even were necessary. Consequently, we see in the literature a wide variety of possibilities for what this field of endeavor really is. Looking online, the Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary from 1913 defined an entrepreneur as “one who creates a product on his own account.” That sounds a trifle stuffy, is very limited and doesn’t fit for many of the people widely known as entrepreneurs. The meaning of the word entrepreneur has certainly evolved since 1913. Does just creating a product make you entrepreneurial if you never do anything with it? What if you take someone’s
