Alusine Barrie: Enterprise is the way - How People Who Want To Make An Impact End Up Becoming Entrepreneurs

If you pay attention as you grow up, you'll start noticing those things that are consistent about you; the things you care about, your likes and dislikes, the kind of people you enjoy to work with, environments that bring out the best in you and the types of problems you enjoy tackling and how you enjoy approaching them.

One of the greatest challenges I have observed people who want to have an impact face (especially those who start non-profit organizations) is the constant frustration to keep an organization running (with sufficient financial resources primarily) while staying true to their mission and vision. In the quest to gain funding from donors who have their own agendas and templates, who have their own preferences or may not see the urgency and dynamics of the problem you are trying to solve and how you want to solve it, it's a constant battle to explain and convince, and living by the whims of people who may not understand your approach.

People like these are leaders and are not afraid to work and give everything to the things they care about. But it's so hard sometimes to convince donors about why and how things should be done. They may feel slowed down, have to bang their heads a thousand times to close down a piece of funding and constantly have to live in the worry of whether or not they can fulfill their organization's basic responsibilities. These frustrations I have seen are what have driven my interest into utilizing the power of entrepreneurship to reach the impact I want to have. And this is becoming more and more evident as I continue to meet people striving to have and impact.

People like Bill and Melinda Gates are a striking example in this regard. With their wealth, they set up the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation through which they tackle big causes like poverty and health care especially in the world's poorest countries. As Arnold Schwarzenegger said, "any idea is great, but if you don't have the money, you can't implement anything". Steve Jobs (co-founder of Apple) also had this to say "I think money is a good thing. It allows you to invest in things that don't have a short term payback."

Many who embody the traits of an entrepreneur (a.k.a proactive leader), actually don't think they do. This is exactly how I have seen myself for a very long time. However, entrepreneurs are just people driven to change things, whose character helps them see opportunities and solve problems around them. This is the definition of leadership at its core too. In my view, entrepreneurship is a more proactive form of leadership and change making; one that takes into account of this reality. What entrepreneurship does is that it gives you the space and resources to see the change you want to see the way you want to see it. NOT how the donor wants you to reach it.
Many people who end up becoming entrepreneurs are people who care deeply about a problem or cause and use their enterprises as a way to have the impact they envisioned. For many entrepreneurship is just a necessary step to reaching their purpose in life. The image of the business prodigy who started selling at the age of 10 doesn't fit many of us and definitely doesn't fit many number of  those who have created the greatest enterprises in history.

What most people don't realize is that the traits like vision, purpose, passion, drive, decisiveness, persuasiveness, risk tolerance, flexibility, trustworthiness etc that make a great leader are also all the key traits that define an entrepreneur. For many, like the one I just met, entrepreneurship is just a necessary 'evil' to something else - to see the change they want to see while staying true to who they are and want to approach things.

There's one caveat though; Entrepreneurship is not an easy ride so don't get into entrepreneurship just for the sake of money. Choose a problem you deeply care about and enjoy working on. All those who have succeeded in building business have emphasized the necessity of passion in succeeding as an entrepreneur. See my earlier post on why doing work you're passionate about is the only legitimate shortcut to success and fulfillment: http://theyouthstand.blogspot.com/2019/07/the-only-legitimate-shortcut-to-true.html.
Thanks,
Alusine Barrie.