Have You Believed Any Of These Five Myths About Entrepreneurship?

One of the best ways to demystify myths from reality, is to look for factual business information and see whether it goes in line with what is being said

Presently, about one in every 20 people globally runs their own business. For a number of these people, business is a conscious choice, and often, one they made knowledgeably. But for a vast majority of business owners, starting a business venture was done out of pure necessity. With little to almost no knowledge of entrepreneurship and what it means to own a business, many entrepreneurs, particularly in developing nations, start businesses out of pure necessity. For them, business is the only way to gain financial independence.

As such, many business founders have been frustrated, and have even run down their businesses, because instead of being well informed about entrepreneurship, they have mostly been conditioned to myths and stereotypes that others have generated about starting a business, and running it successfully.

This lack of sufficient and quality entrepreneurship education has paved the way for such myths and misconceptions to pose a great hurdle to the growth of entrepreneurship. By debunking some of these misconceptions around entrepreneurship, we hope startup leaders get a sieve to help them separate what is accurate from what lacks accuracy in as far as business is concerned.

So, which are some of the myths that circulate about entrepreneurship?

All It Takes Is A Great Idea

Many people believe that all it takes to become a successful entrepreneur is a single revolutionary idea. While this line of thought isn’t wholly incorrect, it is deceptive. Even the best ideas, those laden with the potential to disrupt an entire industry, require proper execution in order to become a reality.

As much as Ideas are vital, so is the ability to plan for a business, financial literacy, a proper understanding of target markets and clients’ needs, effective communication, resilience and a variety of other factors. This, in fact, is one of the reasons why entrepreneurship learning is an essential tool in every founder’s tool-box; it makes you knowledgeable on a myriad of issues that would have cost years of experience, if not multiple failures, to acquire.

When It Comes To Business, One Size Fits All

“Play by the rules, but be ferocious.” — Phil Knight. These are the famous words given to us by Nike. The quote implies that you can’t “just do it” without any regard to the existing rules, but you are not limited to how passionate you can be while playing by the rules. A wonderful principle, we would say, yet one that is limiting where entrepreneurship is concerned.

When it comes to business, sometimes one needs to defy conventional wisdom. Defiance does not mean being destructive. Quite the contrary. Bucking the status quo a little should actually be for constructive reasons. To make advancements, to inspire change, to bring solutions to existing problems. After all, doing the same thing the same way every time and expecting different results as Albert Einstein would put it, is insanity. A start-up need not look like the next best duplicate of an already existing successful company in its industry, sometimes it’s the difference that makes the difference.

Winners Never Quit And Quitters Never Win

If anything were to be further from the truth it would be that entrepreneurs should always put up with failure, hoping that someday, it will turn into a success. Many books and a lot of the content produced online seem to emphasize that entrepreneurs have to stick everything out, come what may. But, we don’t believe that this is cast on stone.

The journey between setting up a business and getting it to become successful, is an arduous one, and patience is a definite must-have. However, one needs to know just how far to extend this patience. Truth be told patience will not fix all ideas; some ideas need a complete overhaul! That said, abandoning one business approach, or one’s business venture for another does not translate to them being an unsuccessful business person. If anything, it might just be what the business needs to break the glass ceiling.

Entrepreneurship Is Among The Quickest Ways To Get Rich

Living in the wake of a global pandemic has been anything but easy. For many, Covid 19 brought a decrease, if not loss of income and a widespread economic struggle. Along with this was also the notion that business could be the next best bet out of financial turbulence. Many people saw entrepreneurship as the way out, and yes, it very well could be. Unfortunately, what a majority fail to realize is that having a stable, much less a successful business, is not an overnight achievement

Contrary to what many “ best businesses to start during lockdown” blogs, and YouTube videos may have you think, businesses take time to build, and to break-even. Even though there are some entrepreneurs that seem to have achieved entrepreneurship success within really short periods of time, the fact is, those are a very small fraction of the entrepreneurial population, and cannot be used to determine effectively that starting a business is a speedy guarantee to “break a bank”.

If You Don’t Have The Papers, You Can’t Make Your Paper

As cheesy as this line may sound, it is surprising that very many people still believe that academic qualifications are a major determinant of entrepreneurial success. The general assumption is that highly educated people have what it takes to run business in a smart and effective way, and therefore they stand a higher chance at being amazing entrepreneurs.

While formal education delivers innumerable benefits, you really do not need Degrees and MBAs to become an entrepreneur, and a successful one at that. In fact, what may set you on the path to success, is the insights that you get about your markets, how well you can plan your business idea and how well you can execute it. All these are concepts that can be taught even away from the confines of formal education.

How To Avoid The Influence Of Entrepreneurship-Related Myths

From time to time, it may prove difficult to avoid being swept away by the waves of entrepreneurship-related myths. It’s expected that some of these myths may seem very realistic, and sometimes even relatable. In our opinion however, they aren’t real, and the best way to demystify them from reality, is to look for factual business information and see whether it goes in line with what is being said.

This is why we strive to get entrepreneurs timely and relevant information that is tailored to answer their specific entrepreneurship queries. Starting your business with insights that reflect your markets can be one of the best ways to scale its greatness, and it all starts with a simple click.