They say when a person is about to die, flashes of his past life appears infront of his/her eyes. I thought we could take this opportunity and take a flash back to the start of this journey and to see what we have gained as we approach the end.This blog is divided into four parts, starting first in Entrepreneurship/ Leadership, The difference between an entrepreneur and a manager and further the link with opportunity creation or opportunity identification, the new terms, the entrepreneurs personal style of thinking and solving problem, and the list goes on to the importance in organizational culture. These all will be covered in several posts and they are all linked to opening a new venture or managing one. The aim is to help weave one whole picture that has been dispersed via different articles...this is done in order to prove the last statement or reflections for this blog; that statement my dear friends is that the study/journey was all worth it.

Since the blog are for students and to keep it interesting, I have used a less academic approach, however the knowledge and details provided are all authetic and as ususal the reference are at the end of each post.

Having said that, let us approach from the popular theme of Entrepreneurship:

"An entrepreneur is an individual who establishes and manages a business for the principal purposes of profit and growth. The entrepreneur is characterized principally by innovative behavior and will employ strategic management practices in the business."

(Carland, et. al. , 1988)

Many literatures tried to define who an entrepreneur is, in the beginning it was the trait approach, who said that entrepreneurs are born and there are skills that others can't achieve, for this purpose study was based on traits like independence, self acualization and risk taking propensity. Alas after 35 years, the trait based approach wasn't considered insufficient because it did not have a process, was subjective and encourage a breed of elite entrepreneurs.

Then followed the skills approach who believed that entrepreneurs skill can be achieved. They formed on three main areas: technical, human and conceptual. Then came the style approach, which based on the concept that the leader could be defined with how he leads a team. This approach followed from the research done by University of Michigan studies and the Ohio university. Their output can be seen from the Blake & Mouton model.

After them there was the situational approach, which focused on the situations building the entrepreneurs, they also developed a matrix based on the directive and supportive which was further built in the different styles the entrepreneur took,listed as directing, coaching, suppporting and delegating. Later the contigency theory came which focused on matching the leader with the situation as shown below and the last is the path goal theory, which states that the job of a leader was to remove the hurdles from the path leading to the aim by being supportive.

However according to (Busenitz, & Barney, 1997) its states that the cognitive theory is more practical, because it solves the problem as to why some entrepreneurs are successfully able to take advantage of their opportunities and while others are not are able to do so and it is also useful in understanding why this may be the reason entrepreneurs don't make good managers.

The theory that they propose is based on biases and heuristics, which in other term is also known as a 'muddle' approach strategy.Biases and Heuristic is a strategy used by most entrepreneur that focuses on day-to day solving of problem, where the decisions are based on approaches that have been successfully implented in the past and the main goal is to survive.

Without these biases and heuristics, many decisions would never be made. In entrepreneurial ventures, in particular, the window of opportunity would often be gone by the
time all the necessary information became available for more rational decision-making.
Additionally, successfully starting a new business usually involves overcoming multiple
hurdles. Using biases and heuristics as simplifying mechanisms for dealing with these
multiple problems may be crucial. To face hurdles from a strict econometric approach would not only postpone decisions, but would in all likelihood make them overwhelming.

These theories support the definition of the leader defined below:
The leader’s role is to determine the desired future state (direction of growth), identify
the kind of formal structures and systems needed to support that vision, and guide the implementation process.

However, ironically and quite interesting is that I agree with the cognitive theory and contradict with the definition a leader/ entrepreneur. I agree with (Nicholls-Nixon, 2005), which according to the complexity science prefer the definition of the leader below:

"Instead of determining direction and creating organization fit, the primary task of the leader is to develop a knowledge creation process that will generate the innovations needed to enhance future performance."

As we all know that as the organizations grow, an entrepreneur has to learn to be the manager and adopt an outward focus, if he/she wants the business to grow further. However literature and pratical examples illustrate that its the most difficult time for them, but the theoires are sure to explain how a leader/entreprenuer can behave to make sure that the ball remains in his court!!!

Reference:

Busenitz, L. W., & Barney, J. B. (1997). Differences between entrepreneurs and
managers in large organizations: biases and heuristics in strategic decision-making.
Journal of Business Venturing, 12(1), 9-30.

Carland, J. W., Hoy, F., & Carland, J. A. C. (1988). "Who is an entrepreneur?" is aquestion worth asking. American Journal of Small Business, 12(4).

Nicholls-Nixon, C. (2005), Rapid growth and high performance: The entrepreneur’s
“impossible dream?” Academy of Management Executive, 19 (1), 77-89.