GUARDIAN, Angelu Manoelle F.

August 30, 2022

2nd year – AC2B

GEE1: Assumptions people make to entrepreneurs

“Don’t Assume Unless Otherwise Stated”

When non-entrepreneurial people encounter entrepreneurs, there are these

usual connotations about entrepreneurs that they would always think about, and this is
inevitable. People would always tend to assume similarities in the lives of every
entrepreneur as if all entrepreneurs they meet will always be the same and are living the
same way.

There are many assumptions that people make about entrepreneurs whenever
they meet them. First is that they think that entrepreneurs are rich and have a lot of
money. People have been viewing the lives of entrepreneurs as if they are instantly rich
even when they have just recently had business. However, if we are to carefully
observe the background lives of very successful entrepreneurs, most of them came
from families with money as they can take such great risks that may give them great
success as well. On the other hand, if we are to also look at the percentage of
successful entrepreneurs from families that were not so financially stable, these
entrepreneurs will still spend years and years of hard work in order to become rich as
people usually think of, because believe me or not, I know a few businessmen that are
not as successful as businessmen that are millionaires or billionaires, and these
businessmen I know are just making the right amount of income from their businesses
to financially support their own family. Another fact stated by Roberts (2015) has stated
in his answer on Quora.com, it’s a great misconception that people see entrepreneurs
as wealthy and successful just because of how Hollywood portrays them and that the
reality is that many entrepreneurs actually live on less than $30,000 a year.

The second assumption people make about entrepreneurs is that they are
geniuses. Just as what Potgieter (2016) has given as one of the assumptions that are
thought of about entrepreneurs, succeeding in the business industry doesn’t necessarily
mean that these people are more intelligent than any other person because even
though intelligence helps with their success, tenacity, and capacity to learn still
outweighs it. We must always take note that the most common characteristic among
successful entrepreneurs is persistence to succeed and not intelligence because being
persistent is what’s really required to succeed.

Another assumption people make about entrepreneurs is that they are huge risk-
takers (Tong, 2015). This is another assumption that people usually make about
entrepreneurs but is also a misconception because being a huge risk-taker is not really
the key to a successful business but having calculated risks is what the market favors.
Having calculated risks means that success is more ensured even if this calculated risk
is a low or high one and that may result in either low or high rewards as well. Even if
calculated risk still imposes possible dangers for the business, it will still bring a higher
chance for rewards than those risks that aren’t carefully planned and has a reasonable
possibility of benefit.

Lastly, and not least, another assumption that people make about entrepreneurs
is that the big success they are seeing from a certain entrepreneur is the result of a
single massive jump that was made by the entrepreneur which took an equally massive
risk (Maier, 2016). However, this is really not the case because behind every success of
each successful entrepreneur is a series of small steps. Small steps that may be a
success or even a failure. These small steps of successes and failures have made them
up to where these successful entrepreneurs are and weren’t done overnight but were
done after countless battles and downfalls that weren’t able to stop the passion and
persistence of that successful entrepreneur.

With these stated assumptions people make about entrepreneurs, we have also
learned of the real situations entrepreneurs undergo on their way to their successes
along with the fact that most of these assumptions are actually not the truth with how
entrepreneurs are living their lives. These assumptions usually turn into misconceptions
especially if these are not supported with facts and statements from actual
entrepreneurs. Therefore, just as how the accounting principle would say, “don’t
assume, unless otherwise, stated.”

One thing’s for sure, the big successes people look up to were way beyond hard
to reach than most people think they did. These big successes were attained by the
immeasurable hard work of persistent entrepreneurs.
REFERENCES:

Maier, M. (2016, May 24). I think the biggest mistaken assumption people make is that

the successful entrepreneur took a single massive jump, and took [Online forum

post]. Quora. https://qr.ae/pvgRNP

Potgieter, G. (2016, September 21). What are some assumptions that people make

about successful entrepreneurs that aren’t necessarily true? [Online forum post].

Quora. https://qr.ae/pvg7wr

Roberts, J. L. (2015, October 23). Interesting question, actually there is a lot about

entrepreneurs that non entrepreneurs believe that is not true. With this in

[Quora]. Quora. https://qr.ae/pvg7P9

Tong, K. (2015, December 24). Entrepreneurs come in many shapes, sizes and form. In

the most liberal form, even your local drug dealer or solo [Online forum post].

Quora. https://qr.ae/pvgRNP