Understanding the Entrepreneur

www.solvayentrepreneurs.be
WHO IS THE ENTREPRENEUR?
SESSION 1 (out of 10)
THE ENTREPRENEUR
This session is part of a 10-weeks course
given to master students of the SOLVAY
BRUSSELS SCHOOL OF ECONOMICS
AND MANAGEMENT by professor Olivier
WITMEUR.

Entrepreneurship Course – Session 1 - 2014 © Olivier WITMEUR
•  Introduce the course
•  Who is who
•  What is entrepreneurship and
what are the key constructs
•  Who is the entrepreneur
QUESTIONS AGENDA RESOURCES
•  Introduction
•  Course design
•  About entrepreneurs
•  « Definitions »
•  The Entrepreneurial Process (in
W. Bygrave & A. Zacharakis,
Entrepreneurship, 2011)
Desired Outcomes of the Session
2

INTRODUCTION
#1
3

What have these companies in common?
4
Delhaize , Colruyt, Leclerc, Sears & Roebuck
Solvay, Pfizer, Yves Rocher
Citroen, Renault, Ferrari
McKinsey, Deloitte & Touche, JP Morgan
McDonald, Neuhaus
Dell, Hewlett-Packard
Siemens, Dyson

Examples of very successful entrepreneurs
5
Richard Branson,
Virgin (1989)
Larry Page &
Sergey Brin,
Google (1998)
Mark Zuckerberg,
Facebook (2004)
Steve Job,
Apple (1976)
Howard Schultz,
Starbucks (1971)
Anita Roddick,
The Body Shop (1976)
Jeff Bezos,
Amazon (1994)
Ingvar Kamprad,
IKEA (1943)Hasso Plattner,
SAP (1972)
Amancio Ortega,
ZARA (1974)

•  No gender
•  No education
•  No background / experience
•  No age
•  No family
•  …
•  No superman/woman
•  Can entrepreneurship be taught?
•  Science vs. Art?
6
… but everybody can be an entrepreneur.

Entrepreneurship is …
(2 minutes)

Questions
•  How many entrepreneurs do you identify in this film?
•  What are the questions and topics that are typically ‘entrepreneurial’?
8
LA LAITERIE DU BERGER - DANONE LATTITUDES
h"p://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h7HwwR-‐VcuA
(6:35)

The Entrepreneurial Framework
9
ENTREPRENEUR
OPPORTUNITY
RESOURCES
Conviction
Creativity
Communication
CONTEXT
Adaptation
Fits &
Gaps
* Adapted from J. Timmons & A. Bidé

Entrepreneurship as a Process
10
•  Individual variables: skills, profiles, motivations…
•  Group-level variables: reactions from customers, investors, potential
employees…
•  Societal-level variables: governmental policies, economic conditions…
Idea /
Opportunity
recognition
Decision
to proceed
Analysing
the project
Assembling
resources:
team, € …
LAUNCH /
START
Build /
Grow
Harvest

COURSE DESIGN
11
#2

Understand why entrepreneurship matters
Introduce key-concepts and best practices in various entrepreneurial settings
Challenge your entrepreneurial mindset
At the end of course participants must be able to:
–  Master new tools and techniques that are part of the ‘entrepreneurial toolbox’
–  Imagine, assess and design an entrepreneurial projects
–  Identify the main issues associated with such projects and be able to deal with them
End-up with more open questions than definitive answers
Work hard
Have fun!
12
Desired outcomes of the course

•  Who is the entrepreneur?
•  To what extent are entrepreneurs different from managers?
•  What makes a good idea?
•  How to start when you don’t have the resources needed?
•  What does it take to make decision when you don’t know what comes next?
•  What are the typical strategies for starting-up and growing a new venture?
•  How entrepreneurship can contribute to a better world?
13
Central questions

Entrepreneurship Course – Session 1 - 2014 © Olivier WITMEUR 14
Fail Early, Fast and Cheap
to Succeed Sooner.
(The course and its main assignment are mainly about mindset, tools and methods)

ABOUT
ENTREPRENEURS
15
#3

The typical answers cover
•  Feeling of freedom
•  Ability to innovate
•  Personal fulfillment linked to the management of a business
•  Rejection of the employee status
•  Rejection of big institutions
•  Money … in case of success
•  Social recognition
16
Motivations of Entrepreneurs

About Entrepreneurs (a personal view)
17
Network & Social Capital
Knowledge & ExpertiseTolerance for Ambiguity
Commitment & Courage
Passion & Values

•  Initiative, adventure
•  Strong persuasive powers
•  Moderate rather than high risk-taking ability
•  Flexibility
•  Creativity
•  Problem-solving ability
•  Need for achievement
•  Self confidence
•  Imagination
•  Locus of control
18
The entrepreneurial mindset and attributes
•  Leadership
•  Hard work
•  Self efficacy
•  Resilience
•  Optimism
•  Commitment

Traits approach: Classical variables
19
Need for achievement (N-Ach) refers to an individual's desire
for significant accomplishment, mastering of skills, control, or
high standards.
Locus of control refers to how much individuals believe they
can control events that affect them.
Need for
achievement
Locus of
control
Ambiguity tolerance is the ability to perceive ambiguity in
information and behaviour in a neutral and open way
Tolerance for
ambiguity
Self-efficacy is the extent or strength of one's belief in one's
own ability to complete tasks and reach goals
Self efficacy

No pain.
No gain.

Ø  As a revolutionary à ‘Entrepreneurial leadership’
Ø  As a manager à ‘Entrepreneurial management’
Ø  As a salesman
Ø  As a team player à Entrepreneurial team
21
Different views on the entrepreneur

•  Anticipate change and deal with uncertainty
•  Willing to take considered risk and trying to reduce it.
•  Start without having all resources available
•  Mobilize all resources available / Use of inter-personal network
–  Financial commitment!
•  Ready to get hands dirty
•  Blurred frontiers between business and private life
•  Not afraid to be alone and to be criticized even by family and friends
Leadership skills:
o  Decision taking / Use of personal power
o  Communication
o  Team motivation
o  Delegation
o  Negotiation
22
The Entrepreneur as a Revolutionary

About Social Entrepreneurs
23
Social entrepreneurs drive social innovation
and transformation in various fields including
education, health, environment and enterprise
development. They pursue poverty alleviation
goals with entrepreneurial zeal, business
methods and the courage to innovate and
overcome traditional practices. A social
entrepreneur, similar to a business
entrepreneur, builds strong and sustainable
organizations, which are either set up as not-
for-profits or companies.
Social entrepreneurs are individuals with
innovative solutions to society’s most pressing
social problems. They are ambitious and
persistent, tackling major social issues and
offering new ideas for wide-scale change.
Rather than leaving societal needs to the
government or business sectors, social
entrepreneurs find what is not working and
solve the problem by changing the system,
spreading the solution, and persuading entire
societies to move in different directions.

The Entrepreneur as a Manager
24
Work hard
Ø  Time commitment!
Specific skills gained from experience
Realism, pragmatism, flexibility
Accept failure
Share success
General management skills
Ø  Strategy
Ø  Sales & Marketing
Ø  Project management and planning
Ø  Time management
Ø  Finances

Sales is absolutely essential
•  To customers
•  To the first employee
•  To the business partners
•  To the financial partners
Customer-centricity is a key success factor
•  Start with customer’s needs
Ø  Their needs, their vision, their situation, their constraints, their processes, their goals, …
•  Match product/service and internal sales process to those needs
•  Create close relationship (intimacy!) with customers
25
The Entrepreneur as a Salesman

No sales,
No business.

Complementarities and balance
Ø  The dream team = CEO + CTO + CFO
Expected qualities of a team
•  Relevant experience and track record
•  Commitment, determination
•  Clear job distribution and collaboration processes
•  Creativity
•  Adaptability
•  Team focus
•  Shared vision
•  Performance driven, fault-tolerant
27
The Entrepreneur as a Team Player

Obsession of control
Suspicion, paranoia…
Oversized need for recognition
Not always calm especially when things go wrong
Genius or fool? They act the same!
28
The Dark Side of Entrepreneurs
* Adapted from M. Kets de Vries (HBR, 1985)

To be continued…
29
Who is the entrepreneur is the wrong question!
How do entrepreneurs think and act?

WHAT IS
ENTREPRENEURSHIP?
30
#4

Definition 1: The HBS working definition
31
The pursuit of opportunity beyond the resources you currently control.
H. Stevenson, USA

We define the field of entrepreneurship as the scholarly examination of how, by
whom and with what effects opportunities to create future goods and services are
discovered, evaluated and exploited.
32
Definition 2: The classical academic definition
S. ShaneS. Venkataraman
* Academy of Management Review, 2000, vol. 25, n°1, 217-226

Definition 3: Degree of entrepreneurship?
33
New
to founders
Franchisee
Shops
Take-over
Buy Out
Innovation
Lawyers,
Doctors,
….
Change
New to
market
High tech
& Social
start-ups
Ch. Bruyat
* Adapted from C. Bruyat (1993) & A. Fayolle
A. Fayolle
Corporate
Spin-offs

Definition 4: A classical definition
34
A way of thinking and acting that is opportunity obsessed, holistic in
approach & leadership balanced for the purpose of value creation.
J. Timmons, USA
Thinking and acting =
There is a “method”
Central role of the opportunity
(but found or made?)
Take all aspects into
consideration
Need to be managed
There are best practices
Value for the stakeholders, i.e. founders,
team, investors, customers, society…

NEVER STOP
WONDERING
&
ASKING!

A real passion for entrepreneurship education and entrepreneurs.
•  Student entrepreneurs: 2x
•  Full time entrepreneur: once, in a team of 5
•  Coach: 500+ projects over the last 20 years
•  (Advisory) Board member in multiple new ventures
•  Policy making: 2x
•  Director of Solvay Entrepreneurs
•  PhD in entrepreneurship in 2008
•  … never as an investor
My wife (as Colombo), no kids, one dog (Vicky).
36
Olivier Witmeur (Belgian, 46)

Solvay entrepreneurs is the entrepreneurship center of the Université Libre de
Bruxelles. We support entrepreneurs through the development of their venture, from
an idea to a successful and sustainable business.
37
Solvay Entrepreneurs

Let’s keep in touch!
382014%©%Olivier%Witmeur
FOLLOW US ON
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Solvay-Entrepreneurs
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SolvayStart
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Understanding the Entrepreneur

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