Characteristics of an Entrepreneur
What is an entrepreneur? According to Wikipedia, an entrepreneur is a person who has possession of an enterprise, or venture, and assumes significant accountability for the inherent risks and the outcome. To translate it into simple terms, an entrepreneur owns a business of which the entrepreneur is responsible for the risks and outcomes. To be an entrepreneur, one has to possess defined characteristics of an entrepreneur.
What are the characteristics of an entrepreneur? Are these characteristics vital? It’s a no-brainer actually, of course it’s important! Your chances of business success is significantly lower if you do not possess these characteristics. The characteristics of an entrepreneur consists of:
1. Good leadership
Leadership is a rare characteristic. It is very hard to find individuals with good leadership qualities. This is because not many people dare to take responsibility, or take the lead. Alan Keith of Genetech once said, “Leadership is ultimately about creating a way for people to contribute to making something extraordinary happen.” Precise and right to the point.
To be a good entrepreneur, you must be a leader. You must be able to guide, direct, influence and affect people. This way, all your business problems can be overcomed with ease.
2. Risk taker
All businesses involve risks. There is not a single business in the known world right now that is 100% risk-free. You can’t make money if you are not willing to take risks. If you are not willing to take risks, then you are bound to fail in the business world.
But, a successful entrepreneur does not take all the risks he faces. All risks must be evaluated first, before taking the dive. You wouldn’t want to dive into some unknown waters, would you?
3. Honest and Trustworthy
This is an undeniable characteristic that all entrepreneurs MUST have. Let’s face it, would you give your money to some stranger that guarantees you to make 1000% profit on the street? No you would not. Maybe if that stranger asked for $10 dollars or he convinced you with hard facts, you would, but that’s out of the case. As the saying goes,”Honesty is the best policy.” Every one likes honest and trustworthy people.
Being honest and trustworthy is considered one of your most important characteristics. It would take years to build your credibility and honesty, but it would take just a few seconds to totally destroy your image should you do something dishonest.
4. Your Passion
Your passion fuels your actions. And your actions make money. Any entrepreneur should be passionate about their business to be able to perform well. You must maintain your enthusiasm and interest in your field. For example, when making money online is your passion, you wouldn’t feel working even if you stick yourself to the monitor 24hours a day.
Your passion makes it easy for you to act. Working no longer means working when you work with your passion. It just means doing something you like. If you like to play games and playing games is your 12-hour job, it certainly wouldn’t feel like working 12 hours a day.
5. Intelligence
No, I don’t mean you need to have exceptionally high IQ to success. But what I mean is that an entrepreneur should be clever and witty in all your business dealings. You have to show that you are concentrated and 100% focused on your job to be able to gain your clients’ respect and trust.
The world is a mean one. Scammers are out there somewhere, preying for a weak target everyday. To resist being scammed or being duped, an entrepreneur should be smart and be alert of who you are dealing with. If not, you would eventually suffer some uncalculated losses.
These are one of the few characteristics of a successful business entrepreneur. These characteristics will, no doubt, help you overcome obstacles you may have to face when you are operating a business. And without these characteristics, your business may eventually fail and you will have to bear the losses.
What if you have the main characteristics of an entrepreneur already? Then study the market, find a solution or make a product, get some capital and you’re ready to make a killing in the ever-changing world of business.