To be an entrepreneur is not that easy. A successful entrepreneur must be a person with technical competence, initiative, good judgment, intelligence, leadership qualities, self-confidence, energy, attitude, creativity, fairness, honesty, tactfulness and emotional stability. The followings are the important characteristics of an entrepreneur.
Image source; i.huffpost.com/gen/1156708/images/o-ENTREPRENEUR-facebook.jpg
1. Calculated Risk-taker:
The entrepreneur has the ability to take calculated risks. He has to take risk to achieve pre-determined business objective. A risk situation involves potential gain or loss.
The greater is the risk involved, the greater is the chances of loss. He avoids low-risk involved; the grater is the chances of loss.
ADVERTISEMENTS:
He avoids low-risk situation due to lack of challenge and avoids high-risk situation because he wants to succeed. He likes achievable challenges. Thus, entrepreneurs are ‘risk-bearing’ agents of production.
2. Innovation:
The entrepreneur has to play the crucial role of innovator. Innovation ability involves doing things in a new and better way. Innovation may take several forms e.g.
i) Develop0ment of new products
ii) Adoption of new methods of production
ADVERTISEMENTS:
iii) The creation of a new market
iv) The conquest of a new source of raw-material
v) New form of organization of industry.
Therefore, an entrepreneur conceives new ideas and puts them into effect in the process of economic growth and development.
3. Organization Skill:
An entrepreneur has the capacity of combining together all resources required for starting up an enterprise and then to produce goods. The entrepreneur combines the land. Labor and capital to produce a product.
ADVERTISEMENTS:
By selling the product in the market, he pays interest on capital, rent on land and wages to laborers and what remains left is his/her profit.
Being a good organizer, an entrepreneur is energetic, resourceful, alert to new opportunities and able to adjust according to changing conditions.
He determines the line of business, expansion and growth of enterprise. As an organizer, he performs planning, co-ordination and control functions.
4. Technical Knowledge:
Technical knowledge refers to the minute details of the process and technology of manufacture and marketing of goods and services, which acquired through interest and hard work.
A successful entrepreneur always keeps himself abreast of the latest changes in the technology so as to be a head of others in the competitive environment.
5. Optimistic:
Entrepreneurs look at the brighter side of the situation and intermittent problems do not distract their attention from accomplishment of their goals. They believe that future will be favorable and they will be able to clean all the hurdles on their way towards a bright future.
6. Effective Communication Ability:
The job of entrepreneur involves dealing with people to get his objective accomplished. Communication is the nervous system of any organization and the entrepreneur as an effective communicator analyses people’s mind, talks in their languages so as to make the message clear and understandable and gets them to contribute as per plan.
7. Decision Making:
Decision making requires selection from amount alternatives and entrepreneurs with their analytical ability evaluate the alternatives and come out with the best decision in a given situation.
8. Creativity:
Entrepreneur should be creative. Creativity is the ability to devise and successfully implement something new and better. Successful innovations depend upon creativity.
Creativity involves innovation or introduction of new product, new method of productions, new form of business, different ways of dealing with problems etc.
9. Self-Confident:
An entrepreneur must have self-confident. Entrepreneurs must have belief in themselves and the ability to achieve their goals. If entrepreneur should have faith in himself then only then he can trust others.
10. Human Relation Ability:
An entrepreneur must to be maintained good relation with his customers to get their loyalty. He must maintain good relations with his employees to motivate them to perform their jobs at a high level of efficiency.
An entrepreneur who has the ability to maintain good human relation with customers, employees, suppliers, creditors and the community is in the position to run his enterprise successfully.
11. Business Secrecy:
A successful entrepreneur must be able to guard his business secrets from the leakage to trade competitors.
12. Clear Objectives:
Objectives guide the effort and action. A successful entrepreneur should have a clear objective about the nature of his business, the nature and type of goods to be produced etc. so as to provide purposeful direction.
An entrepreneur may have the objective to establish the product, to make profit or to provide social service.
13. Mental Ability:
The mental ability. It consists of intelligence and creative thinking to deal with different situations. An entrepreneur must be reasonably intelligent.
Must be able to study different business problems and situations in order to deal with them. The entrepreneur should be able to anticipate the business them in profit able business opportunities.
14. Visionary:
An entrepreneur must be a visionary. Entrepreneurs have a vision for further growth and development, commitment to constructive change and energy to achieve results.
An entrepreneur is the one who can create new ideas, starts his enterprise with these ideas and provides added value to society based on their independent initiative.
15. Desire for High Achievement:
The entrepreneurs have a strong desire to achieve high goals in business.
16. Hard worker:
Hard work is the key to the success and there is no substitute for hard work for an entrepreneur. Entrepreneurs work hard consistently and persistently towards the never-ending goal of excellence.
17. Socially Responsible:
An entrepreneur must be socially conscious. His entrepreneurial ability may create jobs for others. He may invent new products and new manufacturing methods by doing things in never ways.
All these have social consequences. He should refrain from illegal and social irrespective activities.
18. Courage to face Adversities:
Entrepreneur must have the ability and courage to face the adversities boldly and bravely. Entrepreneur must have the faith in himself and attempt to solve the problems even under pressure.
19. Ability to Exploit Opportunities:
An entrepreneur must be able to exploit new business opportunities to earn maximum profit in coming future.
20. Independence:
Entrepreneurs develop their own path rather than treading into other’s footsteps.
21. Foresight:
The entrepreneurs have a good foresight to know about future business environment. They well visualize the likely changes to take place in market, consumer attitude, technological developments etc. and take timely actions accordingly.