Podcast: Why Do People Become Entrepreneurs

Entrepreneurship: Are you thinking about it? Listen on Spotify

Click the ‘Play’ button to listen to the podcast but if it’s not your thing, here are my notes instead.

I was never really entrepreneur material and my ambition was to get hired or become a good entertainer. Making people happy really drove me forward,

History of business is that men started business, women stayed home, have children, and kept the home clean. This was way…..back, bear in mind.

The scene has changed, of course. There are more women entrepreneurs now than ever before.

Around 252 million women around the world are entrepreneurs, and another 153 million women operate well-established businesses. The percentage of female entrepreneurs has increased by 114% in the last 20 years.

There were 6,861 more women-owned firms in 2018 than in 2017, up 0.6% to 1.1 million, according to the Census Bureau’s Annual Business Survey (ABS)

In fact, I have friends who run communities that support women entrepreneurs because that’s how we jive these days.

The need for creativity that doesn’t quite fit the corporate landscape.

Not everyone’s made for the corporate world, especially people who are more on the creative side of the spectrum. Creative people also tend to want more control over what happens to their careers. This is not so easy in the corporate world.

Being self-employed means being in control over your investment, time, effort, and the people you hire or support. You dictate the choices, strategy and plan.

People with great ideas, big dreams, aggressive plans, and have intelligent mapped-out strategies will find it challenging to convince others to invest in their plans. Let’s face it – when your dream is big and people don’t see things the way you do, it gets demotivating.

The 9-5 Misfit

Some people are built for 9-5 work, one of whom is a close family member. Anything that wrings her out of her routine would certainly result in a breakdown. It’s all she’s known and want.

With the pandemic, things switched up. By March 2021, more than 24% people said that the ability to continue working from home is so important to them that they would take a pay cut.
Some people simply perform better when they’re in control of their schedule. These are the ones who may start venturing out on their own.
We all know by now that there are pros and cons to being your own boss – yes, you can take vacation time any time you want, but the cost is you may lose a client, or overwork when you’re back, playing catch-up.
Although most of my family and friends adapt well to climbing the corporate ladder and hustling through the rate race, I’ve also met people who are are too creative, strong-willed, and ambitious for their own good.

Which brings me to the next point of why some people prefer to be entrepreneurs.

The Stranger in a Corporate World

Let me just ask you one simple question – can you imagine Elon Musk or, say, Bill Gates, being anything other than an innovator, creator, business people, renegade, and world changer?

Their curiosity and willingness to venture into unknown territories literally know no boundaries. If there’s anything I’ve learned about corporate culture is that you take orders and suppress your own urge to do things on the whim.

People become entrepreneurs because, in part, they are learners and experimenters. They find great ideas and go head-first into them.

They struggle with thinking like everyone else, making them feel abnormal or strange in a corporate environment. It’s a good thing to have someone who can think outside-the-box in your team but not every boss think the same way. That’s because some entrepreneurs don’t always follow the rule book.
When they want to take action, they often risk ruffling feathers…which is not good news to the people at the top. Entrepreneurs live in a can-do environment. The wheels in their minds revolve around ‘Do it, we will figure it out. It can be done’. This isn’t exactly how the corporate world works.

They Want to Change the World and They’re Confident They Can

Many people want to have the go-getter, dreamer, the can-do person, the proactive person in their team. Yet, corporate people have trouble with these people when they’re not in the position to make important decisions.
They want to change the world, solve a problem close to their hearts, or make a serious impact on certain issues. They question status quo and the corporate world don’t relish unproven ideas that are not backed by science, data, and reports.
I’ve met entrepreneurs who thrive on simply doing what’s NOT expected of them. They love doing something that everyone’s NOT already doing, embracing the challenge, one after another. Coming up with new ideas on how to make the world a better place, even in small ways, powers their days and nights.
If you’re good at spotting opportunities and working around barriers of entry, it would make you a good entrepreneur. For example, if you meet someone who is trying to promote a new way to recycle waste products and you think there’s an opportunity for a collaboration, if you’re an entrepreneur, you simply cannot look away!

Freedom and Control

I’ve been on both sides – being an entrepreneur and a corporate rat. I can tell you from my own personal opinion that entrepreneurs definitely want more freedom and control over what can and cannot be done for the business.
They don’t really NEED to have complete control. They work well with others but entrepreneurs need to find a balance between growing their business based on their ideas and negotiating around how to make things work.
This is not to say that when you’re working for someone else, you’re like a robot or soldier, there only to take orders. This is highly dependent on the kind of company or boss you’re working for. I’ve met the best and worst of them and I dare say, bosses come in different shades and personalities. I hope only the best for you.

The Flexible Schedule

I was working for myself for well over 20 years so, I guess you can say this is coming from personal experience. Some say that being your own boss gives you a flexible schedule…positively looked at. There are two sides to this coin.
Working for others, in fact, gives me more control over my time when I set proper boundaries. Whereas, when I am working for myself, there’s never time off. And when I DO eventually decide to take time off, there’s the guilt. Something’s lurking at the back of my mind, telling me that I am compromising my business and that I don’t deserve success because I am not 1000% committed to my ventures. It feels awful.
The great (or bad) part about being an entrepreneur is that you get to assemble your own team of avengers. You can work from, literally, everywhere and anywhere in the world. You could be in Barcelona running your company in New York. You could be in San Diego with a team of people working their arses off in Singapore.
Entrepreneurs also understand that they reap what they sow. They’re the boss. They dictate the direction of the company.
As the boss of your company, you also get to decide how much you get paid and you’re own job title. I know of some business people who give themselves quirky names like ‘Maestro of Armageddon’ or something like that. The downside is that when the company is not turning a profit or disaster hits, the first person to get a pay cut is probably you.

Wearing Many Hats

There were times when I was working for myself that I did something I shouldn’t have – take on the job of someone I hired because I wanted results fast…and I knew exactly what I wanted and knew how to do it. If you’re running a plumbing business, you’re probably better at fixing the sink than the person you hired. So, at times, you could find yourself doing it instead of patiently instructing or teaching your hire to get the job done.
Being an entrepreneur is always about being a leader. A leader who trusts his or her own people to do their jobs right. Doing everything yourself defeats the purpose and you’d be working long hours and resent your employees.

Should You Become an Entrepreneur?

Being your own boss sounds like a pipe dream. You have control over everything and you decide the journey of your project or corporation.

There are pros and cons to being an entrepreneur. Take some time to think about whether you can shoulder the responsibility of growing your business with your team. Also think about whether you can take on the risk of failure or having to pivot midway. Do you have the backup if things go south?
Entrepreneurs thrive in communities and networks. So, you’d have to be a bit of a networker, and rub shoulders with other entrepreneurs. There are communities of business owners from all over the world who are ready to open doors when things get tough.
There has to be a sense of purpose, something deeper than just making money and having freedom of choice, to make you a good entrepreneur. It has to be something close to your heart. For example, you could be selling baby clothes because you recently became a mom. You could be providing construction materials because you’d just left your engineering job. You could also start your own Youtube channel on recipes because you’ve been cooking for your family.
Just make sure it’s something you love doing. Otherwise, riding through rough waves could be a sink or swim situation.

Thanks for listening

So that’s me, telling it like it is (or was) about becoming an entrepreneur and what it takes to make it work. I hope you’ve had some takeaways from listening to this because I’ve spent days looking into some tough things that I went through as a freelancer while raising my 2 kids at the same time.

I hope only the best for you and thank you for listening to this podcast. Please subscribe to this podcast or head over to my website to sign up for my newsletter. Let’s connect and be friends.

Leave me a comment if you found it helpful because it really does make my day.

See you on the next podcast! Cheers.