Entrepreneurship and learning by listening and imitating the behaviors of others
by Paolo Gubitta (University of Padua and CUOA Business School)
By now we all know that entrepreneurs become and are not born.
But how do you do it?
The training paths are certainly the main road, because modern teaching approaches allow both to acquire the knowledge and managerial skills necessary to manage any organization (from strategy to business, from control to organization, from marketing to logistics and so on), and to experiment the behavioral skills, without which it is not possible to relate effectively, to make teams, to motivate people and to enhance personal and other talents (from the well known “know-how” to the less known but not less important, know how “to stay in situation”).
But also the learning by listening and imitating the behaviors of others is effective, both when we imitate the cases of success, and when we can listen to the mistakes made by others (not to imitate them, of course).
Do you know why?
The legend goes that Steve Jobs at school was a full-blown bad student and that he left the university to go to India in search of enlightenment: he returned and founded Apple, fell, was driven out, came back and was triumph.
In your opinion, is it possible to teach how to become like Steve Jobs? No, it is more fruitful to listen to him, to hear him tell what he did well and what he did wrong and to have someone who filters behaviors and actions, to get some general teachings out of specific experience, which can be (these yes!) taught and then each applies to their professional context.
Some studies say that when a teenager was a rule breaker (ie, a Mr. I want to do it my way) is more likely to become an entrepreneur. People with this characteristic have the typical traits of the so-called opportunity entrepreneurs, who start a new business because they believe they can take advantage of a market opportunity that they believe they have identified, unlike the necessity entrepreneurs, who choose the entrepreneurial activity as a fallback.
Other studies, such as those of the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor, allow us, instead, to open our eyes to the business world like absorbing papers.
This research reminds us that companies founded and run by young people are more likely to fail, but, at the same time, have higher standards in terms of innovation, exploration of new businesses, adoption of new organizational structures and use of new technologies. Entrepreneurial exuberance can play bad jokes, but it should not be eliminated: it should only be accompanied and oriented in the right directions because, early entrepreneurs very often really know a page more than the book and who approaches them, to understand them must first tune in their frequencies.
It is also for these reasons that a forward-looking company must support early entrepreneurs, celebrating their successes, protecting them from the Italian stigma of the bankrupt, and multiplying the opportunities to put them to the test, providing them with support tools to finalize the energies and reckon with the market.
Also in this case, the learning by listening and not imitating the behaviors of others is very effective.
IP Crew