Entrepreneurship
Employees Versus Entrepreneurs
By Jan Okonji
To be employed or become an entrepreneur? Which is better? Is entrepreneurship something you grow into or a naturally occurring trait, can it be learned? Can one do both? So much information out there and so much advice.
On this column I cut through the piles of theory and give you a direct view into the world of the employee vs the world of the entrepreneur. Now, at this juncture I will say three things:
• When it comes to employment or entrepreneurship, choosing one over the other is a personal choice. It is not a matter of one option being superior to the other.
• When I use the term entrepreneurship, I am referring to the individual who develops products to solve a problem for a particular group of people while creating impact, all at scale. The key word here being scale. I am not referencing businesspeople, investors or self-employed individuals- these are slightly different from a real entrepreneur.
• This article is specifically for those currently in employment who are looking at stepping out into entrepreneurship and need a view of how that entrepreneurial world looks like beforehand.
When I left the corporate world after 13 amazing years of gainful employment, I set out to conquer the world of entrepreneurship. I thought to myself: how hard can this possibly be? Surely it cannot be harder than navigating office politics and working in management for a bluechip company?
And so, I stepped out into the unknown with a lot of energy, academic knowledge, corporate pride and a massive trove of theories to show these other entrepreneurs how it is done. Then I failed. Again and again and again.
I could not understand what I was doing wrong! I had read all the necessary motivational books, subscribed to all the top online business channels, read the magazines, attended the fancy networking breakfasts( in suits) at top hotels, and even developed a business plan. What exactly was the problem?
Looking back, I realized the issue was not with what was happening on the outside, but rather what was happening within my head. After 13 years in employment, I was trying to break into entrepreneurship as an employee rather than an entrepreneur. I had an old mindset in a new situation. For all my good intentions and purposes, this approach was just not going to work.
In employment, failing at an assignment can mean disciplinary action, loss of an annual bonus, being overlooked for a job promotion in future and worse still: retrenchment. In entrepreneurship one gets better by failing and learning and trying again. Failure is the silent mentor and coach of the entrepreneur and a lot of the greatest innovations around us are because of numerous failures.
To finally experience that entrepreneurial success I wanted, I had to shift my mindset from a typical employee paradigm to one of an entrepreneur. It was not easy but over 7 years I did it, and to be honest am still doing it.
Top Differentiators Between Employees And Entrepreneurs.
Here is a list of the top 15 differences between employees and entrepreneurs. I hope they give you insights into both worlds, and help you make knowledgeable and wise decisions as you probably transition from one place to another, without having to make the costly mistakes that I did:
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