What Are the 10 Hidden Traits of an Entrepreneur?

What Are the 10 Hidden Traits of an Entrepreneur?

Even after forming the business, entrepreneurs keep looking for employers who could hire them for a job.

By Rakesh Raman

You can’t trust dictionaries blindly. Like bikinis, they conceal more than what they reveal about a word.

Case in point: Entrepreneur. A dictionary would define this word as a person who sets up a business while taking financial risks in the hope of profit.

However, in the real world, the so-called entrepreneur hardly sets up any business in the true sense, but always believes that he or she runs a business.

Then what is an entrepreneur?

Here are these 10 hidden traits of an entrepreneur.

1. The dictionary definition of an entrepreneur is half truth. In that, their eyes are always on profits without taking any financial risk because they hardly have any money with which they could take a risk.
2. They don’t become entrepreneurs because they want to become entrepreneurs. But they’re forced to choose this option when they’re thrown out of every job that they try.
3. They keep complaining about everything – from clients’ calls to the color of the office walls – when they’re in a job and are always restless.
4. After starting a small unit, they spend more time running after the investors than on their work. They’re always eager to make a fast buck without doing anything.
5. Even after forming the business, they keep looking for employers who could hire them for a job.
6. They like quotes of famous entrepreneurs such as Bill Gates and Steve Jobs to ostensibly show that they follow their business practices and in any case will never stop before reaching their stature. But actually they’re clueless about business affairs.
7. Similarly, they preach with lifted quotes on social media sites by saying some obvious things like “Work Hard” or something.
8. They’re quite arrogant and instead of joining hands with others to get business synergies and grow together, they keep dragging their feet alone.
9. They are so confused that they can sometimes start shaving their beard with toothpaste instead of a shaving cream. [ This trait applies to men – and in some cases to women also. ]
10. Most entrepreneurs die a natural death. But if an entrepreneur survives, it’s because of their sheer luck instead of their competence.

I am an entrepreneur.

[ Also Read: 10 Reasons Why Small Businesses Fail in India ]

By Rakesh Raman, who is a national award-winning journalist and founder of the humanitarian organization RMN Foundation. He has been running the global technology news site RMN Digital for the past 12 years. Earlier, he was writing an exclusive edit-page tech business column (named Technophile) regularly for The Financial Express, which is a daily business newspaper of The Indian Express Group. 

He had also been associated with the United Nations (UN) through the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) as a digital media expert to help businesses use technology for brand marketing and business development. You can click here to know more about him and his work.