Entrepreneurship: Definition and Perspectives

Entrepreneurship Defined

• Entrepreneurship is defined as the skill in starting new businesses, especially when it involves seeing new opportunities, according to the Cambridge dictionary.
• It's a discipline that seeks to understand how opportunities are discovered, created, and exploited, by whom, and with what consequences.

Two Main Perspectives of Entrepreneurship

• Predictive Logic sees Entrepreneurship as a linear process with ideally predictable steps and outcomes, working best in times of certainty.
• Creation Logic is a form of thinking used when the future is unpredictable, and involves building a future through trial and error.

Prediction vs Action

• Prediction involves big planning, while action involves small actions.
• Prediction waits until you get what you need, while action starts with what you have.
• Prediction expects a return, while action accepts loss.
• Prediction is linear, while action is iterative.
• Prediction optimizes, while action experiments.
• Prediction avoids failure, while action embraces and leverages failure.
• Prediction is competitive, while action is collaborative.
• Prediction is knowable, while action is unknowable.
• To the extent there is control of the future it can be predicted.
• To the extent we can create the future there is no need to predict it.

Creation Approach

• By using the creation approach, entrepreneurs learn through action and manage uncertainty by focusing on developing five key skills.

Five Key Skills for Entrepreneurs

• The five skills include the skill of play, as well as experimentation, empathy, creativity and reflection.
• The skill of play: frees the imagination, opens minds to opportunities, and helps become more innovative
• Play includes the use of serious games (i.e., educational games) such as alternative reality games and learning simulations that challenge you to be creative and to think like an entrepreneur.
• The skill of Experimentation: acting in order to learn; collecting real-world information; testing new concepts; asking questions; validating assumptions; based on action not research
• Experimenting means taking action, such as getting out of the building and collect real-word information to test new concepts, rather than sitting as a desk searching databases for the latest research
• The skill of Empathy: understanding the emotion, circumstances, intentions, thoughts, and needs of others.
• Empathy allows connection with potential stakeholders and identify unmet needs.
• Interviewing practicing entrepreneurs can help empathy for what they have been through and ability to imagine being in their position.
• The skill of Creativity takes action under conditions of uncertainty, and requires openness to the world
• The skill of Reflection helps critically analyze feelings and knowledge
• Reflection provides new perspectives, evaluates outcomes, and draws conclusions.
• Reflection helps make sense of all of the other actions required of play, empathy, creativity and experimentation.
• Reflection codifies learning from practicing the four other skills.

Ways to Practice Reflection

• Narrative reflection
• Emotional reflection
• Perceptive reflection
• Analytical reflection
• Evaluative reflection
• Critical reflection

Entrepreneurship as a Method versus Process

• Entrepreneurship as a method involves a body of skills that together comprise a toolkit for Entrepreneurial action.
• The method approach involves trial and error, requiring iterative learning, practicing, and reflecting
• Entrepreneurship as a process is the means of identifying an opportunity, understanding resource requirements, acquiring resources, planning, implementing, and harvesting, while involving planning and prediction.

Entrepreneurship as a Method vs Entrepreneurship as a Process

• Method involves a set of practices while process involves known inputs and predicted outputs.
• Method involves phases of learning while process involves steps to complete.
• Method is iterative while process is linear.
• Method is creative while process is predictive.
• Method is action focused while process is focused on planning.
• Method focuses on investment for learning while process focuses on expected return.
• Method is collaborative while process is competitive.

The Practice of Entrepreneurs

• Emphasizes smart action over planning
• Moves quickly from white board to real world
• Trying is a low-cost experiment
• Experiment with many new ideas simultaneously

Eight Components of the Practice of Entrepreneurs

• Reflect on your desired impact on the world.
• Start with means at hand.
• Describe affordable loss.
• Calculate the idea today.
• Take small action.
• Network and enroll others.
• Build on what you learn.
• Reflect and be honest with yourself.

Tips from Baekgaard and Miller

• Concentrate on what you do best
• Don't be satisfied with the status quo-innovate and practice continuous improvement
• Choose the right people to work with: vendors, bankers, and employees
• Networking is important; it's important when people like you and you like them
• Don't be afraid to take risks
• Take one day at a time
• Follow your passion and have fun!

Deliberate Practice

• Deliberate practice is a method of carrying out carefully focused efforts to improve current performance.
• Students who used deliberate practice were able to make more proficient use of their time, energy, and resources, and seemed to learn how to learn.

Components of Deliberate Practice

• High levels of focus, attention, and concentration
• Strengthens performance by identifying weakness
• Must be consistent and be maintained
• Must be repeated to produce lasting results
• Requires continuous feedback
• Involves setting goals
• Involves self-observation and self-reflection

Why Deliberate Practice?

• It helps people “learn how to learn."
• It enhances perception, pattern recognition, and analytical skills.
• There is no need to feel daunted because you can begin with transferable skills you already have!