Bill Gates: The Journey of an Entrepreneur

INTERNATIONAL ENTREPRENEURSHIP - A+B
PART A
Background of Bill Gates
William Henry Gates III was born on October 28, 1955 in Seattle,Washington. His
father William H. Gates Sr. was a prominent lawyer and mother Mary Maxwell Gates
was in board of directors of First Interstate BancSystem. Bill Gates has two sisters’
older one Kristianne and younger sister Libby. When he was 7 years of age his home in
Sand Point Area of Seattle was damaged by a tornado. When he turned 13 he was
enrolled into the private Lakeside Prep School. This was when he wrote his first
software program. Gales was also excused from his maths class to pursue his interests
in computers (Dayanandan and Kuntluru, 2020). This is when he made a programme in
which one can play tic-tac-toe against computer. After many such incidents Gates' work
was well known in his class. He then also created a program which used to schedule
students in classes. After graduating from School in 1973 Gates was a National Merit
Scholar. He then enrolled in Harvard College where he did not had any study plan and
spent most of his time using computers. Meanwhile his friend Paul started a venture of
his own known as Traf-O-Data. Gates joined Paul in Honeywell in the year 1974. After
the release of new MITS Altair 8800 based on Intel's 8080 CPU Gates and Paul thought
of starting their own software company.
Educational background – This person was a voracious reader since childhood.
He used to spend hours in reading encyclopaedia. He was very different from other
children and his parents thought that he was a loner. Thus, they decided to send him to
Lakeside School where he was offered computer classes (Donnelly, 2019). While he
was learning computers, he made a tic tac toe program in Basic computer language.
His intellectual knowledge was very good as his scored reflects. He scored 1590 out of
1600.
Theories of family and kids entrepreneurship in this part
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Inter role behavioural congruence is known as theory in which workplace leaders
are an essential factor. This theory depends upon cross situational consistency in
personality trait expression. Bill Gates has developed leadership qualities in his
childhood. His family was disciplined and leading skills are developed within him since
his childhood. Another theory of kid entrepreneurship is parenting styles. This theory
states that behaviour of an individual depends upon the way they are treated by
parents. Bill gates is a disciplined child and his parents helped him to attain success in
life (Schreuder, Schalk, and Batistič, 2019).
Bill Gates in other people's words
A number of successful executives, comedians etc. said positive as well as
negative things about Bill Gates. Bob MetCalfe(founder of 3Com)said that Bill Gates
can be dangerous sometimes. He says that while working in groups Bill Gates always
leads. Bill Gates is also ideal for many businessmen. Bob also said that Bill gates have
done many extraordinary work which is appreciated by all (Nie, B. and Sun, S., 2019).
There are four rules that Bill Gates follow for getting most out of his reading.
Reading is one of the passion that Bill Gates has (Goldthwaite, 2019). The habit of
reading has helped in building one of the most influential companies of the world. Bill
Gates said that he used to read 50 books within a year. The different rules developed
by him are – making notes in the margins, finishing what you have started, reading what
is comfortable and blocking out an hour. It is important to make notes in margin while
reading anything as it will help in grabbing important information from the topic. It is
necessary to stop the work which is started. This rule is not very easy but it must be
followed for success. Those things which are comfortable to you whether it is digital or
print, that particular medium must be used for reading and at least one hour must be left
for serious reading.
Theory of entrepreneurship knowledge
According to the knowledge spillover theory of entrepreneurship, the
context in which decision-making is derived can influence one’s determination
to become an entrepreneur. In reference to Bill gates, it is concluded that he
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has used his knowledge in proper manner and this is reason for success of
his life (Kazanjian, Drazin, and Glynn, 2017).
Bill Gates Microsoft story
Bill Gates is one of the famous entrepreneurs of the world and his success is
reflected by his business venture - “Microsoft”. Gates read an article about Popular
Electronics that explained Altair 8800. When Gates got to know that MITS is making
new microcomputer then he contacted them and informed them that he and his group
mates are working on BASIC interpreter for the platform (Martins, and et. Al, 2019).
After getting permission from president of MITS, they developed Altair emulator within
very less time. Paul Allen and Gates got opportunity to work with MITS for distributing
interpreter as Altair emulator. Paul and gates named their partnership, Micro – Soft. On
November 1976, their company Microsoft was registered. This organisation is a great
success as this is one of the best examples of technology. Bill Gates said that – a
person cannot make $60,000 a Year Right out of High School. He said that it is an
honest thought that nobody is going to hire a person as CEO of a multinational
company just because you have degree in Business administration. The position of
CEO can be earned by starting new business venture and working hard for taking it to
top position. Motivation and intellectual knowledge in right direction helps in attaining
high success in life. Affordable Loss Principle - set affordable loss. Invest only as much
as you can afford to lose, and let your partners invest only as much as they can afford
to lose – rather than describing expected returns. Bill Gates believed in investing his
money and time in thing that will provide profit in return (Ketolainen, Nummela, and
Kalinic, 2016)
According to Bill gates, having focus is not enough, it is important to dream big
and pursue that he uses single minded determination. It is essential for entrepreneurs to
develop confidence and lead their teams (Meerwijk, 2019). Bill Gates said that passion
is key for success and anything can be achieved by using this passion effectively and
focusing on work. After dropping out of college, Bill Gates decided to achieve his
dreams and putting efforts in developing software and hardware. Bill Gates has always
believed in giving back to society. The Bill and Melinda Foundation has given new
dimension to philanthropy by checking new global issues like AIDS, malaria, cancer,
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