Sense of entrepreneurship among students in Bangladesh

Salahuddin Ahmed In their book Essentials of Entrepreneurship and Small Business Management, renowned writers Thomas W. Zimmerer and Norman M. Scarborough mention a recent study by the Small Business Administration (USA). One major finding of the study is: small firms produce more economically and technically important innovations than the larger firms. What is the entrepreneurial 'secret' for creating value in the market place? In reality, the 'secret' is not secret at all. It is applying creativity and innovation to solve problems and to exploit opportunities that people face every day. These two writers also mention that creativity is the ability to develop new ideas and innovation to find creative solutions. My focus here is to bring attention to my readers about the role of entrepreneurship which is very critical for our country. Readers might be surprised why I have started my article like a class room lecture, especially when I am writing something for education page. I am trying to point at entrepreneurship. We can certainly develop creativity and innovation among our students. Now question is why we need to create this entrepreneurial sense among our students and how we can develop that. This is truly important that for the true development of poor country we need more and more entrepreneurs. And who are the entrepreneurs? Those who are willing to take risks and challenges, believe in innovation and creativity and try to make a difference are considered to be entrepreneurs. Why is this important to inject sense of entrepreneurship among our students? If we could do so, we would be able to create some innovative minds through which we can develop our nation. In our country this is not possible for all to get a job; one has to search a job for months after months to manage a very ordinary job. But this same person could be motivated, could be a risk taker and could start something new. If we wait for a long time only to manage an ordinary job, people could easily be frustrated and could commit any mischief. Traditionally, the Bangladeshi people are not risk takers. If we do not have jobs, do we need to wait for it or do we need to make something different? Through my experience of studying in the USA, I have seen many people are earning huge money without having even a college degree. They simply use their creativity and innovation to make things happen. Consequent to this, all these people make contribution to the overall development of that country. We do know that talk is cheap; we talk much about entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial issues, but do we exactly know what this is all about? In our country, people do have ideas, but they simply do not have money to make the idea into reality. We need to remember that individuals who wish to become entrepreneurs need some sort of financial support to make their venture a success. This is a huge limitation in our country that we do not know how to cultivate our innovation and creativity. Student life is the best at acquiring this sense; students could learn about this concept while studying their regular subject side by side. Our curriculum should be designed in such a way that we could develop students with this sense of sprit. In universities in developed countries there are merely two semesters: Spring and Fall. In between these semesters, there is another semester-Summer, but it is not mandatory for the students to study in the Summer semester and therefore, they can have huge time to make something different. All these students utilise their time and they either do some jobs in some places or they do something from their own, that means they also try to do something different, which does not only give them money, but ultimately enhances their competence. Even almost in all education institutions students have been educated to develop drive for entrepreneurship; they are creative and they have been educated in such a way that they could do many creative works once they leave their universities or colleges. I have seen many people in the US have been doing such innovative and creative works and make a difference; they have good degrees, but what they do not actually require any formal degree, but still they do so. The fact of the matter is we try to do many things, but still we confine ourselves in our traditional beliefs. All of us only try to get a traditional job and do not know how to make something different. When we create entrepreneurs, we need to make sure that we back them up with proper supports; all financial institutions should provide adequate support to the young entrepreneurs and especially from the government level there should be adequate provision through which these young entrepreneurs can succeed in their ventures. In our country we could have more entrepreneurs, because our people survive more than many other people around the globe. I believe our people know how to survive and we need to capitalize this instinctive. One of the theories of entrepreneurship suggests that thread of childhood deprivation and early adolescent experience play a part to form the entrepreneurship. If we look in our country, we can see many renowned entrepreneurs who have had bad time in the past. In our country we need to create this sense among our students and we need to present to them the stories of those renowned persons who made a revolution in this world through their entrepreneurial activities. Our schools, colleges, universities and madrasahs should give our students practical lessons so that they would be inspired not to get good jobs, but would be inspired to create jobs of their own through which they would be able to create an ever lasting impression. The writer is Lecturer at School of Business, Independent University, Bangladesh (IUB), email: sahmed@ashland.edu