critical thinking and entrepreneurship

Critical Thinking in Entrepreneurship: Definition, Types and How to Develop It

To be a successful entrepreneur, you will need a variety of skills and abilities. Some entrepreneurs will need good marketing skills while others need to be able to develop great products. To do these effectively, all successful entrepreneurs will need to learn how to think critically. 

Critical thinking in entrepreneurship is something many people know is important but do not fully understand. In this article, we will take a look at the role of critical thinking in business and entrepreneurship, the types of critical thinking skills as well as how to develop those skills.

What is Critical Thinking in Entrepreneurship?

Critical thinking in entrepreneurship is about making reasoned judgments that are logical and well-thought-out. It involves thinking in a self-regulated and self-corrective way. For an entrepreneur who wants to make the most of their business and themselves, this skill is vital. 

This skill transcends the simple accumulation of data and facts; it’s about synthesizing and evaluating information from various sources, discerning relevance and accuracy, and applying this knowledge to decision-making processes. Critical thinking in entrepreneurship involves a balanced approach to problem-solving, where emotional impulses are moderated by rational analysis. This balance is crucial in a landscape where decisions often have significant and lasting impacts.

Entrepreneurial critical thinking also extends to understanding and predicting market trends, consumer behaviors, and economic shifts. It involves questioning the status quo, challenging traditional business models, and innovating new pathways for growth. In this realm, critical thinking is not just a tool for problem-solving but a framework for envisioning and realizing new possibilities.

Types of Critical Thinking Skills

Problem-solving ability.

Entrepreneurs with strong problem-solving skills can navigate challenges much better than those who struggle here. That is because problem-solving is the majority of what entrepreneurs do. Legendary entrepreneur Richard Branson once said, “Launching a business is essentially an adventure in problem-solving.”

Problem-solving is perhaps the most direct application of critical thinking in entrepreneurship. Problem solving involves identifying problems, analyzing their root causes, and developing effective solutions. From there, entrepreneurs need to learn to make informed decisions that mitigate risks and maximize opportunities.

 This skill is essential for managing day-to-day operations, overcoming obstacles, and achieving long-term business objectives. Without being able to think critically about the problems they face, entrepreneurs have little hope for success.

Decision-Making

Decision-making is another one of those non-negotiable skills needed for business and entrepreneurship. When it comes to hierarchy, entrepreneurs are at the very top of their businesses. This means without a boss to tell them what to do, they are primarily the last stop when it comes to making decisions. Even in the realm of co-founders, each person is responsible for a certain level of decision-making. This can add additional stress and anxiety to the already stress-inducing role of the entrepreneur.

However, entrepreneurs do not need to feel alone in feeling like making decisions is difficult. In fact, a new study by Oracle and New York Times bestselling author Seth Stephens-Davidowitz found that 70% of business leaders would prefer a robot to make their decisions. 85% of business leaders have suffered from decision distress – regretting, feeling guilty about, or questioning a decision they made in the past year.

While AI has come a long way, it hasn’t reached the decision-making level of a competent entrepreneur with good critical thinking skills. This means that this is still a critical thinking skill that needs to be developed by entrepreneurs who intend to advance their businesses.

Open-Mindedness

Open-mindedness in critical thinking is about being receptive to new ideas, perspectives, and possibilities. It requires an entrepreneur to be flexible and adaptable. The person has to be willing to consider viewpoints that are different from their own. Also, they need to consider that others may have solutions to problems that they have missed.

This includes their team, co-founders, and partners. However, it also means customers and competitors too. As a way to build critical thinking skills, an entrepreneur needs to be able to be open to the fact that they do not know it all and will never know it all. They need to practice asking for feedback and accepting that feedback in a way that betters their own ability to run and grow their business.

Identifying Opportunities

Opportunity recognition in entrepreneurship is the process of identifying and evaluating potential business ideas or markets that are not yet fully maximized. This is a really important skill for entrepreneurs and they need to be able to think critically to do it. The reason is that it involves finding gaps in the market or a specific need that has not been met.

Successful opportunity recognition often hinges on an entrepreneur’s ability to perceive change. It requires a combination of intuition, insight, and a deep understanding of the market dynamics. While opportunity recognition is similar to entrepreneurial idea generation , which is the step in entrepreneurship that involves coming up with ideas, it is not the same. In opportunity recognition, entrepreneurs are not yet coming up with ideas. Rather, they are recognizing an opportunity to execute a future idea or fill a gap in the market.

In entrepreneurship and business, not being able to take advantage of opportunities can mean loss of revenue, market share, and, in some cases, loss of an entire business. Needless to say, capturing the opportunity cannot happen if a person is unable to identify them in the first place.

Risk Assessment and Management

Risk is an inherent part of entrepreneurship. However, not all risks are equal, and understanding which risks are worth taking is a crucial aspect of business success. This can be tough because there are a number of different types of risks associated with entrepreneurship. 69% of executives are not confident that their current risk management policies and practices will be enough to meet future needs. There are financial risks, operational risks, human resource risks, and several other types. 

Managing personal and professional risks is important for entrepreneurs as they attempt to grow businesses and themselves. This critical thinking skill means learning which risks are worth taking and mitigating those risks. 

Develop Critical Thinking Skills

Now that you’ve gotten a better understanding of what critical thinking in entrepreneurship is, let’s take a look at some ways to develop this skill. We will take a brief look at the different ways to start this process. However, there is much more to growing critical thinking skills. We have an article on how to develop critical thinking skills in entrepreneurship that you may want to read after finishing this article.

Here are some ways to start the process:

• Learn to Analyze Problems -The way you analyze a problem will greatly affect the solution you develop. Great business owners develop systems around analyzing business problems.
• Ask Good Questions- As an entrepreneur, always ask questions. Making assumptions can be detrimental. By asking questions, entrepreneurs can challenge assumptions and uncover hidden opportunities for improvement. Asking questions can help to identify the root cause of an issue. It also helps to better understand a situation from all angles. Asking the right questions can sometimes be tricky though.
• Think Alternate Views- By diversifying where you get your information you will expose yourself to new perspectives and broaden your knowledge of a topic. To take it another step forward, you can participate in engaging dialogue around a topic as well. Seek to understand others’ perspectives and see an issue from another angle.
• Be Observant- Being observant of the world around you is useful for understanding how things operate. It allows you to notice when things change or aren’t working the way they were intended to and be able to act.

Critical thinking is an indispensable tool in the entrepreneur’s toolkit. It is not just about thinking more deeply or analytically, but about thinking in a more structured and disciplined way. Entrepreneurs who master the art of critical thinking are better equipped to navigate the complexities of starting and growing a business. Ultimately, critical thinking is about making better choices, and in the entrepreneurial world, these choices often make the difference between success and failure.

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Ralph is the Managing Editor at StartUp Mindset. The StartUp Mindset team consists of dedicated individuals and is designed to help new, seasoned, and aspiring entrepreneurs succeed.

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Why Critical Thinking is Crucial for Entrepreneurs

A s an entrepreneur, change is the only constant. The environment shifts rapidly, and the best entrepreneurs need to be able to adapt on the fly. That capability requires strong critical thinking skills. So why is critical thinking so important?

They define Critical thinking as the process of actively and intentionally conceptualizing information gathered via experience, reasoning, and observation and using that information to guide action and belief.

While critical thinking is an essential skill for people in all professions, entrepreneurs who know how to leverage it can create more opportunities in their industries and maintain their competitive edges – no matter what reality throws at them.  

This blog will talk about the benefits of critical thinking, what it does for entrepreneurs, and how you can develop more of it.

The 8 Characteristics of Critical Thinking 

Experts identify eight unique characteristics of critical thinking . They are as follows:

• Asking questions . Asking questions is essential for good critical thinking. Why is something the way it is? What does that mean for your business? And if you’re going to change it, how?
• Defining a problem . What gets measured gets managed. Entrepreneurs with good critical thinking skills know how to define a problem by making it specific enough to do address.
• Examining evidence . What’s the evidence that a problem exists? What is the duration and severity of the evidence, and how widespread is it?
• Analyzing assumptions and biases . Once you’ve examined the evidence, you also need to look at your reaction to the evidence. Forward-thinking entrepreneurs get honest about their beliefs and biases and know how to avoid sabotaging a decision because of them. 
• Avoiding emotional reasoning . Emotions can intoxicate, but they’re not a great platform for business decisions. Good critical thinking involves avoiding emotional reasoning and making decisions based on evidence, logic, and observation. 
• Avoiding oversimplification . While emotions aren’t a good way to make business decisions, neither is an oversimplification. It’s essential to consider an issue for what it is, with all its complexities and gray areas intact. 
• Considering other interpretations . What would others say about the situation? How would one of your mentors or leaders react? What might someone in a different professional position do about it? Considering other interpretations is a great way to better conceptualize a situation and make an intelligent decision. 
• Tolerating ambiguity . Finally, good critical thinking requires you to tolerate ambiguity. As an entrepreneur, situations won’t always have a cut-and-dried solution or outcome. You need to take that ambiguity and lean into the uncertainty to succeed in this arena. 

Critical Thinking Skills Entrepreneurs Do Differently

Now that we’ve discussed critical thinking characteristics, let’s discuss the features of the people who display it. Entrepreneurs with outstanding critical thinking skills tend to do these things differently:

• Develop Curiosity. Entrepreneurs with solid critical thinking skills know how to get curious and ask questions. They challenge the status quo, think outside the box, and cultivate a culture of innovation in their daily lives. 
• Alternative Thinking . Ambiguity, the quality of being open to more than one interpretation, is foundational to critical thinking. Entrepreneurs who think critically know how to lean into the obscurity, adapt, and keep moving – even when things don’t turn out as planned or unexpected information arises.
• Collaborate. Successful entrepreneurs know how to communicate with those around them. They clearly share the information they’ve gained and listen to input from others, understanding that their own ideas may not always be the best.
• Situational Assessment. Just because you held one position once doesn’t mean that position will hold in the future. The most successful entrepreneurs use critical thinking skills to redefine and validate their ideas, reassess their outlook, and determine whether they still view a situation accurately. 
• Risk Tolerance . Back to ambiguity – the best entrepreneurs know how to tolerate risk and balance risk and reward to keep moving forward accordingly. 
• Grit and Persistence . One of the best things about excellent critical thinking skills is that they equip entrepreneurs with the grit and persistence to learn from failure, keep going, and find solutions. 
• Big Picture Focus. Finally, critical thinking skills equip entrepreneurs to focus on the big picture. Instead of getting caught up in the minutia, they look at the long-term, which allows them to grow, pivot, and sustain their businesses. 

4 Quick Ways to Improve Your Critical Thinking Skills

Want to improve your critical thinking skills ? Don’t worry – great critical thinking is made , not born . Here are a few ways to build your critical thinking muscles:

1. Start Questioning Everything

Asking basic questions is a great way to build critical thinking skills. Start by thinking about a few simple questions, like what you already know, how you know it, what you’re trying to prove, and what you might be overlooking.  Simply getting in the habit of asking basic questions is an excellent place to improve your critical thinking skills.

2. Question Your Assumptions

Assumptions are dangerous throughout the business world, but especially so for entrepreneurs. Since entrepreneurs are trying to pave new paths and develop new ways of doing things, you cannot afford to make assumptions. Instead, get used to questioning your assumptions and critically evaluating your beliefs.

3. Evaluate The Evidence

If you’re not sure where to go, start evaluating the evidence you already have. What does it say about the situation? What does it reveal about the future?  How can you leverage it to make an informed, intelligent decision? Are there biases or assumptions you’re holding about the evidence?

4. Give Yourself Some Grace

Finally, remember that nobody thinks critically 100% of the time.  After all, critical thinking is a tool that you should deploy when you need to solve challenging problems, not a state you should be in at all times. If you miss an opportunity for critical thinking, be gentle with yourself and try again later. 

Better Critical Thinking Means Better Entrepreneurship

Want to improve your entrepreneurial skills? Improve your critical thinking skills! While developing excellent critical thinking may seem complicated, it’s as simple as identifying essential characteristics and incorporating them into your daily life. 

  Article by: Rick Mayo 

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Critical Thinking Crucial to Entrepreneurship

Apr 18, 2022

The students we serve, sometimes called Generation Next, are typically between 18 and 25 years of age and have grown up with personal computers, cell phones, the internet, text messaging and social media. They are taking their place in a world where the only constant is rapid change.  

Our entrepreneurship programs are focused on developing knowledge and critical thinking skills in an action-based, learn-by-doing setting. We see a new age of diversity coming — more diversity of backgrounds, more women and more younger people.

Characteristics we see in successful entrepreneurs which shape our thinking on programs and initiatives are:

• A sense of curiosity that allows them to continually challenge the status quo, explore different options and innovate
• A willingness to refine and validate their idea to determine whether it has potential
• The ability to adapt and keep moving forward when unexpected events occur
• The decisiveness to make challenging decisions and see them through
• The ability to build a team with complementary talents focused on a common goal
• A high risk tolerance and the ability to balance risk and reward
• Persistence, grit and the ability to deal with and learn from failure
• Critical thinking skills and a long-term focus which allows them to start, grow and sustain a business

In 1899, Charles Dewell, head of the U.S. Patent Office, recommended to President McKinley that the office should be closed because “Everything that can be invented has been invented.” History has proven and will continue to prove that vision to be woefully incorrect. Our take on the future has innovation and an increasingly diverse population of entrepreneurs playing a significant role in providing products and services across a broad range of solutions in health care, data analytics, artificial intelligence, additive manufacturing, digital commerce, ease of use, social media, social and environmental responsibility, location-independent solutions serviced by more remote workers, as well as online learning, just to name a few.  

Our job is to help develop the critical thinking skills to enable Auburn students to lead and excel in these fields and many others.

Lou Bifano Director New Venture Accelerator

VentureWell

Bringing Critical Thinking Into the Entrepreneurship Classroom: Six Techniques

Through the Improving Undergraduate STEM Education (IUSE) workshop series, funded by the National Science Foundation, social scientists collaborated with entrepreneurship educators to bridge the gap between their areas of expertise. The resulting white papers provide research-based insights and classroom techniques for inclusive entrepreneurship educators. This ongoing series currently covers Teamwork , Motivation , and Critical Thinking. Stay tuned for more topics!

“Critical thinking is not only closely intertwined with entrepreneurship, but it is also a meta-skill to master other entrepreneurship skills/abilities.”—Carla Firetto, Abdullah Konak

Successful entrepreneurs not only have to engage in entrepreneurship processes—the knowledge and skills to turn an idea into a business—they also need an entrepreneurial mindset that looks for problems and solutions. Critical thinking is crucial to both of these elements. Throughout the entrepreneurial journey, from customer discovery to idea generation to business model innovation and beyond, critical thinking skills are necessary to engage these complex tasks in a meaningful, useful fashion.

Entrepreneurship education must therefore include critical thinking skills, and fortunately, the messy nature of starting a business is the perfect subject matter for teaching critical thinking.

Carla Firetto and Abdullah Konak have outlined six tools that entrepreneurship educators can use that teach both entrepreneurship and critical thinking.

Download the full white paper “Theoretical Perspectives on Critical Thinking: Implications for Entrepreneurship Education Research and Practice.”

Carla Firetto , assistant professor of Educational Psychology at Arizona State University Abdullah Konak , distinguished professor of Information Sciences and Technology at Pennsylvania State University, Berks

1. Encourage Students To Probe Their Own Decision-Making

Asking questions in a purposeful and intentional manner pushes students to develop their critical thinking skills to figure out answers. Thousands of years after its invention, the Socratic method still works. In particular, ask students to clarify their ideas, probe their own reasoning, and consider different viewpoints as they work through a complex project. In entrepreneurship, being able to identify inconsistencies and question assumptions is essential to the process, and will improve students’ decision-making skills. The questions you ask them become the questions they learn to ask themselves.

2. Teach Logic Through Guided Role-Play Activities

Group discussion and debate are the most common ways that reflection and argumentation—asking students to express their thoughts and reactions and also to construct logical arguments—show up in the classroom. But these are highly flexible tools for teaching critical thinking and can be put into practice in many different formats: spoken or written, individually or in groups, led by instructors or led by students, or as self- or peer-assessments. In entrepreneurship classes, consider combining reflection and argumentation with role-playing when you ask students to evaluate one another’s ideas and projects. Try out tools like Bono’s Six Hats and other role playing scenarios to facilitate structured reflection and argumentation. Role-playing can make argumentation or critiques more fun, less confrontational, and easier for students to engage with and learn from.

3. Dig Into Problem- and Project-Based Learning

Active learning is crucial to entrepreneurship education, and it is a powerful tool for teaching critical thinking. As the authors write, “Critical thinking skills can be developed by interacting with and learning about a thought-provoking subject matter without explicitly introducing critical thinking.” When students engage with a hands-on, real-world entrepreneurship project or problem, the complexity of the task demands that they apply critical thinking in order to succeed.

4. Untangle the Complexity of Building a Business with Case Studies

By presenting real-world business scenarios with multiple perspectives and dilemmas, case studies allow students to analyze complex situations. To enhance critical thinking skills, ask students to identify key aspects of the case, consider various viewpoints, and evaluate alternatives and consequences. Push these skills even further by holding discussions that encourage students to reflect on their analytical processes.

5. Offer Experiential Learning Through Virtual Simulations

Simulations and interactive games are increasingly popular in entrepreneurship education for their ability to simulate real-world business scenarios. They offer multiple decision pathways and unexpected events, and they allow students to explore various strategies and see the outcomes of their choices play out. These dynamic, immersive learning environments stimulate critical thinking. Games that involve role-playing and strategic decision-making are particularly effective in fostering critical thinking skills.

6. Connect Students with Mentors To Build Their Skills

Mentors play a key role in experiential learning and entrepreneurship. They help students internalize their experiences by providing guidance, feedback, and constructive criticism, which then enhances problem-solving and decision-making skills. In entrepreneurship education, mentorship is often linked with extracurricular activities like student competitions, incubators, and accelerators. In these settings—or in classroom-based experiential learning projects with mentors—the mentors encourage students to explore new ideas and also provide a reality check through constructive criticism. Mentors help students focus and develop their skills effectively.

7. The Ability To Think Critically

Critical thinking is, of course, not only useful in entrepreneurship. Once learned, the habits of critical thinking can be applied to any endeavor, any problem. Teaching critical thinking is essential to teaching entrepreneurship; successful entrepreneurs will use these skills every day as they face unexpected situations and are called on to make important decisions under imperfect circumstances.

The reverse is also true. Entrepreneurship is a wonderful vehicle for teaching critical thinking. Not every student in an entrepreneurship class will found a company… or three. But every single student will benefit from learning critical thinking and honing their critical thinking skills on this challenging and engaging material.

Dig into the research and get more insights and classroom tools. Download the white paper “Theoretical Perspectives on Critical Thinking: Implications for Entrepreneurship Education Research and Practice.”

This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under IUSE Grant No. 2220329.

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Entrepreneurial Skills

The skills you need to start a great business.

By the Mind Tools Content Team

Are you thinking about setting up your own business? If the answer is yes, you're not alone. The pandemic may have laid waste to great swathes of industry, but it's fueled an extraordinary surge in startups and new small businesses, as those laid off from affected firms explore new opportunities.

Reports from the U.S., Japan and across Europe show record-breaking levels of business registrations. [1] For example, figures from the U.S. Census Bureau show that new business registrations in July 2020 were 95 percent higher than during the same period in 2019. [2]

But what does it take to be a successful entrepreneur? Whether you've seen an exciting gap in the market, or feel forced to reassess your career following job loss, this article explores the skills you need to make it as an entrepreneur. It also signposts resources that you can use to develop the skills required for success.

What Are Entrepreneurial Skills?

Entrepreneurial skills are those normally associated with being an entrepreneur, although anyone can develop them.

Being an entrepreneur usually means starting and building your own successful business, but people with entrepreneurial skills can thrive within larger organizations, too.

Many researchers have studied entrepreneurial skills, but found no definitive answers. Some common themes are:

• Personal characteristics.
• Interpersonal skills.
• Critical and creative-thinking skills.
• Practical skills and knowledge.

Regardless of how you define it, entrepreneurship isn't easy. So be prepared to do the "hard yards," even after you've learned the skills we describe below.

The following sections examine each skill area in more detail, and look at some of the questions you'll need to ask yourself if you want to become a successful entrepreneur.

The Personal Characteristics of an Entrepreneur

Do you have the mindset to be a successful entrepreneur? For example, entrepreneurs tend to be strongly innovative in outlook, and they may take risks that others would avoid.

Examine your own personal characteristics, values and beliefs, and ask yourself these questions:

• Optimism: Are you an optimistic thinker? Optimism is an asset, and it will help you through the tough times that many entrepreneurs experience as they find a business model that works for them.
• Initiative: Do you have initiative, and instinctively start problem-solving or business-improvement projects?
• Drive and persistence: Are you self-motivated and energetic? And are you prepared to work hard, for a very long time, to realize your goals?
• Risk tolerance: Are you able to take risks, and make decisions when facts are uncertain?
• Resilience: Are you resilient, so that you can pick yourself up when things don't go as planned? And do you learn and grow from your mistakes and failures? (If you avoid taking action because you're afraid of failing, our article, Overcoming Fear of Failure , can help you to face your fears and move forward.)

Entrepreneurial Interpersonal Skills

As an entrepreneur, you'll likely have to work closely with others – so it's essential that you're able to build good relationships with your team, customers, suppliers, shareholders, investors, and other stakeholders.

Some people are more gifted in this area than others, but you can learn and improve these skills.

Evaluate your people skills by taking our How Good Are Your People Skills? self-test.

The types of interpersonal skills you'll need include:

• Leadership and motivation: Can you lead and motivate others to follow you and deliver your vision? And are you able to delegate work to other people? As an entrepreneur, you'll have to depend on others to get beyond the early stages of your business – there's just too much to do by yourself!
• Communication skills: Are you skilled in all types of communication? You need to be able to communicate well to sell your vision of the future to a wide variety of audiences, including investors, potential clients and team members.
• Listening: Do you hear what others are telling you? Your ability to listen and absorb information and opinions can make or break you as an entrepreneur. Make sure that you're skilled at active and empathic listening .
• Personal relationships: Do you have good "people skills"? Are you self-aware, good at regulating your emotions, and able to respond positively to feedback or criticism? Our article, Emotional Intelligence , offers a range of strategies for developing these crucial attributes.
• Negotiation: Are you a strong negotiator? Not only do you need to negotiate favorable prices, but you'll also need to resolve differences between people in a positive, mutually beneficial way.
• Ethics: Do you deal with people based on respect, integrity, fairness, and trust? Can you lead ethically? You'll find it difficult to build a happy, productive business if you deal with staff, customers or suppliers in a shabby way.

Many startups are single-owner ventures, or small numbers of friends or family members looking to make it together. For information on how to work or manage in these micro- or family enterprises, see these useful Mind Tools resources:

• How to Manage People in a Micro Business
• Working in a Family Business
• Managing in a Family Business
• Working for a Small Business

Critical and Creative-Thinking Skills for Entrepreneurs

As an entrepreneur, you need to come up with fresh ideas, and make good decisions about opportunities and potential projects.

Many people think that you're either born creative or you're not. But creativity is a skill that you can develop, and there are many tools available to inspire you.

• Creative thinking: Are you able to see situations from a variety of perspectives to generate original ideas? Tools like the Reframing Matrix can help you to do this.
• Problem solving: You'll need sound strategies for solving business problems that will inevitably arise. Tools such as Cause & Effect Analysis , the 5 Whys technique, and CATWOE are a good place to start.
• Recognizing opportunities: Do you recognize opportunities when they present themselves? Can you spot a trend? And are you able to create a workable plan to take advantage of the opportunities you identify?

Practical Entrepreneurial Skills and Knowledge

Entrepreneurs also need solid practical skills and knowledge to produce goods or services effectively, and to run a company.

• Goal setting: Setting SMART goals (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-Bound) will focus your efforts and allow you to use your time and resources more effectively.
• Planning and organizing: Do you have the talents, skills and abilities necessary to achieve your goals? Can you coordinate people to achieve these efficiently and effectively? Strong project-management skills are important, as are basic organization skills. And you'll need a coherent, well thought-out business plan , and the appropriate financial forecasts .
• Decision making: Your business decisions should be based on good information, evidence, and weighing up the potential consequences. Core decision-making tools include Decision Tree Analysis, Grid Analysis, and Six Thinking Hats .

Take our self-test, How Good Is Your Decision Making? , to learn more.

You need knowledge in many different areas when you're starting or running a business, so be prepared for some serious learning!

Be sure to include:

• Business knowledge: Ensure that you have a working knowledge of the main functional areas of a business: sales, marketing, finance, and operations. If you can't fulfilll all these functions yourself, you'll need to hire others to work with you, and manage them competently.
• Entrepreneurial knowledge: How will you fund your business, and how much capital do you need to raise? Finding a business model that works for you can require a long period of experimentation and hard work.
• Opportunity-Specific Knowledge: Do you understand the market you're attempting to enter, and do you know what you need to do to bring your product or service to market?
• Venture-Specific Knowledge: Do you know what it takes to make this type of business successful? And do you understand the specifics of the business that you want to start?

You can also learn from others who've worked on projects similar to the ones that you're contemplating, or find a mentor – someone else who's been there before and is willing to coach you.

As an entrepreneur, you must also learn the rules and regulations that apply in the territory or territories that you're operating in. These websites may be useful:

• Australia – Business.gov.au
• Canada – Canada Business Network
• India – startupindia
• United Kingdom – GOV.UK
• United States – U.S. Small Business Administration

Working in a business like the one you want to launch is a great way to learn the ropes. But be aware of non-compete clauses in your employment contract. In some jurisdictions, these clauses can be very restrictive. You don't want to risk your future projects by violating the rights of another entrepreneur or organization.

Is Entrepreneurship Right for You?

Before you proceed with your plan to become an entrepreneur, assess your skills against all of the questions and considerations above. Use a Personal SWOT Analysis to examine your Strengths and Weaknesses, your Opportunities, and the Threats that you may face.

Be honest with yourself about your motivations and the level of commitment you're prepared to give to your project. This could prevent you from making a costly mistake.

As you work through your analysis, you may feel that you're ready to plunge into your exciting new venture. Alternatively, you may decide to wait and further develop your skills. You may even decide that entrepreneurship isn't for you after all.

Becoming an entrepreneur is an important career decision, so avoid the temptation to act impulsively. Do your homework. Reflect on your needs, your objectives, and your financial and personal circumstances. Entrepreneurialism can take a huge amount of time and dedication, so make sure that it feels right.

While there's no single set of traits or skills for being a successful entrepreneur, there are many that you can learn to help you succeed.

These can be divided into four broad categories:

Examine your own strengths and weaknesses in these areas and assess the time and commitment you'll need to get "up to speed."

Take time to decide whether this is the right path for you.

[1] Forbes (2021). Pandemic Fuels Global Growth Of Entrepreneurship And Startup Frenzy [online]. Available here . [Accessed May 23, 2022.]

[2] U.S. Census Bureau. Business Formation Statistics [online]. Available here . [Accessed May 23, 2022.]

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Difficult Conversations

Creativity Tools

Self-Management

Work-Life Balance

Stress Management and Wellbeing

Coaching and Mentoring

Change Management

Team Management

Managing Conflict

Delegation and Empowerment

Performance Management

Leadership Skills

Developing Your Team

Talent Management

Problem Solving

Decision Making

Member Podcast

6.1 Problem Solving to Find Entrepreneurial Solutions

Portions of the material in this section are based on original work by Geoffrey Graybeal and produced with support from the Rebus Community. The original is freely available under the terms of the CC BY 4.0 license at https://press.rebus.community/media-innovation-and-entrepreneurship/.

Learning Objectives

By the end of this section, you will be able to:

• Define problem solving in the context of entrepreneurship
• Describe and compare the adaptive model and the innovative model of problem solving
• Identify the skills entrepreneurs need for effective problem solving
• Identify types of problem solvers

As you’ve learned, entrepreneurs often visualize an opportunity gap, a gap between what exists and what could exist, as Hirabayashi and Lidey did with Shine. Entrepreneurial problem solving is the process of using innovation and creative solutions to close that gap by resolving societal, business, or technological problems. Sometimes, personal problems can lead to entrepreneurial opportunities if validated in the market. The entrepreneur visualizes the prospect of filling the gap with an innovative solution that might entail the revision of a product or the creation of an entirely new product. In any case, the entrepreneur approaches the problem-solving process in various ways. This chapter is more about problem solving as it pertains to the entrepreneur’s thought process and approach rather than on problem solving in the sense of opportunity recognition and filling those gaps with new products.

For example, as we read in Identifying Entrepreneurial Opportunity , Sara Blakely (as shown in Figure 6.2 ) saw a need for body contouring and smoothing undergarments one day in the late 1990s when she was getting dressed for a party and couldn’t find what she needed to give her a silhouette she’d be pleased with in a pair of slacks. She saw a problem: a market need. But her problem-solving efforts are what drove her to turn her solution (Spanx undergarments) into a viable product. Those efforts came from her self-admitted can-do attitude: “It’s really important to be resourceful and scrappy—a glass half-full mindset.” 1 Her efforts at creating a new undergarment met resistance with hosiery executives, most of whom were male and out of touch with their female consumers. The hosiery owner who decided to help Blakely initially passed on the idea until running it by his daughters and realizing she was on to something. That something became Spanx , and today, Blakely is a successful entrepreneur. 2

Before getting into the heart of this chapter, we need to make a distinction: Decision making is different from problem solving . A decision is needed to continue or smooth a process affecting the operation of a firm. It can be intuitive or might require research and a long period of consideration. Problem solving , however, is more direct. It entails the solution of some problem where a gap exists between a current state and a desired state. Entrepreneurs are problem solvers who offer solutions using creativity or innovative ventures that exploit opportunities. This chapter focuses on different approaches to problem solving and need recognition that help potential entrepreneurs come up with ideas and refine those ideas.

Two Problem Solving Models: Adaptive and Innovative

There are two prominent established problem-solving models: adaptive and innovative . A renowned British psychologist, Michael Kirton , developed the Kirton Adaption-Innovation (KAI) Inventory to measure an individual’s style of problem solving. 3 Problem-solving preferences are dependent on the personality characteristics of originality, conformity, and efficiency, according to Kirton. The KAI inventory identifies an individual’s problem-solving approach by measuring agreement with statements that align with characteristics, such as the ability to produce many novel ideas, to follow rules and get along in groups, and to systematically orient daily behavior. The results categorize an individual as an innovator or an adaptor. Innovators are highly original, do not like to conform, and value efficiency less than adaptors.

The first and more conservative approach an entrepreneur may use to solve problems is the adaptive model. The adaptive model seeks solutions for problems in ways that are tested and known to be effective. An adaptive model accepts the problem definition and is concerned with resolving problems rather than finding them. This approach seeks greater efficiency while aiming at continuity and stability. The second and more creative approach is the innovative model of entrepreneurial problem solving, which uses techniques that are unknown to the market and that bring advantage to an organization. An innovative problem-solving style challenges the problem definition, discovers problems and avenues for their solutions, and questions existing assumptions—in a nutshell, it does things differently. It uses outside-the-box thinking and searches for novel solutions. Novelty is a shared trait of creative entrepreneurship, and it’s why entrepreneurs gravitate toward this method of problem solving. According to Dr. Shaun M. Powell , a senior lecturer at the University of Wollongong, Australia: “Creative entrepreneurs are notable for a distinctive management style that is based on intuition, informality and rapid decision making, whereas the more conventional thinking styles are not in accord with the unique attributes of creative entrepreneurs.” 4 This way of problem solving doesn’t alter an existing product. It is the creation of something entirely new.

For example, healthcare facilities have long been known as a source of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), a deadly infection that can have long-term effects on patients. Vital Vio , led by Colleen Costello , has developed white light technology that effectively disinfects healthcare facilities by targeting a molecule specific to bacteria. The light, safe to humans, can burn constantly to kill regenerative bacteria. An adaptive problem-solving model would seek to minimize harm of MRSA within a hospital—to respond to it—whereas the Vital Vio is an entirely new technique that seeks to eliminate it. Adaptive solutions to MRSA include established processes and protocols for prevention, such as having doctors, nurses, and other healthcare providers clean their hands with soap and water, or an alcohol-based hand rub before and after patient care, testing patients to see if they have MRSA on their skin, cleaning hospital rooms and medical equipment, and washing and drying clothes and bed linens in the warmest recommended temperatures. 5

Link to Learning

Visit Inc. Magazine for support and advice for up-and-coming startups to learn more. Examples of how “Dorm Room” entrepreneurs spot and pursue opportunities are shared along with tips and advice for making your startup a success.

Problem-Solving Skills

While identifying problems is a necessary part of the origin of the entrepreneurial process, managing problems is an entirely different aspect once a venture is off the ground and running. An entrepreneur does not have the luxury of avoiding problems and is often responsible for all problem solving in a startup or other form of business. There are certain skills that entrepreneurs possess that make them particularly good problem solvers. Let’s examine each skill (shown in Figure 6.3 ) .

Critical Thinking

Critical thinking is the complex analysis of a problem or issue with the goal of solving the problem or making a decision. The entrepreneur analyzes and peels away the layers of a problem to find the core of an issue facing a business. The entrepreneur focuses on the heart of the problem and responds reasonably and openly to suggestions for solving it. Critical thinking is not only important for developing entrepreneurial ideas: it is a sought-after asset in education and employment. Entrepreneur Rebecca Kantar dropped out of Harvard in 2015 to found the tech startup Imbellus , which aims to replace standardized college admissions tests like the SAT with interactive scenarios that test critical-thinking skills. Many standardized tests may include multiple choice questions asking for the answer to a straightforward knowledge question or math problem. Kantar seeks to create tests that are more concerned with the analytic ability and reasoning that goes into the process of solving the problem. Imbellus says it aims to test “how people think,” not just what they know. The platform, which has not yet launched, will use simulations for its user assessments. 6

Read more about problem solving and EnterpriseWorks/Vita’s story at Harvard Business Review .

Communication

Communication skills , the ability to communicate messages effectively to an intended recipient, are the skills entrepreneurs use to pool resources for the purposes of investigating solutions leading to innovative problem solving and competitive advantage. Good communication allows for the free association of ideas between entrepreneurs and businesses. It can illustrate a problem area or a shared vision, and seeks stakeholder buy-in from various constituencies. Networking and communication within an industry allow the entrepreneur to recognize the position of an enterprise in the market and work toward verbalizing solutions that move an organization beyond its current state. By “verbalizing,” we mean communication from and with the company/entity. Internal communications include company emails, newsletters, presentations, and reports that can set strategic goals and objectives, and report on what has been accomplished and what goals and objectives remain, so that employees within an organization are knowledgeable and can work on solving problems that remain within the organization. External communications could include press releases, blogs and websites, social media, public speeches, and presentations that explain the company’s solutions to problems. They could also be investor pitches complete with business plans and financial projections.

Ideation exercises, such as brainstorming sessions (discussed in Creativity, Innovation, and Invention , are good communication tools that entrepreneurs can use to generate solutions to problems. Another such tool is a hackathon —an event, usually hosted by a tech company or organization, which brings together programmers and workers with other degrees of specialization within the company, community, or organization to collaborate on a project over a short period of time. These can last from twenty-four hours to a few days over a weekend. A hackathon can be an internal company-wide initiative or an external event that brings community participants together. A business model canvas , which is covered in Business Model and Plan and other activities outlined in other chapters can be used internally or externally to identify problems and work toward creating a viable solution.

Networking is an important manifestation of useful communication. What better method is there of presenting one’s concept, gaining funding and buy-in, and marketing for the startup than through building a network of individuals willing to support your venture? A network may consist of potential employees, customers, board members, outside advisors, investors, or champions (people who just love your product) with no direct vested interest. Social networks consist of weak ties and strong ties. Sociologist Mark Granovetter studied such networks back in the 1970s, and his findings still apply today, even if we include social media networks in the definition too. Weak ties facilitate flow of information and community organization, he said, whereas strong ties represent strong connections among close friends, family members, and supportive coworkers. 7 Strong ties require more work to maintain than weak ties (as illustrated by the strong lines and weak dotted lines in Figure 6.4 ) and in a business context, they don’t lead to many new opportunities. Weak ties, in contrast, do open doors in that they act as bridges to other weak ties within functional areas or departments that you might not have had access to directly or through strong ties. 8

In fact, many young entrepreneurs, including tech entrepreneur Oliver Isaacs , realize college is a great place to begin building teams. Isaacs is the founder of viral opinion network Amirite.com , which is widely credited as the place where Internet memes started and online slang got a foothold. 9 Amirite.com consists of a large network of pages and partnerships on Facebook and Instagram that reach 15 million users each month. Isaacs recommends using your alumni network to build a team and customer base for your own venture because you never know if you’re talking to a future employee or partner.

Sharing of ideas and resources is highly valued in the entrepreneurial process. Communication is a vital skill in problem solving because the ability to identify and articulate the problem (define the problem space) is necessary to adequately address a problem. A problem can be too vague or broad or narrow. Thus, communicating the problem is important, as is conveying the solution.

Decisiveness

Decisiveness is as it sounds: the ability to make a quick, effective decision, not letting too much time go by in the process. Entrepreneurs must be productive, even in the face of risk. They often rely on intuition as well as on hard facts in making a choice. They ask what problem needs to be solved, think about solutions, and then consider the means necessary to implement an idea. And the decisions must be informed with research.

For example, as explained in Adam Grant’s book The Originals , the co-founders of Warby Parker, a venture-backed startup focused on the eyewear industry, started their company while they were graduate students. At the time they knew little about the industry, but after conducting some detailed research, they learned that the industry was dominated by one major player—Luxottica. They used this information and other data to refine their strategy and business model (focusing mainly on value, quality, and convenience via an online channel). By the time they decided to launch the business, they had thought through the key details, and they attained rapid early success. Today Warby Parker has over 100 retail stores in the US, is profitable, and is valued at almost $2 billion.

Decisiveness is the catapult to progress. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos preaches the importance of decisiveness throughout his organization. Bezos believes that decisiveness can even lead to innovation. Bezos advocates for making decisions after obtaining 70 percent of the information you need to do so: “Being wrong may be less costly than you think, whereas being slow is going to be expensive for sure,” Bezos wrote in a 2017 annual letter to stockholders. 10

Read this LinkedIn blog post on decisiveness to learn more.

Ability to Analyze Data

Data analysis is the process of analyzing data and modeling it into a structure that leads to innovative conclusions. Identifying Entrepreneurial Opportunity covered much of the sources of data that entrepreneurs might seek. But it is one thing to amass information and statistics. It is another to make sense of that data, to use it to fill a market need or forecast a trend to come. Successful founders know how to pose questions about and make meaning out of information. And if they can’t do that themselves, they know how to bring in experts who can.

In addition to public sources of broad data, a business can collect data on customers when they interact with the company on social media or when they visit the company website, especially if they complete a credit card transaction. They can collect their own specific data on their own customers, including location, name, activity, and how they got to the website. Analyzing these data will give the entrepreneur a better idea about the interested audience’s demographic.

In entrepreneurship, analyzing data can help with opportunity recognition, creation, and assessment by analyzing data in a variety of ways. Entrepreneurs can explore and leverage different data sources to identify and compare “attractive” opportunities, since such analyses can describe what has happened, why it happened, and how likely it is to happen again in the future. In business in general, analytics is used to help managers/entrepreneurs gain improved insight about their business operations/emerging ventures and make better, fact-based decisions.

Analytics can be descriptive, predictive, or prescriptive. Descriptive analytics involves understanding what has happened and what is happening; predictive analytics uses data from past performance to estimate future performance; and prescriptive analytics uses the results of descriptive and predictive analytics to make decisions. Data analysis can be applied to manage customer relations, inform financial and marketing activities, make pricing decisions, manage the supply chain, and plan for human resource needs, among other functions of a venture. In addition to statistical analysis, quantitative methods, and computer models to aid decision-making, companies are also increasingly using artificial intelligence algorithms to analyze data and make quick decisions.

Understanding of Business and Industry

Entrepreneurs need sound understanding of markets and industries. Often times, they are already working in a large organization when they see growth opportunities or inefficiencies in a market. The employee gains a deep understanding of the industry at hand. If the employee considers a possible solution for a problem, this solution might become the basis for a new business.

For example, consider a marketing agency that used traditional marketing for thirty years. This agency had an established clientele. An executive in the organization began studying social media analytics and social media. The executive approached the owner of the business to change processes and begin serving clients through social media, but the owner refused. Clients within the agency began to clamor for exposure on social media. The marketing executive investigated the possibility of building an agency in her locale servicing clients who wish to utilize social media. The marketing executive left the organization and started her own agency (providing, of course, that this is in compliance with any noncompete clauses in her contract). Her competitive advantage was familiarity with both traditional and social media venues. Later, the original agency started floundering because it did not offer social media advertising. Our intrepid executive purchased the agency to gain the clientele and serve those wishing to move away from traditional marketing.

A similar experience occurred for entrepreneur Katie Witkin . After working in traditional marketing roles, the University of Wisconsin-Madison graduate, pictured in Figure 6.5 , left agency life behind four years out of college to cofound her own company, AGW Group . In 2009, Witkin had been interning at a music marketing agency that didn’t have a social media department. She knew, both from her time at college and from observing industry trends, that social media was changing the way companies connected with customers. For her own venture, she expanded the focus to all supporting brands to manage all things digital. Today, the cultural and marketing communications agency has fifteen employees and big-name clients ranging from HBO to Red Bull. 11

Resourcefulness

Resourcefulness is the ability to discover clever solutions to obstacles. Sherrie Campbell , a psychologist, author, and frequent contributor to Entrepreneur magazine on business topics, put it this way:

“There is not a more useful or important trait to possess than resourcefulness in the pursuit of success. Resourcefulness is a mindset, and is especially relevant when the goals you have set are difficult to achieve or you cannot envision a clear path to get to where you desire to go. With a resourcefulness mindset you are driven to find a way. An attitude of resourcefulness inspires out-of-the-box thinking, the generation of new ideas, and the ability to visualize all the possible ways to achieve what you desire. Resourcefulness turns you into a scrappy, inventive and enterprising entrepreneur. It places you a cut above the rest.” 12

Entrepreneurs start thinking about a business venture or startup by talking to people and procuring experts to help create, fund, and begin a business. Entrepreneurs are risk takers, passionate about new endeavors. If they don’t have a college degree or a great deal of business experience, they understand there are many resources available to support them in the endeavor, such as the Service Corps of Retired Executives (SCORE) and the Small Business Administration (SBA) . There are many sources available to fund the business with little or no debt and options, as you will see in the chapter on Entrepreneurial Finance and Accounting . The entrepreneur follows a vision and researches opportunities to move toward a dream.

For example, in the late 1990s, Bill McBean and his business partner Billy Sterett had an opportunity to buy an underperforming auto dealership that would make their company the dominant one in the market. Neither wanting to take cash from other ventures nor wanting to borrow more money and tie themselves to more debt, the entrepreneurs were resourceful by finding another path forward to obtaining the money necessary for the acquisition they both coveted. They changed banks and renegotiated their banking payback requirements, lowering their interest payments, reducing fees, and lowering their monthly payments, ultimately freeing up a significant amount of cash that allowed them to buy the new company. 13

Types of Problem Solvers

Entrepreneurs have an insatiable appetite for problem solving. This drive motivates them to find a resolution when a gap in a product or service occurs. They recognize opportunities and take advantage of them. There are several types of entrepreneurial problem solvers, including self-regulators, theorists, and petitioners.

Self-Regulating Problem Solvers

Self-regulating problem solvers are autonomous and work on their own without external influence. They have the ability to see a problem, visualize a possible solution to the problem, and seek to devise a solution, as Figure 6.6 illustrates. The solution may be a risk, but a self-regulating problem solver will recognize, evaluate, and mitigate the risk. For example, an entrepreneur has programmed a computerized process for a client, but in testing it, finds the program continually falls into a loop, meaning it gets stuck in a cycle and doesn’t progress. Rather than wait for the client to find the problem, the entrepreneur searches the code for the error causing the loop, immediately edits it, and delivers the corrected program to the customer. There is immediate analysis, immediate correction, and immediate implementation. The self-regulating problem solvers’ biggest competitive advantage is the speed with which they recognize and provide solutions to problems.

Theorist Problem Solvers

Theorist problem solvers see a problem and begin to consider a path toward solving the problem using a theory. Theorist problem solvers are process oriented and systematic. While managers may start with a problem and focus on an outcome with little consideration of a means to an end, entrepreneurs may see a problem and begin to build a path with what is known, a theory, toward an outcome. That is, the entrepreneur proceeds through the steps to solve the problem and then builds on the successes, rejects the failures, and works toward the outcome by experimenting and building on known results. At this point, the problem solver may not know the outcome, but a solution will arise as experiments toward a solution occur. Figure 6.7 shows this process.

For example, if we consider Marie Curie as an entrepreneur, Curie worked toward the isolation of an element. As different approaches to isolating the element failed, Curie recorded the failures and attempted other possible solutions. Curie’s failed theories eventually revealed the outcome for the isolation of radium. Like Curie, theorists use considered analysis, considered corrective action, and a considered implementation process. When time is of the essence, entrepreneurs should understand continual experimentation slows the problem-solving process.

Petitioner Problem Solvers

Petitioner problem solvers ( Figure 6.8 ) see a problem and ask others for solution ideas. This entrepreneur likes to consult a person who has “been there and done that.” The petitioner might also prefer to solve the problem in a team environment. Petitioning the entrepreneurial team for input ensures that the entrepreneur is on a consensus-driven path. This type of problem solving takes the longest to complete because the entrepreneur must engage in a democratic process that allows all members on the team to have input. The process involves exploration of alternatives for the ultimate solution. In organizational decision-making, for example, comprehensiveness is a measure of the extent a firm attempts to be inclusive or exhaustive in its decision-making. Comprehensiveness can be gauged by the number of scheduled meetings, the process by which information is sought, the process by which input is obtained from external sources, the number of employees involved, the use of specialized consultants and the functional expertise of the people involved, the years of historical data review, and the assignment of primary responsibility, among other factors. Comprehensive decision-making would be an example of a petitioner problem-solving style, as it seeks input from a vast number of team members.

A charette —a meeting to resolve conflicts and identify solutions—is another example that employs a petitioner problem-solving approach. Often times, a developer of a new project might hold a community charette to aid in the design of a project, hoping to gain approval from elected officials. In the building example, this could consist of the developer and his team of architects, project designers, and people with expertise in the project working alongside community members, business executives, elected officials, or representatives like staff members or citizen-appointed boards like a planning board. Such an activity is representative of a petitioner problem-solving approach, as opposed to a developer representative designing the project with no input from anyone else.

In summary, there is no right or wrong style of problem solving; each problem solver must rely on the instincts that best drive innovation. Further, they must remember that not all problem-solving methods work in every situation. They must be willing to adapt their own preference to the situation to maximize efficiency and ensure they find an effective solution. Attempting to force a problem-solving style may prevent an organization from finding the best solution. While general entrepreneurial problem-solving skills such as critical thinking, decisiveness, communication, and the ability to analyze data will likely be used on a regular basis in your life and entrepreneurial journey, other problem-solving skills and the approach you take will depend on the problem as it arises.

There are a number of resources online that can help analyze your problem-solving abilities. Mindtools.com is one such resource. These are useful to learn your general problem-solving tendencies before being called upon to apply them in a real-world setting. One of the problem-solving techniques available from mindtools.com offers that problems can be addressed from six different perspectives. Called CATWOE , the approach is an acronym for Customers, Actors (people within the organization), Transformative, Worldwide, Owner, and Environment (organizational).

Learn more about the CATWOE technique for problem solving.

• 1 Helen Lock. “‘I Put My Butt on the Line’: How Spanx Took Over the World.” The Guardian. July 11, 2016. https://www.theguardian.com/small-business-network/2016/jul/11/put-butt-on-the-line-how-spanx-world
• 2 Gary Keller. “Business Success Series, Part 1: Sara Blakely-Spanx.” The One Thing. n.d. https://www.the1thing.com/blog/the-one-thing/business-success-series-part-1-sara-blakely-spanx/
• 3 “Characteristics of Adaptors and Innovators.” Kirton KAI Inventory Tool . n.d. http://pubs.acs.org/subscribe/archive/ci/31/i11/html/11hipple_box3.ci.html
• 4 Shaun Powell. “The Management and Consumption of Organisational Creativity.” Journal of Consumer Marketing 25, no. 3 (2008): 158–166.
• 5 N.C Healthcare-Associated Infections Prevention Program. Healthcare-Associated Infections in North Carolina: 2014 Annual Report, Healthcare Consumer Version. April 2015. https://epi.dph.ncdhhs.gov/cd/hai/figures/hai_apr2015_consumers_annual.pdf
• 6 Romesh Ratnesar. “What If Instead of Taking the SAT You Got to Play a Video Game?” Bloomberg BusinessWeek. March 19, 2019. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2019-03-19/a-harvard-dropout-s-plan-to-fix-college-admissions-with-video-games
• 7 Mark Granovetter. “The Strength of Weak Ties.” American Journal of Sociology 5 (1973): 1360–1380.
• 8 Jacob Morgan. “Why Every Employee Should Be Building Weak Ties at Work.” Forbes. March 11, 2014. https://www.forbes.com/sites/jacobmorgan/2014/03/11/every-employee-weak-ties-work/#277851063168
• 9 John White. “Top UK Influencer Oliver Isaacs Reveals What It Takes to Go Viral.” Inc . August 6, 2017. https://www.inc.com/john-white/top-uk-influencer-oliver-isaacs-reveals-what-it-ta.html
• 10 Erik Larson. “How Jeff Bezos Uses Faster Better Decisions to Keep Amazon Innovating.” Forbes . September 24, 2018. https://www.forbes.com/sites/eriklarson/2018/09/24/how-jeff-bezos-uses-faster-better-decisions-to-keep-amazon-innovating/#492c351b7a65
• 11 Stephanie Schomer. “How Getting Laid Off Empowered This Entrepreneur to Start Her Own Award-Winning Marketing Agency.” Entrepreneur. January 15, 2019. https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/326212
• 12 Sherrie Campbell. “6 Characteristics of Resourceful People That Bring Them Success.” Entrepreneur. March 10, 2016. https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/272171
• 13 “Resourcefulness Is More Important Than Resources.” The Ecommerce Mindset: How Successful Store Owners Think. n.d. https://www.oberlo.com/ebooks/mindset/resourceful-entrepreneur

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Why Critical Thinking Matters in Your Business

Table of Contents

Many professionals hope to pursue careers they’re passionate about so they can find joy and meaning in their work. Caring deeply about your work is vital for engagement and productivity, but balancing emotions with critical thinking is essential in the workplace. 

When employees engage in critical thinking, they use an independent, reflective thought process to evaluate issues and solve problems based on knowledge and objective evidence. 

Critical thinking skills can guide your organization toward success, but to truly maximize the problem-solving benefits of critical thinking, it’s crucial to teach this skill to your entire team. We’ll explore critical thinking skills and how to teach them in the workplace to help your business improve its decision-making and problem-solving. 

What is critical thinking?

Jen Lawrence, co-author of Engage the Fox: A Business Fable About Thinking Critically and Motivating Your Team , defines critical thinking as “the ability to solve problems effectively by systematically gathering information about an issue, generating further ideas involving a variety of perspectives, evaluating the information using logic, and making sure everyone involved is on board.”

This is a complex definition for a challenging concept. Though critical thinking might seem as straightforward as stepping back and using a formal thinking process instead of reacting instinctively to conflicts or problems, it is actually a much more challenging task.

Critical thinking’s ultimate goal is ensuring you have the best answer to a problem with maximum buy-in from all parties involved – an outcome that will ultimately save your business time, money and stress.

Why is critical thinking essential in the workplace?

A World Economic Forum report revealed that critical thinking is one of the most in-demand career skills employers seek when trying to attract and retain the best employees – and employers believe critical thinking skills will become even more necessary in the coming years. 

Critical thinking in the workplace guarantees objective and efficient problem-solving, ultimately reducing costly errors and ensuring that your organization’s resources are used wisely. Team members employing critical thinking can connect ideas, spot errors and inconsistencies, and make the best decisions most often. 

Employees with critical thinking are also more likely to accomplish the following:

• Analyzing information
• Thinking outside the box
• Coming up with creative solutions to sudden problems
• Devising thought-through, systematic plans
• Requiring less supervision

What are critical thinking skills?

Critical thinking is a soft skill that comprises multiple interpersonal and analytical abilities and attributes. Here are some essential critical thinking skills that can support workforce success.

• Observation: Employees with critical thinking can easily sense and identify an existing problem – and even predict potential issues – based on their experience and sharp perception. They’re willing to embrace multiple points of view and look at the big picture. 
• Analytical thinking: Analytical thinkers collect data from multiple sources, reject bias, and ask thoughtful questions. When approaching a problem, they gather and double-check facts, assess independent research, and sift through information to determine what’s accurate and what can help resolve the problem. 
• Open-mindedness: Employees who demonstrate critical thinking are open-minded – not afraid to consider opinions and information that differ from their beliefs and assumptions. They listen to colleagues; they can let go of personal biases and recognize that a problem’s solution can come from unexpected sources. 
• Problem-solving attitude: Critical thinkers possess a positive attitude toward problem-solving and look for optimal solutions to issues they’ve identified and analyzed. They are usually proactive and willing to offer suggestions based on all the information they receive. [Related article: How to Develop a Positive Attitude in the Workplace ]
• Communication: When managers make a decision, they must share it with the rest of the team and other stakeholders. Critical thinkers demonstrate excellent communication skills and can provide supporting arguments and evidence that substantiate the decision to ensure the entire team is on the same page. 

What are the benefits of critical thinking in the workplace?

Many workplaces operate at a frantic tempo that reinforces hasty thinking and rushed business decisions, resulting in costly mistakes and blunders. When employees are trained in critical thinking, they learn to slow the pace and gather crucial information before making decisions. 

Along with reducing costly errors, critical thinking in the workplace brings the following benefits: 

• Critical thinking improves communication. When employees think more clearly and aren’t swayed by emotion, they communicate better. “If you can think more clearly and better articulate your positions, you can better engage in discussions and make a much more meaningful contribution in your job,” said David Welton, managing partner at Grove Critical Thinking.
• Critical thinking boosts emotional intelligence. It might seem counterintuitive to associate analytical rationality with emotional intelligence . However, team members who possess critical thinking skills are less prone to rash, emotion-driven decisions. Instead, they take time to analyze the situation and make the most informed decision while being mindful and respectful of the emotional and ethical implications. 
• Critical thinking encourages creativity. Critical thinkers are open to new ideas and perspectives and accumulate a significant amount of information when facing decisions. Because of this, they’re more likely to come up with creative solutions . They are also curious and don’t shy away from asking open-ended questions. 
• Critical thinking saves time and money. By encouraging critical thinking in the workplace, you minimize the need for supervision, catch potential problems early, promote independence and initiative, and free managers to focus on other duties. All this helps your company save valuable time and resources. 

How do you teach critical thinking in the workplace?

Experts agree that critical thinking is a teachable skill. Both Lawrence and Welton recommend exploring critical thinking training programs and methods to improve your workplace’s critical thinking proficiency. Here’s a breakdown of how to teach critical thinking in the workplace: 

• Identify problem areas. Executives and managers should assess workplace areas most lacking in critical thinking. If mistakes are consistently made, determine whether the issue is a lack of critical thinking or an inherent issue with a team or process. After identifying areas that lack critical thinking, research the type of training best suited to your organization. 
• Start small. Employees newly embracing critical thinking might have trouble tackling large issues immediately. Instead, present them with smaller challenges. “Start practicing critical thinking as a skill with smaller problems as examples, and then work your way up to larger problems,” Lawrence said.
• Act preemptively. Teaching and implementing critical thinking training and methodology takes time and patience. Lawrence emphasized that critical thinking skills are best acquired during a time of calm. It might feel urgent to seek critical thinking during a crisis, but critical thinking is a challenging skill to learn amid panic and stress. Critical thinking training is best done preemptively so that when a crisis hits, employees will be prepared and critical thinking will come naturally.
• Allow sufficient time. From a managerial perspective, giving employees extra time on projects or problems might feel stressful in the middle of deadlines and executive pressures. But if you want those working for you to engage in critical thinking processes, it’s imperative to give them ample time. Allowing employees sufficient time to work through their critical thinking process can save the company time and money in the long run.

How do you identify successful critical thinking?

Successful critical thinking happens during a crisis, not after.

Lawrence provided an example involving restaurants and waitstaff: If a customer has a bad experience at a restaurant, a server using critical thinking skills will be more likely to figure out a solution to save the interaction, such as offering a free appetizer or discount. “This can save the hard-earned customer relationship you spent a lot of marketing dollars to create,” Lawrence said. This concept is applicable across many business and organizational structures. 

You should also be aware of signs of a lack of critical thinking. Lawrence pointed out that companies that change strategy rapidly, moving from one thing to the next, are likely not engaging in critical thinking. This is also the case at companies that seem to have good ideas but have trouble executing them.

As with many issues in business, company leadership determines how the rest of the organization acts. If leaders have excellent ideas but don’t follow critical thinking processes, their team will not buy into those ideas, and the company will suffer. This is why critical thinking skills often accompany positive communication skills.

“Critical thinking doesn’t just help you arrive at the best answer, but at a solution most people embrace,” Lawrence said. Modeling critical thinking at the top will help the skill trickle down to the rest of the organization, no matter your company’s type or size.

Critical thinking is the key to your business success

When critical thinking is actively implemented in an organization, mistakes are minimized, and operations run more seamlessly. 

With training, time and patience, critical thinking can become a second-nature skill for employees at all levels of experience and seniority. The money, time and conflict you’ll save in the long run are worth the extra effort of implementing critical thinking in your workplace.

Rebecka Green contributed to the writing and reporting in this article. Source interviews were conducted for a previous version of this article.

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Critical Thinking Skills for Entrepreneurs

The average person is barely equipped with foundational knowledge on how to start a business, which is why the most successful entrepreneurs will tell you that it takes more than just ideas or even intelligence to turn that idea into an operating company. It's all about critical thinking.

Here, we'll look at the fundamental critical thinking skills every entrepreneur needs to succeed. These perceptions- and understanding-changing skills can be acquired through a thorough education or life experience, so there's no reason not to learn them.

Learn understanding not concepts:

This is the most important foundational skill of critical thinking. It allows you to process complex information and arrive at sound decisions. Understanding comes from analyzing data, discovering new perspectives, and finding hidden meanings in a meaningful way.

Practical experience teaches you to ask hard questions, think outside the box, and connect complex dots. There is no faster way to develop understanding than learning from mistakes and challenging your beliefs through debate.

Experiment, take risks, and challenge your own beliefs:

This is the testing phase of critical thinking, where you put your understanding to the test. That means you create two different conclusions and let the audience decide which one sounds more convincing. You can challenge your beliefs in real time if you know how to phrase your arguments correctly.

It's important to deal with ambiguity and uncertainty as well. You should be prepared for when things don't work out as you'd expect. A good example is emotional intelligence, where you get to choose between different options, like choosing between anger and relief.

Know what you don't know:           

When you were just an observer, you could choose between two sides. When you become an observer and create a new perspective, you are no longer the judge; you are the subject. The consequence is that you need to acknowledge that you don't know things.

Recognizing your ignorance will help you understand the unknown parts of any problem. It also helps you in your decision-making because you'll be able to consider new options and understand risks a lot better than if you felt invincible.

Do you feel like you are struggling with putting "strategy" and "business growth concepts" in place that make a difference? Doing it all is overwhelming! Let’s have a honest discussion about your business and see if the Power of 10 can help you. Click  “HERE”  to have a great conversation with our team today.

Written By The Strategic Advisor Board - Chris O'Byrne C. 2017-2021 Strategic Advisor Board / M&C All Rights Reserved www.strategicadvisorboard.com / [email protected]

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Must-Have Entrepreneurial Skills for Aspiring Business Owners

• 25 Aug 2020

What comes to mind when you hear the word “entrepreneur”?

Maybe you picture a talented college dropout, or a seasoned business professional with a knack for predicting the next big thing. Whatever the persona, replace it with yourself.

There’s no specific demographic or personality profile of a successful entrepreneur . No matter your age, race, gender, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status, or upbringing, you can be an entrepreneur if you have the dedication, drive, and business skills.

Access your free e-book today.

Are Entrepreneurs Born or Made?

Whether entrepreneurship is a mix of innate traits or learned abilities is a constant debate. While risk tolerance, resilience , innovation , and creative problem-solving can provide a head start, they aren’t the only qualities to becoming an effective business owner.

Unlike personality traits and demographic details, you can learn and practice entrepreneurship through education, training, and experience. By taking advantage of growth opportunities, you can build valuable skills and generate innovative ideas to achieve business success.

If entrepreneurship is a path you’d like to pursue, use this list to take stock of your strengths and weaknesses and determine which skills to develop before launching your venture .

Check out the video below to learn more about what it takes to be a successful entrepreneur, and subscribe to our YouTube channel for more explainer content!

6 Skills All Entrepreneurs Need

1. finance skills.

Finance skills, such as budgeting and financial statement analysis , are necessary for running a business.

Creating a reasonable budget and sticking to it can be the difference between your venture’s success and failure. By learning this essential finance skill, you can avoid overspending and appropriately allocate company resources.

It’s also imperative to know how to read and prepare financial statements , including a balance sheet , income statement , and cash flow statement . Aside from being required for reporting and tax purposes, these documents help you track performance, make future projections, and manage expenses. They can also be useful to investors and banks that are considering funding your startup because they show your business’s financial progress.

2. Networking

Your network is one of your greatest assets. Networking can enable you to not only meet like-minded professionals but build your future team and keep a finger on your industry’s pulse.

Your professional network can comprise:

• Former and current co-workers
• Alumni from educational institutions
• Professors and teachers
• Industry leaders and speakers
• Past and present clients
• Friends and family members
• Business professionals in your geographic area
• Fellow entrepreneurs with similar interests, responsibilities, and goals

Identify and reach out to people in your network who can guide you in your entrepreneurial journey and inform your decision-making . Ask them about their businesses, how long they’ve been in their industries, and lessons they’ve learned from successes and failures. Perhaps they’ve started several companies and can offer valuable advice about raising funds, developing products, and building a client base. They may even be able to connect you to contacts whose work aligns with yours.

In addition to leveraging your network, expand it. One way to do so is by signing up for networking events in your area or industry, such as HBS Online’s annual Connext conference, where learners from around the world come together to network, engage, and learn from HBS leadership and faculty.

LinkedIn is another valuable way to connect with others. Using the platform’s feed and recommendation algorithm, you can find professionals with whom you have shared connections and similar interests and job titles. Don’t be afraid to send a note introducing yourself to a new contact.

Related: How Leaders Develop and Use Their Network

3. Speaking Confidently

The importance of speaking confidently as an aspiring entrepreneur can’t be overstated. Whether pitching to investors , communicating with clients, or making conversation at an event, the way you talk about your business and its potential can influence how others see it, too. Showing a lack of confidence can deter investors from funding your venture and lead customers to question their decisions to buy from you.

Remember: You are your business’s biggest advocate. If you’ve achieved a milestone like product-market fit , share that with others.

People may doubt you along the way, but you should never be one of them. Confidence can make all the difference when it comes to attracting and retaining customers and investors.

4. Accepting and Acting on Feedback

To succeed as an entrepreneur, you must be eager to receive feedback and act on it. This requires staying humble and accepting that your idea of your product’s perfect version may not resonate with your target customers.

“Pinpointing your target customer is a critical early step in the startup business model development process,” Harvard Business School Senior Lecturer Jeffery Bussgang says in the online course Launching Tech Ventures .

One way to gather feedback is by conducting customer validation interviews to solicit constructive criticism regarding your product, proposed business model , and assumptions you’ve made about users.

You may also garner feedback from investors, more experienced entrepreneurs, and friends and family—and some of it may be unsolicited. You’re not required to implement all their advice, but it’s beneficial to consider it. Would their suggestions increase your product’s quality, value, or user experience? If the answer is “yes,” make those improvements.

Related: 5 Key Pieces of Advice for Aspiring Entrepreneurs

5. Recognizing Patterns

Pattern recognition—in data, market trends, and user behavior—is an often-overlooked entrepreneurial skill.

For instance, identifying patterns in cash flow statements can enable you to make predictions about future cash flows. When observing market sales data, you can identify seasonality or other time-related trends that inform long-term goals.

Recognizing patterns can also help you to excel in your industry. If entering the tech space, you must understand the common challenges and patterns of what Bussgang calls “tough tech ventures” in Launching Tech Ventures . For example, health care settings involve many ethical issues around patient-facing products due to data privacy and Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) regulations.

When observing how users interact with your product, pay attention to how they react to specific elements and what questions arise. If your product is an app, perhaps you identify a pattern among teenage users who download it and immediately open the chat function. You can use trends to learn more about customers’ motivations and improve your product to better fit their needs.

Related: 7 Questions to Ask for an Insightful User Interview

6. Maintaining a Growth Mindset

As an aspiring entrepreneur, it’s critical to have a growth mindset . A growth mindset involves perceiving intelligence, abilities, and talents as learnable and capable of improvement, as opposed to a fixed mindset, which entails believing those same traits to be inherently stable and unchangeable.

One professional who demonstrates the growth mindset is Maggie Robb , vice president of operations at Spire Health. Robb knew she had a lot to learn when making the transition from a large corporation to a Silicon Valley startup and decided to take the online course Entrepreneurship Essentials to strengthen her entrepreneurial skills.

“While I have a deep business background, I wasn’t well versed in several important aspects of entrepreneurship, like investment structure, fundraising, and valuation,” Robb says.

In addition to bolstering her knowledge of those topics, Robb says the course helped her recognize the value of testing and iteration in the entrepreneurial process.

“While not something I was completely unfamiliar with, I realized the importance of it within a startup,” Robb says. “It made me look at our resource allocation in a different way, compared to traditional companies with established products.”

Robb’s story imparts a vital lesson: Your skills aren’t fixed but rather result from effort, practice, and persistence. By maintaining a growth mindset, you can avoid taking your skills for granted and capitalize on opportunities to grow and improve throughout your career.

Developing Your Entrepreneurial Skills

Entrepreneurship is a journey that requires dedication, drive, and hard work. One thing it doesn’t require is fitting a specific demographic.

With financial literacy , networking skills, confidence, the ability to accept feedback and recognize patterns, and a growth mindset, anyone can pursue entrepreneurship.

As long as you’re willing to strengthen your entrepreneurial skills, you can successfully position yourself to start your own company.

Are you interested in bolstering your entrepreneurship skills? Explore Entrepreneurship Essentials and Launching Tech Ventures , two of our online entrepreneurship and innovation courses. If you aren't sure which is the right fit, download our free course flowchart to determine which best aligns with your goals.

This post was updated on July 28, 2023. It was originally published on August 25, 2020.

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Four Critical Skills of an Entrepreneur

November 9, 2023

View all blog posts under Articles

Richard Branson, Bill Gates, Coco Chanel, and Oprah Winfrey: what do all these household names have in common? They’re all entrepreneurs who rose to the top of their game thanks to the following important skills.

Advanced Critical Thinking Skills

It’s no coincidence that MBA programs focus on developing students’ capacity for critical thinking. Critical thinking is closely related to problem-solving, but it goes beyond that. As critical thinkers, entrepreneurs don’t merely solve problems. They solve problems in the best way.

Critical thinkers formulate a number of potential solutions to a problem and consider them all before deciding on the best one.

Superior Collaborative Skills

Many people think of entrepreneurs as individuals who’ve found success because they dared to go it alone rather than running with the pack. However, that doesn’t mean successful entrepreneurs work in isolation. Paul Allen was instrumental in Bill Gates' rise to the top. Steve Jobs might have been the public face of Apple, but Steve Wozniak was working just as hard behind the scenes.

Many successful entrepreneurs say knowing their weaknesses, as well as their strengths, is key to their achievements. When they recognize a weakness in themselves, they find people who excel in this area and work with them to achieve their goals.

Collaboration skills are crucial to this process. Successful entrepreneurs know how to communicate with the people around them. They clearly share the information they’ve gained and listen to input from others, understanding that their own ideas may not always be the best. They might be natural leaders, but they also understand how to work as part of a team.

Excellent Money Management Skills

Image via Flickr by reynermedia

You might employ an accountant or team of finance experts, but that doesn’t mean you can forget about the figures. As an entrepreneur, it’s important to have a sound understanding of your finances, cash flow, funding, and profits. You must feel confident with these numbers to feel confident making decisions about your budgets and revenue growth. Put simply, you must know how to manage money to successfully manage a business.

Superb Sales Skills

Many successful entrepreneurs don’t realize they’re using the same skills their sales team does every day. However, the clear communication, charisma, and persuasive powers sales professionals use are crucial for entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurs employ these skills when they negotiate with vendors, when they network with others in their industry, and when they seek out funding. Any time an entrepreneur looks to influence anyone in the business world, they’re using sales skills.

A lack of sales skills won’t just hinder your chances of success; it may even kill your business. One of the key reasons entrepreneurs fail is because they can’t secure funding. It’s easy to blame this problem on a tough economy, but in truth experts say a lack of trust is a more likely culprit. When you’re securing funding, you need to get investors to believe in you, your company, and your products or services. If you can’t, then your sales skills may need some work.

Cultivate these skills and you too may have what it takes to make it as a successful entrepreneur.

Recommended Reading:

• The EMBA Path for Entrepreneurs and Career Changers
• What Future Executives Can Learn from Poor Leadership
• 3 Ways to Better Prepare for an Executive-Level Interview

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Critical thinking for Entrepreneurs: Its importance, and how to develop it?

• July 19, 2022
• Entrepreneur

The Indian economy has recently seen an escalation in the number of aspiring entrepreneurs coming up with a breakthrough idea or product to change the world. At present, emerging small businesses and entrepreneurs are the reason countries globally are capable of keeping their GDP afloat. Employment opportunities are created, and new ideas as products and services emerge, making life convenient for the ordinary person.

Now there is this thing about a business entrepreneur . It is easy to hop on the bandwagon of running a business and be fascinated with the idea of managing people. But it is not always sunny, and failure is a constant threat. But the first instinct is always risk aversion which demands patience, perseverance, and critical thinking, which rule the entrepreneurial domain.

In a day and age where the internet validates the existence of a sustainable business, business owners have to be thought leaders, not only inspiring their employees/ team in the firm and the people outside of it. While the world is watching and competitors are patiently waiting for them to fall, an entrepreneur’s critical thinking and problem-solving abilities are relentless weapons of success.

So if you are still wondering about the importance of critical thinking for entrepreneurs , it’s time you scroll to stop and continue to read what we have to say about it.

Importance of Critical Thinking

Critical thinking skills are taught to us from an early age to analyze situations and situations practically. It is easy to get high on emotions, especially when circumstances appear to be against you. That’s where a skill set like critical thinking intervenes to see the problem from an objective perspective and make decisions that orient with your business.

Abilities like critical thinking & problem solving are significant factors in business concerning market research. It is quite a challenge for an entrepreneur to grab people’s attention and make a noise in the market, whether they are a solopreneur or running a family business. That’s why critically evaluating the ideal buyer’s persona ensures better business strategy optimization.

It is not just about making a good business plan but interacting with people outside the business, which would require excellent communication skills. Believe it or not but critical thinking facilitates effective communication, which is the basis of growing a business and keeping it sustainable for a long time.

Moreover, to expand your brand and keep the growth consistent, it is essential to have examined beliefs more from a logical viewpoint. With the speed breakers a crucial aspect of business, making the right call by taking a bird’s eye view of the matter transforms the narrative. So, it isn’t only about making revenue in a business but keeping the integrity and business image stable.

How to develop Critical thinking ability as a business entrepreneur?

Be observant and careful, always ask questions.

There is a reason why children can grasp more information and retain knowledge than adults. They are curious about details and do not hesitate to ask questions. A business entrepreneur needs to be constantly curious and ask questions. Ask questions about the report presented by your marketing team; when you do that, it gives you a deeper insight into critically analyzing it for the welfare of your business.

Be Open-Minded

Be open to change and newer ideas from the people in your team. A good entrepreneur is a leader for their employees, encouraging them to share their thoughts. When you hear others’ opinions, you will know about different possibilities and make the right decision.

Entrepreneurship is a long and thoughtful journey where abilities like critical thinking and problem solving would always resolve conflict and keep the functioning of a business smooth. At MIDAS, we teach the value of entrepreneurship which is more than just managing operations and people. To know more, check out our one-year Post graduate diploma in entrepreneurship.

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• February 3, 2023

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• February 1, 2023

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• January 30, 2023

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Fostering an Entrepreneurial Mindset Through Project-Based Learning and Digital Technologies in STEM Teacher Education

• First Online: 02 January 2023

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• Isha DeCoito 4 &
• Lisa K. Briona 4  

Part of the book series: Integrated Science ((IS,volume 15))

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This chapter explores the potential of STEM project-based learning (PBL) and digital video game (DVG) creation to support and integrate STEM and entrepreneurial competencies in teacher education. Specifically, the authors present and describe three STEM projects and three DVGs, with a focus on entrepreneurial and STEM skill development and growth mindsets in a curriculum and pedagogy methods course in STEM education. The authors maintain that in order for teacher candidates (TCs) to develop entrepreneurial and STEM literacies, they need to integrate entrepreneurial and STEM content and pedagogical knowledge to be able to effectively instruct, assess and design STEM curricula that can foster entrepreneurial skills and support future generations of learners. TCs engaged in several tasks utilizing principles of inquiry, design-based and experiential learning, and reflective practice that fostered entrepreneurial awareness and enhanced entrepreneurial competencies. Entrepreneurial growth is evident in the projects, as TCs provided extensions, thus creating value-added content beyond the scope of the initial assignment. These value-added extensions were also catalytic in developing an entrepreneurial growth mindset. The authors contend that teacher education programs, professional development initiatives, and key stakeholders have a pivotal role to play in developing and supporting students’ STEM and entrepreneurship competencies.

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If you always do what you always did, you will always get what you always got. Albert Einstein, Genius

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DeCoito, I., Briona, L.K. (2023). Fostering an Entrepreneurial Mindset Through Project-Based Learning and Digital Technologies in STEM Teacher Education. In: Kaya-Capocci, S., Peters-Burton, E. (eds) Enhancing Entrepreneurial Mindsets Through STEM Education. Integrated Science, vol 15. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-17816-0_9

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Creative behavior is a fundamental catalyst for success. It's what allows entrepreneurs to transcend mere ideation and master strategic innovation. This creative ethos is particularly evident when considering the diverse motivations behind entrepreneurship. While some individuals are considered "opportunity" entrepreneurs—those driven by a passion for innovation or a desire to capitalize on emerging trends—others are propelled by necessity, spurred by economic hardships or limited employment options.

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