ATTRIBUTES,

QUALITIES AND
CHARACTERISTICS OF
AN ENTREPRENEUR
ENMGMT1
ENTREPRENEURIAL MANAGEMENT
PREPARED &
COMPILED BY
BELEN APOSTOL, MBA
Who are Entrepreneurs
• Independent individuals, intensely committed and determined to
persevere, who work very hard.
• They are confident optimists who strive for integrity. They burn with
the competitive desire to excel and use failure as a learning tool.
Who are Entrepreneurs
• Common traits
• Original thinkers
• Risk takers
• Take responsibility for own actions
• Feel competent and capable
• Set high goals and enjoy working toward them
• Self employed parents
• Firstborns
• Between 30-50 years old
• Well educated – 80% have college degree and 1/3 have a graduate
level degree
Successful & Unsuccessful Entrepreneurs
• Successful
• Creative and Innovative
• Position themselves in shifting or new markets
• Create new products
• Create new processes
• Create new delivery
• Unsuccessful
• Poor Managers
• Low work ethic
• Inefficient
• Failure to plan and prepare
• Poor money managers
Characteristics Entrepreneurs

Key Personal
Attributes

Strong Managerial Successful

Competencies Entrepreneurs

Good Technical Skills

Key Personal Attributes
• Entrepreneurs are Made, Not Born!
• Many of these key attributes are developed early in life, with the
family environment playing an important role
• Entrepreneurs tend to have had self employed parents who tend
to support and encourage independence, achievement, and
responsibility
• Firstborns tend to have more entrepreneurial attributes because
they receive more attention, have to forge their own way, thus
creating higher self-confidence.
Key Personal Attributes
• Entrepreneurial Careers
• The idea that entrepreneurial success leads to more
entrepreneurial activity may explain why many entrepreneurs start
multiple companies over the course of their career
• Corridor Principle- Using one business to start or acquire others
and then repeating the process
• Serial Entrepreneurs- A person who finds and operates multiple
companies during one career
Key Personal Attributes
• Need for Achievement
• A person’s desire either for excellence or to succeed in
competitive situations
• High achievers take responsibility for attaining their goals, set
moderately difficult goals, and want immediate feedback on their
performance
• Success is measured in terms of what those efforts have
accomplished
Key Personal Attributes
• Desire for Independence
• Entrepreneurs often seek independence from others
• As a result, they generally aren’t motivated to perform well in
large, bureaucratic organizations
• Entrepreneurs have internal drive, are confident in their own
abilities, and possess a great deal of self-respect
Key Personal Attributes
• Self-Confidence
• Because of the high risks involved in running an entrepreneurial
organization, having an “upbeat” and self-confident attitude is
essential
• A successful track record leads to improved self-confidence and
self-esteem
• Self-confidence enables that person to be optimistic in
representing the firm to employees and customers alike
Key Personal Attributes
• Self-Sacrifice
• Essential
• Nothing worth having is free
• Success has a high price, and entrepreneurs have to be willing to
sacrifice certain things
Technical Proficiency
• Many entrepreneurs demonstrate strong technical skills, typically
bringing some related experience to their business ventures
• For example, successful car dealers usually have lots of technical
knowledge about selling and servicing automobiles before opening
their dealerships
• Especially important in the computer industry
• NOT ALWAYS NECESSARY
Entrepreneurship Theory
• Entrepreneurs cause entrepreneurship.
• Entrepreneurship is a function of the entrepreneur:
• Entrepreneurship is the interaction of skills related to inner control,
planning and goal setting, risk taking, innovation, reality perception,
use of feedback, decision making, human relations, and
independence.
The Entrepreneurial Journey
Entrepreneurs
• Create ventures much as an artist creates a painting.
•Are formed by the lived experience of venture creation.
Experiential Nature of Creating a Sustainable Enterprise
• Emergence of the opportunity
• Emergence of the venture
• End emergence of the entrepreneur
The Dark Side of Entrepreneurship
• The Entrepreneur’s Confrontation with Risk
• Financial risk versus profit (return) motive varies in
entrepreneurs’ desire for wealth.
• Career risk—loss of employment security
• Family and social risk—competing commitments of work and
family
• Psychic risk—psychological impact of failure on the well-being of
entrepreneurs
Stress and the Entrepreneur
Entrepreneurial Stress
• The extent to which entrepreneurs’ work demands and expectations
exceed their abilities to perform as venture initiators, they are likely
to experience stress.
Causes of Entrepreneurial Stress
• Loneliness
• Immersion in business
• People problems
• Need to achieve
Entrepreneurs: Type A Personalities
• Chronic and severe sense of time urgency.
• Constant involvement in multiple projects subject to deadlines.
• Neglect of all aspects of life except work.
• A tendency to take on excessive responsibility, combined with the
feeling that “Only I am capable of taking care of this matter.”
• Explosiveness of speech and a tendency to speak faster than most
people.
Dealing with Stress
• Networking
• Getting away from it all
• Communicating with employees
• Finding satisfaction outside the company
• Delegating
• Exercising Rigorously
The Entrepreneurial Ego
Self-Destructive Characteristics
• Overbearing need for control
• Sense of distrust
• Overriding desire for success
•Unrealistic optimism
Entrepreneurial Motivation
• The quest for new-venture creation as well as the willingness to sustain
that venture.
• Personal characteristics, personal environment, business environment,
personal goal set (expectations), and the existence of a viable business
idea.
ENTREPRENEURIAL
COMPETENCIES
Competencies
• Competency is composed of knowledge, skills, abilities, traits and
other characteristics for successful job performance.
• An entrepreneur is expected to interact with these
environmental forces which require him to be highly competent in
different dimensions like intellectual, attitudinal, behavioral,
technical, and managerial aspects.
Need for Entrepreneur Competencies
• Entrepreneurial competencies are the skills necessary for an
entrepreneur to venture into an enterprise
• Organize and manage an enterprise competently to realize the goal
for which the enterprise is established.
Components of Entrepreneurial Competencies
ATTITUDINAL COMPETENCY ATTRIBUTES
• An attitude is a hypothetical construct that represents an individual’s
degree of like or dislike for something. Attitudes are generally positive
or negative views of a person, place, thing, or event.
• Attitudes are judgments of an individual.
• Behavior in a given situation can be viewed as a function of
the individual’s attitude towards the situation
Components of Entrepreneurial Competencies
Self Confidence
• Self-confidence is an essential trait in an entrepreneur because he is
regularly called upon to perform tasks and make decisions that
require great amounts of faith and belief in himself to achieve the
predetermined goals
Components of Entrepreneurial Competencies
Self Esteem
• Self-esteem of an entrepreneur represents his ability to develop
healthy confidence and respect for himself.
Dealing with Failures
• Entrepreneurship is about getting up whenever the business fails, and
learning from that failure. An entrepreneur believes that failure is part
of the entrepreneurial process, and often without it, success would
not be possible
Components of Entrepreneurial Competencies
Tolerance for Ambiguity
• In the entrepreneurial process tolerance for ambiguity refers to the
ability of an entrepreneur to perceive ambiguous situation as
desirable, challenging, and interesting.
Components of Entrepreneurial Competencies
Concern for high quality
• An entrepreneur has a concern for high quality of his products and
services to meet or surpass existing standards of excellence in a
faster, better and cheaply way.
Components of Entrepreneurial Competencies
Locus of Control (LOC)
• Locus of control is the system of belief of an individual who perceives
the outcome of an event as being either within or beyond his
personal control.
• Entrepreneurs tend to believe in their own ability to control the
outcomes to their efforts by influencing the existing environment,
rather than leave everything to luck.
Components of Entrepreneurial Competencies
BEHAVIORAL COMPETENCY ATTRIBUTES
• Behavioral competency of an entrepreneur refers to the underlying
characteristics having casual relationship with effective or superior
performances in the process of carrying on his business activities.
Components of Entrepreneurial Competencies
Initiatives
• Initiative of an entrepreneur refers to his behavior with a preference
for taking action on different responsibilities or assignments.
Sees and Acting on Opportunities
• Sees and acting on opportunities refers to the unique entrepreneurial
behavior which helps him to be alert to information and ability to
process it in order to identify and recognize the potential business
opportunities even before his competitor.
Components of Entrepreneurial Competencies
Persistence
• Persistence of an entrepreneur denotes the ability which keeps him
constantly motivated even when he is confronted by obstacles and
willing to keep trying when things go wrong.
Components of Entrepreneurial Competencies
Assertiveness
• Assertiveness of an entrepreneur is about his rights or point of view
without either aggressively threatening the rights of others (assuming
a position of dominance) or submissively permitting others to ignore.
Components of Entrepreneurial Competencies
Need for achievement
• Successful entrepreneurs are characterized by a need for
achievement which motivates them to take up responsibilities for
finding solutions to problems.
Need for autonomy
• The need for autonomy of an entrepreneur is characterized by a drive
to control and influence others, a need to win arguments, a need to
persuade and prevail.
Components of Entrepreneurial Competencies
Risk-taking
• Entrepreneurs are essentially persons who take decisions under
uncertainty and therefore they are willing to bear risk.
Innovation
• Innovation refers to characteristic of an individual who has interest
and desire to seek changes in techniques and ready to introduce such
changes into his operations
Components of Entrepreneurial Competencies
Creativity
• An entrepreneur is said to be creative when he is able to identify a
gap in the market and think up a product or service to meet that gap.
• Creativity of an entrepreneur also implies the ability to do old things
in a new way or able to give new solutions.
Components of Entrepreneurial Competencies
MANAGERIAL COMPETENCY ATTRIBUTES
• Managerial Competency of an entrepreneur is the ability to direct his
staff and define the expected outcomes clearly and finally to get the
things done at the best and cheapest ways and means.
Information seeking
• An entrepreneur has an urge to look for the required information in
order to make an informed decision, for example, selecting, starting
and successfully managing the desired business
Components of Entrepreneurial Competencies
Systematic planning
• An entrepreneur is expected to have systematic planning which will
help him to prepare an action plan for every area of operation in
order to achieve the pre determined goals.
Problem solving
• Problem solving refers to the application of appropriate knowledge
and skills in order to solve a problem arising while carrying on the
business.
Components of Entrepreneurial Competencies
• Persuasion
Persuasion in entrepreneurship refers to the ability of entrepreneurs to
link, convince and influence other individuals, groups, agencies,
creditors, debtors, customers and even competitors in order to create a
contact and maintain good rapport.
Components of Entrepreneurial Competencies
Goal setting & Perseverance
• Goal setting refers to the ability of an entrepreneur to set clear and
specific goals and objectives.
• Successful entrepreneurs are able to achieve great things only by
overcoming the obstacles that stand in their way.
• Therefore they need to have perseverance which implies
commitment, hard work, and patience, endurance apart from being
able to bear difficulties calmly and without complaint.
Components of Entrepreneurial Competencies
Communication Skill
• Communication skill refers to the ability of an entrepreneur to
transfer ideas, plans, policies and programs to employees, debtors,
creditors, customers and everyone who is connected with the
business in order to inform, influence and to express his feelings.
Components of Entrepreneurial Competencies
Technical knowledge
• An entrepreneur needs to address the rapid technical changes in the
industry. Higher levels of technology must be introduced in the
production methods in order to achieve productivity demands.
Components of Entrepreneurial Competencies
Social skill
• Social skill of entrepreneurs include social perception (the ability to
perceive others accurately), expressiveness (the ability to express
feelings and reactions clearly and openly), impression management
(skill in making favorable first impressions on others), and social
adaptability (proficiency in adapting one’s actions to current social
contexts) in the process of managing his business.
Components of Entrepreneurial Competencies
Other Competencies
• Opportunity competencies : Competencies related to recognizing and
developing market opportunities through various means .
• Relationship competencies : Competencies related to person-to-
person or individual-to-group-based interactions, e.g., building a
context of cooperation and trust, using contacts and connections,
persuasive ability, communication and interpersonal skill .
Components of Entrepreneurial Competencies
Other Competencies
• Conceptual competencies : Competencies related to different
conceptual abilities, which are reflected in the behaviors of the
entrepreneur, e.g., decision skills, absorbing and understanding
complex information, and risk-taking, and innovativeness .
• Organizing competencies : Competencies related to the
organization of different internal external human, physical, financial
and technological resources, including team-building, leading
employees, training, and controlling
Components of Entrepreneurial Competencies
Other Competencies
• Strategic competencies : Competencies related to setting, evaluating
and implementing the strategies of the firm.
• Commitment competencies : Competencies that drive the
entrepreneur to move ahead with the business.