Entrepreneurs with strong business sense have been shown to contribute to societal change and economic boom.
These high performing people are seen
transforming the sector where they find themselves and setting the pace
for incumbent businesses in the industry.
Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises in
Nigeria have been discovered to outnumber large enterprises, therefore
funding support are increasingly being directed at them.
Experts note that there is high
probability that these contemporary enterprises can completely overhaul
large old fashioned businesses, because of innovative ideas they bring
along that are in tune with the present generation.
They add that outstanding entrepreneurs
have the ability to grow faster, create more jobs, contribute more to
society and transform industries to a greater extent than their peers.
As a result, their life and business evolution are worth studying.
In a survey of 600 firms at the Ernst
and Young “Entrepreneur of the Year” contest conducted by World Economic
Forum, insights into the characteristics of high-impact firms were
gathered.
Impact on innovation/customer benefits
The World Economic Forum report states
that high-impact entrepreneurs are critical to the advancement of
innovations and customer benefits. It says this is achieved by
commercialising results from scientific research and development,
especially in areas of technology and life sciences. It adds that this
group of business people invents new business models or proffer
solutions to problems affecting consumers.
Google organises information on the web
An example is Google whose founders,
Sergey Brin and Larry Page launched the company with a mission to
organise a seemingly infinite and unstructured amount of information on
the web.
It says, “In only 15 years, Google has
grown to over $50bn in annual revenue and has been instrumental in
delivering improvements that provide radically better access to
information for both consumers and other businesses.”
Research has shown that high-impact
entrepreneurs find new sources of clean energy, create consumer products
(food/beverage, apparel) or develop mobile applications to enhance the
way consumers communicate and access information or entertainment.
Amazon invents better distribution channel
Experts note that high performing
entrepreneurs invent or enhance business and distribution models that
lead to lower costs for consumers.
Citing the example of Amazon.com, it
says contemporary businesses often disrupt existing industries and
create significant friction with incumbents that struggle to deal with
the new competition – often a key challenge for young high-impact firms
that requires significant determination and stamina from their founders.
Of the many stories that entrepreneurs
can tell, Richard Branson’s battle when trying to start a new airline
(Virgin Atlantic) from scratch in an environment of nationally backed
carriers has to be one of the more impressive examples, though by no
means the only one, the WEF report notes.
Creates job consistently
WEF notes that the 628 companies studied
in the created approximately 162,000 net jobs over the most recent
two-year fiscal period prior to the competition.
Evaluating the ‘Entrepreneur of the
Year’ applicants by age, it revealed that employment gains sustain
momentum as these companies mature, reflecting their relative size
compared to younger firms and their heightened focus on building out
business infrastructure and scale to meet customer demand and new
opportunities.
It adds, “It is a good illustration that
when it comes to job creation, a narrow focus on early-stage companies
would be misguided.”
They create wealth
The report says that high-impact
entrepreneurship creates significant wealth for successful founders –
with a consistent two thirds of the annual business people on Forbes
billionaire list having built their own fortune in this manner.
According to it, a hallmark of
high-impact entrepreneurship is the vast scope and ambition of their
enterprises that allow others to share in this wealth creation, with a
significant impact on local economies.
It says, “Of course, such wealth
creation needs to be viewed in the broader picture of societal balance
and is not always viewed completely positively by all stakeholders.”
They give back to the society
High-impact entrepreneurs often make a
difference to society beyond their immediate business model or
innovation – this is a particularly important characteristic, as many
high-impact businesses operate in network economies (or even create
them).
According to it, a company like Facebook
has clearly changed the way we communicate and share stories with each
other and has also created a whole ecosystem of developers that design
features and applications for the platform.
In addition, it has made it easier for
interest groups to coordinate among each other, and therefore, arguably
has a major influence on how societies govern themselves.
It says, “High-impact entrepreneurs
often take an interest in society’s problems – targeting areas such as
the environment, poverty reduction, education or sanitation. A whole
field of “impact entrepreneurship” and “social entrepreneurship” has
evolved over the last decades.”
Has been done in the country by the
Future Africa, LEAPAfrica, Fate foundation and other consulting firms,
mentorship, which creates a platform for grooming the next generation of
high-impact entrepreneurs makes the model sustainable.
The report says role models such as
Virgin’s Richard Branson or easyJet’s Stelios Haji-Ioannou have impact
far beyond their own enterprises on whole generations of budding
entrepreneurs.
It says, “Such effects is of crucial
importance when creating entrepreneurial ecosystems in emerging markets,
and has made them a core principle of their operating model.”
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