What is Entrepreneurship?

Isn't it true that nowadays, wherever we look around ourselves, we find our friends and colleagues moving out of their jobs? Well, look who's talking... Didn't I myself just do that? :-)

Jokes apart, in the past 14 days that I have been on my own, I have already met 3-4 friends who are in a similar situation. Some have already left their jobs, while some are in the process of doing so. Most of them are moving out because they want to start their own business. So, keeping the title of this post in mind, am I implying that moving out of a secure job and building a business of our own is entrepreneurship? Does taking risks to tread uncharted territory mean entrepreneurship? The answer is yes and no. Yes, because this is one way that can lead to entrepreneurship. No, because entrepreneurship is a much more evolved concept than just starting a business or taking some risks.

If you ask me, I would say that entrepreneurship is one's desire to evolve. It is the desire to identify one's own capabilities by testing them to the limits. It is our desire to shape the future of the world, in whatever small capacity. Entrepreneurs are people who want to do something innovative, something which is unique to them.

Now this leads me to discussing a very common notion about entrepreneurship, which I believe is wrong. According to Investopedia (http://www.investopedia.com/), an entrepreneur is "An individual who, rather than working as an employee, runs a small business and assumes all the risk and reward of a given business venture, idea, or good or service offered for sale". While this seems fine coming from the mouths of "Investopedia", which projects itself as "Your source for investing education", it is wrong to imply that to be an entrepreneur one has to quit their jobs. I truly believe that one can be an entrepreneur while still working with some organization. I'll probably write another post, "Entrepreneurship in a job", to convey what I mean by this. But that's for later.

The following definition by "Houghton Mifflin" (http://www.hmco.com/indexf.html), "One that creates, founds, or originates", is the one that I believe comes closest to capturing the real spirit of an entrepreneur.

Well, what I have done with these few words is share my thoughts around what is entrepreneurship. I know a lot of you out there have your share of thoughts on this topic. So I would like to invite all bricks and bouquets. Do keep them coming ;-)