Size doesn’t always matter in the new business world
By Joel Young - Kelowna Capital News
Published: August 05, 2010 6:00 PMLast week, I found myself reflecting on the wonderment of cross-border entrepreneurialization—a big word that really means to observe the global movement of the entrepreneurial dream.
Then, as fate occasionally sneaks one in on us when we’re least aware, I was advised of my appointment to the National Advisory Council for Global Entrepreneurship Week, Nov. 15 to 21, 2010.
Now, what is Joel talking about now? Well folks, Global Entrepreneurship Week commenced a few short years ago as National Entrepreneurship Week from the amalgam of the Kauffman Entrepreneurship Philanthropic Foundation in Kansas City, Mo., and the National Policy Institute in Washington, D.C.
It was so incredibly successful for its first two years, that taking it up a notch to international status was an easy step for the originators.
Today, Global Entrepreneurship Week is a global movement taking place in more than 100 countries of the world, inspiring millions of people and hundreds of organizations to embrace innovation, imagination and creativity through entrepreneurship.
The Canadian Youth Business Foundation was chosen to be a lead organization a couple of years ago. Last year was chosen as the most successful in the world in its endeavour to excite the Canadian masses in its focus.
So, for me to be asked to participate on the National Advisory Council was indeed an incredible honour.
But, all this inspired my thoughts to have my readers join me in an exploratory mission this week, in the journey of international entrepreneurship. Let’s go…
Think of an entrepreneur, almost any entrepreneur, and you’ll probably develop an image of someone doing business in your community, city, province or nation.
Rarely, I profess, is an entrepreneur automatically ready to action their venture around the nation and the globe from Day One.
But, as research is now offering us, entrepreneurs with particular talents and ambitions are increasingly looking to market their products, services and technologies around the world.
No stay-at-homes, this new breed of entrepreneur are “ born global “ as one might say.
In general, there are three categories of factors driving the increase in international entrepreneurship:
• First, there are market factors. Some of the most important reasons for the increasing prevalence of born global entrepreneurial firms stems out of the familiar story of market increases due to the fall of tariff barriers and other legal barriers to trade combined with increased harmonization in business practices and consumer tastes. Who doesn’t find an appeal for Avatar in 3D?? Many newer industries, think software or microprocessors have never been strongly segmented into domestic markets and have always been global and thus demanded global participation.
• Second, this trend has been exacerbated by changes in technology that continue to lower communication and transportation costs for smaller firms, erasing the practical boundaries to international entrepreneurship previously existing. Hence, many smaller firms actively seek and pursue cross-border alliances and partnerships to ease their entry into international markets.
• Third, there is clearly a set of factors growing out of the increasing use of alliances and the changing nature of firms in this era that make internationalizing from inception, not only an option, but, in fact, a strategic necessity for some new entrepreneurial ventures.
As business of all sizes become more skilled at building and maintaining alliances, the benefit to a single firm of being large and complex is reduced.
Therefore, networks of small firms become more and more competitive with large firms and international entrepreneurship becomes definitely a more viable option for new entrepreneurs.
I want to offer you the challenge and the opportunity of international entrepreneurship.
The implications of this new reality in the global marketplace are significant.
For entrepreneurs, it means greater opportunity combined with greater risk.
The greater complexity of these new businesses increases the management challenge facing entrepreneurs while simultaneously making success more rewarding.
Dealing with the complexities of international operations, cultural differences, and networks of alliances requires a set of special skills in addition to the well-documented and complex skills of a domestic text-book entrepreneur.
OK then, international entrepreneurship, like international management, is not for everyone.
But, for those with the right combination of interests, skills and market knowledge, it truly opens up exciting new possibilities to create ventures with enhanced scope
For existing small ventures, it means that their market is more and more accessible to entrepreneurs located around the world.
Stay tuned, as the 3D revolution is upon us. You and I soon find the 3D world as commonplace as Twitter and Facebook.
Small businesses focused on local niche markets can find themselves facing equally specialized global competition at any single moment.
But, it also means opportunities to collaborate with internationally minded entrepreneurs who can provide that special conduit to the broader marketplace.
For larger firms, this joyous trend means a continued erosion of their market by small specialist firms with global products and inexpensive production costs. Surprise, surprise.
The current trend toward market fragmentation will only become, in short order, more accelerated, and existing large firms will need to have strategies in place for meeting this challenge.
It also means that more and more, customers, suppliers and potential alliance partners will be international new ventures and why understanding how they work and why they succeed is now become of increasing importance.
I truly hope my comments of today have given rise to your thoughts about how and why you may find your place amongst the travellers on the road to international entrepreneurship.
I would like to close my column this week with words that have been sent to me earlier last week from the Kauffman Entrepreneurship Foundation, originally unveiled on May 13, 2010.
In what is called the Entrepreneurs Pledge, it allows entrepreneurs to not only express their enthusiasm for being a venture owner, but also to show their support for entrepreneurship as a cause.
The pledge reads as follows:
• I am an Entrepreneur
• I am following a dream, pursuing an opportunity, taking charge of my own destiny.
• I am bringing something of value to society, creating a job for myself and others, creating wealth that benefits my family, my community, my region and nation.
• I am one of a movement of millions of entrepreneurs and innovators who make Canada great, and who will continue to keep our economy going…and growing
• I am what I am because many people have helped me along this journey
Therefore:
• I will tell my story, sharing my successes and failures, so that others taking the entrepreneurial path may learn
• I will strive to mentor aspiring entrepreneurs
• I will make my voice heard by those who make policy decisions that affect me and my venture
• I will appreciate and celebrate my accomplishments and the accomplishments of all my fellow entrepreneurs
•I will give back to the society that helped me
•I will build a Stronger Canada
Joel Young is an entrepreneurial leadership educator and the founder of the Okanagan Valley
Entrepreneurs Society.
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8/06/2010
Size doesn’t always matter in the new business world
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