ENTREPRENEURSHIP – THE STRATEGY FOR ALL SEASONS
I guess it will come as no surprise if a novice to Management practice complains at the multiplicity of Leadership theories and success formulas touted out by our Universities, Gurus and Consultants. As a consultant myself, my response has been that Management is an art where multiple schools of thought abound. It is a social science, I argue, not an exact science such as Physics or Biology.
There is a lot of truth in this reasoning. Having said that, what’s our excuse for not having at least some common definitions, language, structures or platforms?
It is a fact that academic and empirical approaches to management have not used the same language. Most empirical theories to date have emerged out of research on a sample of success stories and the strategies, ideas and activities that went into the making of those successes. Unfortunately, with changing events and contexts, those same strategies have often failed the same companies or other intending emulators. To me, this means that the strategies suggested did not study and specify the specific circumstances that they would succeed under – as a student of science, we would cover these under the heading “Given”. To put it differently, the strategies and actions recommended are specific solutions that work in certain situations, while they are presented as laws and panaceas that can work in all situations.
I reckon this calls for a stepping back and looking to more fundamental causes and solutions. Going back to the basics, as it were. If one were to look for situations / circumstances that every organization can relate to, a reference to their own history would be a great starting point. Their own record of success, as they evolved from being a mere idea in the founder’s head to the time when they got some traction and started building a viable, sustainable enterprise; their own entrepreneurial journey in the initial years.
Through-out my career as a bureaucratic-banker turned corporate leader, turned entrepreneur, I have admired the early stages of entrepreneurship. This is the time when one’s strategies and actions have to stand the acid test of the market – against small and rapidly dwindling resources. A few wrong moves and you are facing the prospect of wrapping up. The well-known, high rate of failures among start-ups also sets the benchmark at a very high level and forces the entrepreneur to be hyper alert to both opportunities and problem-signals. To me, therefore, this period – the period of Entrepreneurship – in any business that emerges successfully at the other end, is a fertile ground of learning; replete with lessons in managing markets, funds, people, vision, mission and the various hard and soft aspects of managing an organization.
For sure, there are plenty of studies, books and theories on Entrepreneurship too. More so, after the likes of Bill Gates, Steve Jobs and Sergey Brin have made their billions and added an unprecedented star power sex appeal to the profession! Yet, it seems that most of this study and research has focused on Entrepreneurship as it relates to the business of “start-ups”.
And that is my problem with the current approaches.
I believe, the typical situation, conventionally faced by a start-up – unknown markets (or lack of knowledge about them), paucity of resources, rapidly changing external environments (laws, technologies, social expectations), competition from big and small businesses – have now become de jure for every business, everywhere, all the time. This is what calls for a more intensive focus on the art and science of entrepreneurship. Not just to have more successful start-ups, but for all organizations, big and small, young and old alike. This is the perspective that needs to emerge: The study of Entrepreneurship, as a fertile laboratory for the study of Management itself.
- What are the core qualities an Entrepreneur must possess, to achieve success / sustained survival?
- What are some of the issues faced along the Entrepreneurial journey? What are the specific strategies that could be used in various situations?
- What essential human and managerial qualities are needed in the Entrepreneur or Team to ensure a continuous look-out for the changes in external circumstances and to pivot to the correct course at the right time?
I am sure there are many more questions which an open-ended study of the lessons of Entrepreneurship will raise and answer. The key point being, let us study these, not with the narrow expectation of benefiting the “start-up community”, but to the management of any organization of any size and vintage. For, the environment and eco-system faced by Entrepreneurs today is hardly different from that faced by more mature organizations. It is time we actively mine Entrepreneurship for broader lessons!
Importantly, the beauty of such a study is that the very fact that an organization exists today means it has successfully gone through the entrepreneurial stage – and already has in its DNA some seeds of the success mantras. What is needed is to rediscover this lost ability and adapt it to the current context. It is not necessarily a new learning. Rather it could well be a revival or awakening of something already lying dormant within!
And here comes the crux of the message of this post: There is already enough study of Entrepreneurship for Entrepreneurs – and this is growing at a great pace. What is needed – urgently – is to translate these lessons for their senior, larger, more bureaucratic, more “successful” cousins that hog the headlines in newspapers and populate the stock indices that impact the markets and investors world over.
Management theory needs to take a closer look at the success factors of Entrepreneurs – “Entrepreneurisms” – that can be carried to larger organizations. Entrepreneurisms that will enable them to be more alive to external circumstances, more responsive to come up with appropriate strategies, and more effective in executing the chosen strategies. We need to understand better the root causes of bureaucratic behaviors – “Corporatisms” -- and the know-how to convert these behaviors to “Entrepreneurisms”.
We also need to understand the “dilemma of cannibalism” – the threat to incumbent products, systems, cultural elements, talent, etc. -- and how to ensure they are not simply thrown away in the pursuit of new ideas, yet to be proven. What strategies and tactics are available to organizations to venture into promising new areas that threaten incumbent products, revenue streams or other resources? In fact a core problem for mature businesses in turning entrepreneurial is: Do we just give up their cash cows in the hope that the new stars will succeed? That question has an immense impact on the organization’s reputation, people and revenues – its very survival. To answer “yes” is too simplistic, even na?ve! We need a more nuanced answer, a cleverer strategy that allows a more gradual “grand fathering” of the old and ushering in of the new.
Finally, we need to revisit the study of Change Management in this context. A subject, I would argue, that has been unable to cut clean the umbilical chord of its birth in an IT / System upgrade context. We need to relook at this study in the new technology-led, socio-economic context. The challenges here are:
- To develop a more entrepreneurial culture
- To develop an acceptable strategy to minimize or circumvent cannibalization of value
- To change the engine while the craft is flying.
It is also important to understand that this calls for a study beyond the limits of current studies into specific aspects such as Leadership, Innovation, Execution, Market / Customer focus, and the like. It has to span all of these and may be more.
What is called for is to awaken the spirit of Entrepreneurism that lies buried in the history of every organization!
...Sri Vadrevu