Challenges and Skills of 21st Century Entrepreneurs

Personal research project

Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Background..................................................................................................................................3
Contextualisation.........................................................................................................................3
Critical evaluation of research objectives........................................................................................4
Skills and competencies needed for an entrepreneur.......................................................................4
Position of SMEs within an economy and trends impacting business ventures..............................5
Critical appraisal of operations in SME...........................................................................................5
Marketing.....................................................................................................................................6
Finance.........................................................................................................................................6
Supply chain................................................................................................................................6
Human resource...........................................................................................................................6
Importance of team building and relationships for building creative culture..................................7
Conclusions and recommendations.................................................................................................8
References......................................................................................................................................11
Annotated bibliography.................................................................................................................15
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Introduction
In today's contemporary world, running a small business involves a number of challenges. The
face of entrepreneurship is changing with more people shifting towards new ventures and
preparing for success. With this in mind, it has become essential to prepare in advance for the
complexities and challenges to stay ahead from others. The main purpose of this report is to
explore the life world of an entrepreneur. In order to do this, the subsequent sections of this
report discuss the pressures and complexities that are associated with running a business in the
21st century. This report sheds light on assessing the skills and competencies that are required by
a 21st-century entrepreneur.
Background
This report presents its findings from an interview with Blueberry's CEO. The company is a
medium-sized enterprise that deals in selling customised products to customers through its
platforms. The owner of the company is Nick Bond who is an entrepreneur and shares his
journey of converting an idea into reality. His interview helps in getting insights on a variety of
topics and how an entrepreneur overcomes with various challenges. Through his interview, the
report discusses modern trends within the economy, functions in SME and the importance of
building effective relationships for culture creation. All of these aspects together help in
constructing a valid report that helps in understanding the life world of an entrepreneur.
Contextualisation
In order to explore entrepreneurship in deeper form and to familiarise with the topic, it is
essential to define the context. For this report, small and medium enterprises (SME) is the
context. On the level of SME, there are a variety of features that can be studied which resonates
with understanding entrepreneurship. In SMEs ideas and information are actively negotiated
among their boundaries and they adopt practices that help in increasing their exposure (Storey
2016). Other characteristics of SME like adopting difficulties of funds, competition and so on
helps in generating new and more progressive perspectives. Many developments and operations
in SME are at the forefront of the development of entrepreneurs.
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Critical evaluation of research objectives
Skills and competencies needed for an entrepreneur
In simple terms, an entrepreneur is a person that develops business and takes risks to earn a
profit. There are a number of entrepreneurship theories that help in understanding the phenomena
of entrepreneurship and skills necessary for them. The economic entrepreneurship theory defines
an entrepreneur as the one who takes the risk (Mindt and Rieckmann 2017). This is as the theory
lays emphasis on economic conditions and the opportunities created by entrepreneurs. According
to the resource-based theory, entrepreneurs are those who have the ability to leverage resources
and put all efforts in the best way (Hur, Moon and Rhee 2016). They have those tangible
elements of leadership added with the resource-use which altogether leads to great work. The
psychological theories of entrepreneurship focus on the mental and emotional elements that give
birth to entrepreneurial people. Research by Van Laar et al. (2017) suggests that entrepreneurs
possess a need for achievement that helps in accomplishing their tasks. They have a strong locus
of control. Another research by Botha, Van Vuuren and Kunene (2015) suggested that people
with strong locus of control have the power to influence the external world and is possessed by
the majority of entrepreneurs. Today's entrepreneurs are found to have personality traits varying
from creativity to resilience to optimism that supports their entrepreneurial behaviour. The
sociological or anthropological theory is based upon social contexts that offer opportunities to
entrepreneurs. Thus, cultural forces like social attitudes help in shaping their perception and
behaviour (Mindt and Rieckmann 2017). Lastly, opportunity based theory states that
entrepreneurs have the ability and skills to seek and take advantage of possibilities generated due
to social, technological and cultural changes.
The entrepreneurs of today, especially in SME, have the same skills as stated by the above
theories. They are required to take risks, seek opportunities to stay determinant and so on.
However, along with them, it is essential for today's entrepreneurs to have skills that drive
learning and innovation (Ernest, Matthew and Samuel 2015). These skills include critical
thinking, creativity, and problem-solving and so on. They need to be digitally literate by
possessing skills of information processing, media and technology (Ismail and Zain 2015). They
must be passionate about life and career and must possess self-direction, leadership, and
accountability and adaptability skills.
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