Entrepreneurial Characteristics and Success

This assignment explores the relationship between entrepreneurial characteristics and personal background/experience in achieving success. It provides case studies of two successful entrepreneurs, John Willard Marriott and César Ritz, highlighting their experiences and how they overcame challenges to achieve success. The assignment aims to understand the impact of leadership on small business innovativeness and entrepreneurship.

ENTREPRENEURSHIP
AND
SMALL BUSINESS
MANAGEMENT

TABLE OF CONTENTS
P5 Skills and traits of an entrepreneur........................................................................................1
P6 Aspects of entrepreneurial personality that reflects entrepreneurial motivation and mindset
.....................................................................................................................................................2
M3 Different line of arguments related to entrepreneurial characteristics..................................3
P7 Effect of background and experience in hindering and fostering entrepreneurship..............4
M4 Link between entrepreneurial
characteristics and the
influence of personal
background and experience
to specific successful
entrepreneurs..............................................................................................................................4
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................5

P5 Skills and traits of an entrepreneur
There are several skills and traits which helps an entrepreneur to be successful and this
differentiate them from other business managers. It is essential for young entrepreneurs to
determine these skills and traits in order to become successful. César Ritz and John Willard
Marriott are two successful entrepreneur in hospitality industry with several skills and traits. The
aspects which made both the entrepreneurs successful was their skills and traits that made their
career successful (Burns and Dewhurst, 2016).
César Ritz
Skills :
 Ambition: It is the major skill which is necessary to understand by every entrepreneur. It
is easy to give up when the goings gets tough, but Ritz was not from them, he persist
because of his ambitious nature. His main motive was to be succeed and for this, he
thrive small milestones which were stepping stones to the major goal (Burns, 2016).
 Creativity: Ritz was an entrepreneur who doesn't consider doing same things all the time,
he was always involved in doing new innovations on a regular basis which make him to
stand unique from other competitors in the market. Ritz was having a huge experience in
hospitality industry which led them to generate new opportunities which were not
available in the market previously.
Traits :
 Willpower: Ritz had the strength to see things through, as he don't procrastinate or
vacillate. He just go with the approach whenever he want it, he make it happen. By his
traits and skills he had made everything simple and smart work by him which lead to his
success and made him unique from other business managers (Doern, 2016).
 Passion: It is necessary for an individual to determine their passion, a work is only
successful when it is being done with their passion. Ritz was having the passion to build
his career in hospitality industry which make him successful and made him better from
other business managers.
John Willard Marriott
Skills :
 Assertiveness and Confidence: Marriott was a person who thinks that listening is
beneficial for effective communication and he also know that when to take control of the
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conversation and asserts their opinions and beliefs. Marriott usually provide chance to
everyone for making their opinions and if the individuals were confident they implement
the change by taking risks which make them more successful entrepreneur from other
business managers (Dunne and et.al., 2016).
Traits :
 Patience: It is the most essential trait which an entrepreneur should have, Marriott was
willing to be patient, and they understand that. He knows that in everything, there are
failures and frustrations, he take it personally which made them detriment.
 Communication: The major trait which a entrepreneur must have is effective
communication. Marriott worked to communicate with paying attention to the
communicators around him. He believed that when communication is present, trust and
respect must be followed.
P6 Aspects of entrepreneurial personality that reflects entrepreneurial motivation and mindset
There are several aspects which helps an entrepreneur to motivate and keep their mindset
in a positive direction. It is essential for the young entrepreneurs to understand and determine
these aspects in order to achieve success in their career. Ritz and Marriott are the entrepreneurs
who achieved a lot of success in their lives by such entrepreneurial personality aspects which
make them more effective in achieving their goals as an entrepreneur. The aspects of
entrepreneurial personality which helped both the entrepreneurs in entrepreneurial motivation
and mindset includes passion, motivation, optimism, creativity and risk taking (Ateljevic and
Page, 2017).
Passion
Most of the entrepreneurs are not involved in entrepreneurship for the purpose of earning
money, it is only a added bonus to them. The true benefit for they perform entrepreneurship is
doing all those things which they love. In order to build a business, an individual takes a lot of
time and efforts which leads to working for longer hours and performing extra work for the
success. The most basic logic in finding the success is don't do the work in which an individual is
not having a interest. Ritz and Marriott worked and utilised their skills in hospitality industry as
they both were having the passion to work in this sector which lead them to take towards success
in their life. Their passion motivated them and set their mindset that they have to achieve success
in hospitality industry as it was their passion.
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Motivation
Most of the successful entrepreneurs are dedicated towards their work. They don't rely on
their managers or colleagues for pushing them towards their goals and targets in order to get their
work done. Ritz and Marriott drive comes from themselves which allows them to motivate others
in turn. As per the successful entrepreneurs, if their actions inspire others to dream more, do
more, learn more and become more, this shows that the person has the ability to become a leader
as an entrepreneur (Storey, 2016).
Optimism
It is the most essential entrepreneurial personality aspects which is necessary for every
entrepreneur to consider. In the very starting stage, it is usually seemed like getting the business
off the ground will never happen but successful entrepreneurs doesn't think like that,they are
always optimistic about their future and are always looking ahead. Ritz and Marriott were
optimistic and lead forward with looking at the failures which increased their entrepreneurial
motivation and mindset.
Creativity
Most of the successful entrepreneurs don't think the same way as everyone else. The most
effective entrepreneurs see the world differently and thinks outside the box. Ritz and Marriott
generated big ideas, and these big ideas from them came from the place of creativity, it was from
the way of thinking which was different and unique from others in the market. These skills
helped the entrepreneurs to stand unique in the market which motivated them and cleared their
mindset for their objectives in hospitality industry.
Risk Takers
Ritz and Marriott got a huge success in hospitality industry as their entrepreneurial
personality aspects which they were using helped them to take risk and invest in several projects
in order to achieve success in hospitality industry. Risk taking is the major element which should
be considered while entering into hospitality industry. It is the major aspect which motivated
Ritz and Marriott in order to be successful as they want a good return on their investment which
motivated them to work hard (Oviatt and McDougall‐Covin, 2015).
M3 Different line of arguments related to entrepreneurial characteristics
There are several arguments in entrepreneurial characteristics. These arguments basically
involves the number of failures which are being faced by the entrepreneurs while finding the
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success. Failures are the major reason behind the success of entrepreneurs which helps them in
reaching the objectives by experiencing failures.
P7 Effect of background and experience in hindering and fostering entrepreneurship
There is a huge effect of the background and experience which is being gathered by the
entrepreneurs as more hard work helps in determining the cost of success. César Ritz and John
Willard Marriott both faced several failures which helped them in gaining experience.
John Willard Marriott
Marriott was an American entrepreneur who founded the Marriott corporation which
became later Marriott international in 1993. He was second child from 8 children. As a child he
was called for raising sugar beets and sheep on his family's farm. He performed that job
thoroughly and gave all the money earned by this to his father. At the age of 19, he took the
missionary work of a church for two years. Marriott was graduated from Weber state university
where he also served for body president. He also opened a venture in Washington DC, where he
used sell lemonade, soda pop and ice cream. This all experience of Marriott helped him to
become a successful entrepreneur. His skill of leadership helped him to achieve all the targets in
a more effective manner (Burns, 2016).
César Ritz
He was a Swiss hotelier and founder of several hotel groups, his famous hotel was Hotel
Ritz situated in Paris. Ritz was born in the Swiss village and he was the youngest child from 13
children. He was born in a poor family and at the age of 12 he was sent as a boarder to Jesuit
college at Sion. At the age of 15, while he was working as an apprentice wine waiter, he was
being dismissed by the patron of the hotel from his position, saying that, you'll never make
anything of yourself in the hotel business. He returned to home at the time with the objective to
become something in this. This helped him in making his objectives and his hard work helped
him achieving the success he was founding (Doern, 2016).
M4 Link between entrepreneurial characteristics and the influence of personal background and
experience to specific successful entrepreneurs
Characteristics and background are interrelated to each other as per the life background
of Ritz, his passion for building his career was build from the moment where he was dismissed b
y the patron of his hotel where he worked.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Burns, P. and Dewhurst, J. eds., 2016. Small business and entrepreneurship. Macmillan
International Higher Education.
Burns, P., 2016. Entrepreneurship and small business. Palgrave Macmillan Limited.
Doern, R., 2016. Entrepreneurship and crisis management: The experiences of small businesses
during the London 2011 riots. International Small Business Journal. 34(3). pp.276-302.
Dunne, T.C. and et.al., 2016. The impact of leadership on small business innovativeness. Journal
of Business Research. 69(11). pp.4876-4881.
Ateljevic, J. and Page, S.J. eds., 2017. Tourism and entrepreneurship. Routledge.
Storey, D.J., 2016. Understanding the small business sector. Routledge.
Oviatt, B.M. and McDougall‐Covin, P., 2015. International entrepreneurship. Wiley
Encyclopedia of Management. pp.1-3.
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