Entrepreneurial Mindset & Opportunity - Unit 2

Entrepreneurial Mindset & Opportunity - Unit 2 from SS113: The Entrepreneurial Mind

• The main reference for this unit is "Entrepreneurial Mindset" by Serrano (2020).
• Unit 2 explores mindset characteristics, entrepreneurial habits and ideas.
• Examines opportunity recognition, and how to turn ideas into opportunities.
• Adapt the IDEATE model for opportunity recognition

"Are Entrepreneurs Self-Made or Born?"

• Some people believe entrepreneurial traits like risk-taking, leadership, and creativity are innate.
• Nicolaou and Shane (2009) suggest genetics may influence traits like risk tolerance and persistence.
• Others believe entrepreneurs are shaped by experience, learning, and adaptability.
• Carol Dweck's theory of the growth mindset aligns with this perspective.
• Anyone can develop entrepreneurial skills through hard work and resilience.
• Entrepreneurs can be shaped by both their predispositions and experiences.
• Developing an entrepreneurial mindset is key and traits like innovation, risk-taking, and resilience can be nurtured.
• Success comes from combining natural traits with learning and adaptability.

Steve Jobs (Apple)

• Commonly cited as a natural-born visionary; Jobs' success came from years of adaptation, learning, and failure.
• After being ousted from Apple, Jobs founded NeXT and learned lessons that enabled him to return and lead the company.

Oprah Winfrey (OWN Network)

• Oprah's success comes from her ability to learn from experience, rise from poverty and use her platform.
• Oprah built a media empire, facing numerous obstacles but persevered.

Fixed vs. Growth Mindsets

• Fixed Mindset: Believing abilities, intelligence, and talents are innate with changes that cannot be made.

• Often avoid challenges, fear failure, and give up easily when challenged.

• Believe abilities are static, often saying "I'm either good at it or I'm not."

• Growth Mindset: Believing abilities and intelligence is cultivated through learning, effort and persistence.

• Embrace challenges, learn from mistakes, and are motivated by the belief that hard work improve success.

• Talents and intelligence are viewed as a starting point and believe challenges are for learning.

• An example of somebody with a growth mindset is Micheal Jordan.

Definition of Mindset

• A mindset refers to the total collection of beliefs and attitudes about ourselves and the world.
• Particularly in terms of abilities like talent, intelligence, or potential.
• Mindset impacts how we perceive challenges, opportunities, and failures; which in turn influences success.
• Carol Dweck, a psychologist at Stanford, introduced these concepts in her book Mindset: The New Psychology of Success (2006).
• Dweck's research suggests a fixed or growth mindset has a profound impact on achievements.

Dweck's Research Key Insights

• Effort: The core belief with the growth mindset that effort leads to mastery, and is is nessecary to improve success.
• Challenges: People with a growth mindset welcome the challenges as opportunities to learn. Those with a fixed mindset avoid.
• Failure: Failure is used as a learning experience, individuals reflect on the process and learn from mistakes.

Applications of Mindset Differently

• Education: Students with growth mindsets achieve better academic results.
• Learning is viewed as a gradual process that involves effort; more likey to persevere in challenging subjects like math and science.
• Business and Leadership: Adopting a growth mindset is essential for resilience and innovation.
• Business leaders with growth mindsets create environments for innovation and experimentation, rewarding effort and preserverence.
• Sports: Athletes training and skills are improved with growth mindset.

Entrepreneurial Mindset Characteristics

• The essential characteristics of an entrepreneurial mindset are: Curiosity, Commitment, Optimism, Flexibility, Ownership, Leadership, Connection, and Self-respect.

Curiosity and Commitment

• Curiosity leads to innovation and opportunity recognition, encouraging us to seek new knowledge and explore.
• Elon Musk exemplifies curiosity, driving the creation of both Tesla and Space X.
• Commitment is the determination to follow through on goals through determination to follow through on challenges or failures.
• To navigate challenges successfully requires commitment
• Howard Schultz, the former CEO of Starbucks, faced rejection from over 200 investors when trying to raise funds.
• Commitment provides perseverance when others might give up.

Optimism and Flexibility

• Optimism allows entrepreneurs to maintain a positive attitude by remaining hopeful.
• Optimistic entrepreneurs see solutions and persevere through setbacks.
• Richard Branson, the founder of Virgin Group, is known for his optimism to learn from failures.
• In an ever-changing business landscape, flexibility is important and cruical as an entreprenuar.
• To pivot and adapt to find solutions with changes that arise.
• Flexibility helps respond with unforeseen challanges to sieze new opportunities to stay campetivitive.
• Reed Hastings (CEO of Netflix) is an example by pivoting Netflix into a streaming service despite challenges.

Ownership and Leadership

• Ownership is the belief you are in control of what happens regarding successes or failures.
• Linked to psychologists internal locus of control, where actions impact there life directly.
• Jeff Bezos (Amazon) exemplifies ownership by taking responsibility for both success and failures.
• His motto which emphasizes that if you double experements, you double innovation.
• Ownership is nessarry, because instill confindence in the decisions that are made.
• Leadership means inspiring and guiding a team towards a vision.
• This skill is a requirement for entreprenuers to motivate towards a shared vision.
• Leadership encompasses innovative, empowering and driving change.
• Indra Nooyi, the former CEO of PepsiCO, transformed the direction of the company to work toward sustainable growth.

Connection and Self-Respect

• Connection is the ability to create a strong supportive network that provide both financial and strategic support.
• Entrepreneurs more likley acess business opportunities, devolp partnerships, and find resources.
• Reid Hoffman (LinkedIn) is an example of the power of connections and a belief in professional networks.

Essentials of Entrepreneurial Mindset

• Essential entrepreneurial mindsets combine passion, drive, action, responsibility, and collaboration.

• Passion, possibility, accountability, connection, and giving are the values of the essential mindset.

• Passion First: Align your business with personal passions and your goals, since it is meaningful to you. For example, Steve Jobs built Apple around his passion for innovation and design.

• Everything is Possible: It encourages setting ambitious goals and believing that anything can be accomplished with the right persistence and effort.

• Also, it influences individuals belief that everything is possible to push boundaries, like Elon Musk and Space X.

• Accountable 100%: By being accountable it influences finding solutions versus making excuses. An example Howard Schultz (Starbucks), closed hundreds of stores to improve to core values.

• We Are Connected: Collaboration drives meaningful results and recognizing the importance of advisors.

• Reid Hoffman (LinkedIn) created LinkedIn from a mindset of connection.

Live Life to Give: Embrace Corporate Social Responsibility.

• Entrepreneurs who give back strengthing the businesss reputation.
• By using corporate social responsibiltiy (CSR) , drives entreprenuers to give back more.
• Bill Gates dedicated a large sum of money to address global issues by creating the Gates Foundation.

The IDEATE Model

• A structured framework guides entrepreneurs through the process of identifying, developing and executing business opportunities
• Entrepreneurs should transform an idea into viable business ventures by following the steps
• Step one: Indentify the problem.
• Step two: Devlop a suitable solution.
• Step three: Evaluate the feasibility of the solution.
• Step four: Adapt based on feedback
• Step five: Test the idea
• Step six: Execute the plan

IDEATE - Indentify: Explore Potential Opportunities

• Indentifing potential opporunities is vital in the market to observe trends, understand market gaps and understand consumer needs.
• For istance, Brian Chesky and Joe Gebbia created airbnb when people had spare rooms to create afforable housing.
• Develop which aims to refine ideas, by gathering feeback and prototyping concepts.
• Then after feedback, refine and further devlop for potential oppurunities.
• Evaluate is where people evaluate financial forcasting, and asses customer demand.
• Rigorously Elon Mask evaluated for the tesla with electric vehicles for demand and funding.
• All ventures have speed bumps, adapt focuses on modifying business models based on market conditons.
• For Instance, intstagram because popular for photo sharing versus location check-ins with feedback.
• Once this has passed Transform allows business to create tangible goods or products.

Assess Entrepreneurship as a Habit

• Focuses on taking your actions which allow the mind to navigate complexities of a business and success.
• To achieve success requires these qualities for entrepreurial growth: Self Leadership and Behaior Focused Strategies.