Module in Opportunity Seeking_________________________________________________

Dr. Janette D. Julaton

Faculty Member, College
of Business Administration

3
ATTRIBUTES OF ENTREPRENEURS
“Aside from assuming risks and initiating innovation, taking control such as assuming
ownership of the business is a primary concern of the entrepreneurs.” - Dr. N. A.
Orcullo, Jr.

OVERVIEW
Nowadays, everything change so fast. There are new products created
especially in technology. New ideas have replaced the old ones. The fast-changing in
our world is influence greatly by the internet. People become more advance, creative
and innovative. More and more individuals explore possibilities of running their own
business especially that we are now facing a difficulty due to this pandemic.

In this module, you will be able to understand who is an entrepreneur, you will
be able to appreciate the advantages and the drawbacks of being an entrepreneur and
also you will learn the attributes, qualities and characteristics that an entrepreneur
should possess.

LEARNING OUTCOMES
 Define entrepreneur.
 Determine the advantages and drawbacks of being an entrepreneur.
 Emulate the different attributes of an entrepreneur

3.1 Who is an entrepreneur?

An instantaneous or spontaneous response when one is asked about who is an

entrepreneur, is that, the terms refer to an individual who owns and manages his own
business. Truly, an entrepreneur is a person who owns and manages his own
business, however, simply owning and managing one’s business is not all but just one
of the tenets of entrepreneurship as previously discussed. Contemporary researchers
and scholars on entrepreneurship believed that being an entrepreneur is much more
than owning and managing a small business. They come in various forms and in
various settings including situations within an existing business organization.

Karl Vesper has classified the entrepreneurs in various forms as follows:

a. Solo self-employed individual – This group of entrepreneurs include such

group as tradespeople, sales agents, repairmen, and brokers as well as highly
paid professionals, accountants, physicians who operate alone or with only a
few employees and perform work personally. This group also includes
practitioners in the fields of expertise/experience who provide management or
technical advisory services on a fixed-term or long-term basis.

b. Deal-to-dealer – This group includes highly knowledgeable businessmen

engaged in various forms of trades frequently in directly or indirectly related
lines of works. Their engagement in other forms of business directly or indirectly
related to their existing or main line of business comes in specific transaction
and may just be one-shot deal.

c. Team builders – They refer to those who go on to build larger companies using
hiring and delegation can be regarded as another category. An example of this
include a skilled machinist who, after his apprenticeship, opens his own small
shop and then gradually expands his work force as sales rise.

d. Independent innovators – They include such persons who hit upon ideas for
better products or services and then create companies to develop, produce and
sell them.

e. Pattern multiplier – These are entrepreneurs who spot an effective business

pattern, quite possibly originated by someone else, and multiply it to realize
profits. An example, of this is the McDonald’s “drive thru” restaurant and fast
food chain which later went into franchise expansion.

f. Economy-of-scale exploiters – The fact that until costs tend to shrink as

volume expands has been exploited particularly by entrepreneurs in the
discount merchandising business. By locating the business in lower rent and
tax areas, and by reducing services, they are able to reduce prices, which has
given them sales volume enabling them tor educe prices further and make it
difficult for competitors to enter or compete.
 g. Capital aggregators – They include smart entrepreneurs who use their
experience and expertise in pooling or syndicating a group of financiers to put
together a business endeavor. By pulling together a substantial financial stakes,
either from one well-endowed source or several sources combined, it is possible
to initiate such ventures as banks, savings and loan associations, insurance
companies and mutual funds which cannot be started without large front-end
capital.

h. Acquirers – Among others, there are two ways to enter independent business-
start a new one or acquire a going concern. Those who acquire have a variety
of styles. Some are regarded as turnaround artist because they have taken over
troubled firms and straightened them out. Buy-sell artist seek their profit
through selling off their acquisitions, sometimes after dressing them up to
increase their value.

i. Independent inventors – They include pure inventors who really develop their
own product or invention and take care of marketing them.

j. Buy-sell artist – They include wise guys referred to as corporate raiders and
brokers who turn around, sell and liquidate.

k. Apparent value manipulators – They refer to those who acquire assets at a

discount, representing them for a new use or market, and who restructure
balance sheet to improve ratio.

3.2 Advantages of becoming entrepreneur

Individuals who had been hooked into idea of employment ship may have failed
to notice the advantages of being an entrepreneur, underestimated their potentials or
that they have been exploited by their employers knowingly or unknowingly. Being an
entrepreneur has the following inherent advantages:

a. Opportunity to gain control over one’s own destiny – Managing the business you
own provides independence and opportunity to achieve one’s personal goals.
The business, as an extension of the owner, is often a means by which one can
accomplish what is most important.
b. Opportunity to reach one’s full potential – In managing a business you own, all
of one’s skills are likely to be challenged as never before and the limits of
 creativity as well as physical endurance are put on the block. Managing one’s
own business strengthens character and challenges one’s abilities.
c. Opportunity to benefit financially – The entrepreneurial landscape has tens of
thousand of success stories in money terms (as failures as well). In many cases,
rags-to-riches example reflect the founder’s creativity, ingenuity, hard work, and
dedication to business.
d. Opportunity to contribute to society and be recognized for one’s efforts – as with
financial rewards, recognition for honest dealing as well as service to customers
and community is a major encouragement and inspiration among entrepreneurs.

3.3 Drawbacks of being an entrepreneur

While there are advantages of becoming an entrepreneur, there are drawbacks

that hound entrepreneurs and also scares up many. Some of the drawbacks or
disadvantages of entrepreneurs are:

a. Uncertainty of income – Putting up and running a business provides no

guarantee that any entrepreneur will earn enough money to survive.
b. Risk of losing the entire invested capital – Putting a new business exposes the
entrepreneur to all forms of risk including losing all the amounts you have
worked for in life.
c. Long hours and hard work – Establishing and managing a self-owned business
entails tremendous investments in energy and time to get the business off the
ground.
d. Lower quality of life until the business gets established – The long hours and
hard work needed to launch a company can take the toll on one’s family and
social life.
e. Complete responsibility – It’s to be the big boss, but many entrepreneurs find
that they must make decisions in issues about which they are not really
knowledgeable.

Assessment 1:

1. Describe in your own word who is an entrepreneur?

2. Discuss briefly the advantages of becoming an entrepreneur.
3. Discuss the drawbacks of entrepreneur.
3.4 Attributes, Qualities, and Characteristics of an Entrepreneur

 Self-awareness. He knows who he is, what he is good at, and what he likes to
do. He starts a business that is based on his expertise in a specific field, and
focuses on his involvement in an area he thoroughly enjoys.
 Self-motivated. Also known as drive, self-motivation is one of the most
important personality traits of successful entrepreneurs. This is the
characteristic that gets him going and keeps him moving when he is in business.
 Courage. Courage, or the willingness to take risks is a valuable trait when
striving for success.
 Confidence. The age-old philosophy of positive thinking is a major step in the
direction of success. A confident attitude is one of the most appealing traits he
exhibits to prospective clients, for it lets them know that they will be getting the
best their money can buy.
 Positive thinkers. Entrepreneurs are positive thinkers. They think of success
and bright sides. Such success consciousness leads entrepreneurs to success.
 Patience. When one owns his business, there will be times when he feels like
the roof is craving in, especially when the suppliers seem to be taking their own
sweet time in fulfilling an important order or when a customer’s demands seem
to be unrealistic.
 Decisiveness. Business has been described as a process of making one fast
decision after another. Often, a decision has to be made immediately, on the
spur of the moment.
 Experience. A primary reason some businesses fall within a few years of start-
up is lack of business experience.
 Knowledge. Experience in one’s field is invaluable, but it is not enough. One
has a better chance of succeeding by knowing, as much as possible, about
factors such as business basics, the product or service that he want to sell, the
industry he is entering, his competition, and the local, regional, state, and/or
national markets.
 Information-Seeking. To assure accomplishment of his entrepreneurial goals,
the entrepreneur continuously seeks for relevant information regarding the
market, client, suppliers, and competitors, and consults experts’ advice on
business and other technical matters.
 Perseverance. One of the adages one will hear time and again when talking to
entrepreneurs is that perseverance is 90 percent of the battle to succeed.
  Drive. One must believe in his goal and be determined to succeed. The
successful businessperson does not view obstacles or stumbling blocks as
problems, but rather as challenges.
 Risk-Taking. Entrepreneurs are known for being risk-takers. They prefer tasks,
which provides them some challenges. They are not afraid to take risks.
 Innovative. Entrepreneurs are creative. They do things in new and different
ways.
 Opportunity-Seeking. An entrepreneur readily identifies opportunities for going
into or to improve his business.
 Demand for efficiency and quality. Setting high, but realistic standards of
excellence for himself, he finds it difficult to compromise on those standards.
 Systematic planning and monitoring. As a careful planner, the entrepreneur
sets what are to be accomplished, and meticulously assesses how today’s
activity can contribute to the accomplishment of his long-term goal.
 Persuasion and networking. A persuasive person, the entrepreneur easily
establishes a network of personal and business contacts around him.

ASSESSMENT 2:
Instruction: Read the case study below and answer the
following questions (5 points each).
1. Which entrepreneurial characteristics does Awang have that may be important to
his success?

2. Which characteristics could lead to Awang’s failure?

3. What do you think are the steps to avoid the pitfalls common to a small business?
 SUMMARY
It is not enough for creative and self-driven individuals as well as innovative
corporate organizations to be simply aware of what entrepreneurship is really all
about. Getting involved into entrepreneurship or being an entrepreneur does not
necessarily mean putting up a business. There are a lot of advantages in
becoming an entrepreneur foremost to this is the opportunity to gain control over
one’s own destiny to reaching one’s potentials, and of course, the promise of
economic empowerment as well as social distancing. The flipside of being an
entrepreneur are the various drawbacks which if no proper mind-setting is in place
and no precautionary measures are adapted, could lead to a frustrating scenario.
Hence, being an entrepreneur should possess qualities and characteristics that will
help to face challenges and most of all to become successful.

FEEDBACK
I hope that you fully understand what entrepreneur means, the attributes, qualities and
characteristics that you should adapt to become a successful entrepreneur. You have also
learned the advantages and drawbacks of an entrepreneur. You can appreciate its
importance through adapting it in your daily lives especially that some of you are starting to
create its own business. If you have answered the assessment questions thoroughly, you are
doing a good job! If you have further questions you can directly message me or in our group
chat, but if you think that you understood enough let us proceed to our next topic.

REFERENCES
Santoyo, Alfredo M. Entrepreneurship , MaxCor Publishing Inc., 2019
Asor, Winefreda T. Entrepreneurship in the Philippine Setting, Rex Bookstore Inc.,
2015
Kuratko, Donald F.. Entrepreneurship An Introduction, Philippine Edition , Cengage
Learning Asia Pte. Ltd., 2012
Orcullo, Norberto, Jr. A. Contemporary Entrepreneurship, Academic Publishing
Corporation, 2004