To me, entrepreneurship is a mindset. Some have the 100% dose, others have the 50% dose, and some just have none. At its core, entrepreneurship is the willingness to take the risk of transforming an idea into a tangible product/service/business. Just like many of you reading this article, I’m working for an organization (not one I’ve founded/created). So how then, can we apply the entrepreneurial mindset if we’re not entrepreneurs by nature?
Here’s what I think:
CHALLENGE THE STATUS QUO: Now this doesn’t mean going up to your boss or CEO and doing something crazy, this just means figuring out the holes in the company you work for, finding the sand, grabbing a shovel, and filling those holes. By this metaphor, you realize that it’s not just about identifying the problem, but figuring out a solution, and ACTUALLY GETTING THINGS DONE. The company has enough problem identifiers, complainers, whiners…so don’t be one of them. Instead, brainstorm potential solutions to the problem you identify and tackle it head on. Don’t wait – someone else could beat you to the punch.
GET CREATIVE: Every job, whether it’s one you love or hate has some good things and some bad things….I can’t sugar coat this. So taking the advice from the first point, let’s find a solution. Well just like any activity, whenever it becomes routine…it becomes mundane, repetitive, and boring. If that happens, than YOU will become complacent, uncreative, and pretty much a robot (practicing the same thing day in and day out). The truth is that any job can have improvements, and can learn from a fresh perspective, so if you find yourself stuck that’s only because you decided to jump in the hole rather than fill it up with sand. In my first rotation, there were some aspects that were manual…so I found ways to automate processes using Excel. This eventually cut costs for the department and was a tool that my colleagues started benefiting from as well.
Point being; when you find ways to change, you change the way you find things.
