Introduction
Entrepreneurship is the process of establishing a business for effective service delivery and for profit making. However, within the business community, no single definition of the word entrepreneurship has so far received unanimous adoption making entrepreneurship such a wide concept (Carsrud and Brannback 2007, p. 5). It is no doubt that entrepreneurship remains the most important feature for economic growth in the expansive history of economic timeline. Entrepreneurs, therefore, are the driving forces behind entrepreneurship as a process in expediting the ideals of a business (Philipsen 2010, p. 5). Different individuals have been able to drive business in ways that turn even dormant businesses into success stories. The world over, these business magnates have been able to inspire the business environment making their companies effective role players in the global economy (Gedeon 2010, p. 17). In the last couple of years, entrepreneurship took a new turn with most business entrepreneurs having to front new products and services to meet the desired demands of the ever-changing consumer needs.
This change, according to Philipsen (2010, p. 6), means that organisations may from time to time have to find ways of creating new jobs and seek new markets to keep with the trends in the economy. As businesses grope with the difficult task of surviving in the markets, chances are that business leaders have the capacity to turn around the operations of businesses they lead to make them reach out to their objectives (Gedeon 2010, p. 20). As business managers and corporate leaders, entrepreneurship is one of the qualities that strongly influences the success behind the businesses or organisations they lead. Therefore, this fact underscores the need to understand the individual profile of some of the notable corporate leaders, their characteristics, style of leadership, leadership qualities, and leadership approaches among other factors. Wu Yajun and Steve Jobs are some of the most notable entrepreneurs on whom this paper focuses.
Wu Yajun is arguably one of the most referenced entrepreneurial women in the business world. Wu Yajun is a former journalist turned real estate magnate whose entrepreneurial skills continue to shape leadership in the business community (Vanburen 2013). Yajun started her small business nearer home and has since spread her business canopy to embrace the entire world with major cities in China serving as her business hub. According to Vanburen (2013), effective leadership and strong charismatic personality has always featured substantially as the success factors in Yajun’s business acumen. At the top of her priority, Yajun has positioned herself under a commitment schedule that offers her leadership aspirations the drive of purpose. Among the tried, tested, and trusted methods that Yajun displays, as part of her leadership zest is her adoration for the modern-day managerial skills that are synonymous with corporate success, especially in light of the real estate management (Vanburen 2013). Her pilgrimage to the levels of an excellent corporate leader springs from her ambition of self-discovery and the ever-burning need to transform the people around her, a feat that has galvanised world attention around her corporate leadership shrewdness. That Yajun continues to be an outgoing woman in the Chinese fiscal frontier has always been a subject debatable in every realm of global business politic as most of her success stories revolve around her hands on the job leadership approach, her critical thinking, and team skills notwithstanding. Yajun, nonetheless, is a perfect example of a real estate magnate and shrewd entrepreneur (Vanburen 2013). The world over, her popularity and her real estate corporate ventures have been, overall, yet very successful; all these fact files put together, points to one thing– her secrets of success.
Wu Yajun entrepreneurial acumen
Much explores Yajun’s real estate empire, yet we barely get to very little as to the contributory factors for these great achievements. True to Forbes claims, Yajun has impressively built up a name for herself in the most lucrative asset investment that stands at $ 4.4 billion, yet this woman did not just built these massive wealth and leadership acumen overnight, she toiled to achieve all these (Vanburen 2013). Unlike most of the widely cited successful and wealthy corporate investors, Yajun, according to Vanburen (2013), had not been born to a wealthy family – her parents were not that rich, and this gives her a rare mention of those considered to have come from rugs to riches. While having been born in a lucrative family does not necessarily qualify an individual to such unrivalled levels of managerial and leadership success, outgoingness, initiative, intelligence, and fastidiousness are all the traits attributed to Yajun as the model corporate leader in real estate development (Vanburen 2013). Positioning her within these leadership paradigms, Yajun continues to transform her business enterprise into a tabernacle of unseen marvels. In the end, Yajun has emerged as a Chinese corporate magnate, Chairwoman of Longfor Properties, investor, and author. Nonetheless, she is the founder and president of the Chairwoman of Longfor Properties that continue to expand its branches in most cities of the world (Vanburen 2013). Yajun’s outspokenness and her stab at various outstanding business editions make her a popular celebrity and a household name in the vast continental Asia. In 2011, she emerged number 17 on the Forbes celebrity top 100 list, an embodiment that adds to her corporate life, currently she is worth 4.4 billion US dollar.
Steve Jobs is a Californian born in San Francisco in 1955. His earlier life is not anything to write about, Jobs’ childhood was miserable as his parents could not afford his upkeep and had to give him out for adoption (Whitney 2013, p. 2). Seeking to achieve the best, Jobs was always keen on making his management skills a priority in driving business at Apple Inc. Today, Apple Inc. is a leading multinational participant in the UK and America’s electronics market. His business acumen has since embraced diverse markets in other parts of the world (Maha 2013, p. 3). Jobs’ Apple Inc. is a proficient worldwide manufacturer, marketer, and distributor of personal computers, commercial servers, consumer electronics, and computer software. The company’s chief products range from iPhone technology, iPad table computer, Macintosh computer and iPhone portable media players (Dedrick, Kraemer, and Linden 2009, p. 141). Founded in Cupertino California, Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs are credited with pioneering the formation of Apple Computer. In its initial years, Apple Company was predominantly manufacturing personal computers, such as power mac and Apple II Macintosh, but waning product sales and poor market share later frustrated its moves. This prompted the management under Steve Jobs stewardship to step up its inventive to transform the company’s market infrastructure.
Steve Jobs entrepreneurial acumen
Steve Jobs nurtured corporate philosophy upon assumption of leadership as the CEO of Apple Inc. in mid of 1990s after its near collapse. Under Jobs’ watch, Pisano and Shih (2009, p. 116) note that the company has established itself as a world class leader in the manufacture of consumer electronics, strategizing as a media sales and inventive technology industry that prompted it in 2007 to drop the tag ‘Computer’ in its initials resulting in the birth of Apple Inc. (Hamm 2011). Today, the company boasts of being the largest global corporation with a market size valued at $626 billion and a market cap rated above both the Microsoft and Google combined. All these achievements are attributable to Steve Jobs entrepreneurial skills that continue to inspire the business and management of Apple Inc. Under Steve Jobs’ watch Apple Inc. emerged as a revolutionary company in the consumer electronic market, especially after the launch of its key gadgets in 2010 (Maha 2013, p. 12). In the succeeding year, the global market tag for Tablet PC alone rated at $35.3 billion and this grow exponentially in the succeeding months (UK – Tablet PC market forecast & opportunities – 2016 2012, p. 2). Today Apple Inc. market anticipates a bigger market share with the growth of its major products locally. Apple’s products have received wide acceptance in the UK with an augmented demand from local enterprises.
According to Maha (2013, p. 3), Apple’s products have filled the global market gap by providing the local consumers with magnificent products that fits their ever-changing needs perfectly. Moreover, under Jobs entrepreneurial leadership, Apple Company’s global market grew at a much larger pace than was initially anticipated. Apple Inc.’s higher market penetration in most parts of the world only explains Jobs’ robust entrepreneurial managerial acumen (Lessard, Lucea and Vives 2012). Until the end of 2013, Apple Inc. led in different markets with its ground-breaking products spanning a decade long radical inventiveness under Steve Jobs.
Concepts and models learn from module MGT6A3
Business logic holds that entrepreneurs are more than just brains for generating money. Essentially, they are also avenues for achieving societal purposes and for guaranteeing meaningful livelihood to their employees (Mueller and Thomas 2000, p. 58). Accordingly, the value that a firm creates is an overall achievement that carter for the greater common good of every stakeholder in the business. Therefore, value based leadership is a key ingredient in entrepreneurship. It is an effective instrument in organisational culture capable of maximising value for the business. As key spheres of business strategy, sustainability, planning, and collaboration are the domains of consideration when an entrepreneur means to create tangible values in a business. Insightful entrepreneurs create frameworks that capitalise on human and societal value especially in the concept of decision-making (Jong and Marsili 2010). Value oriented entrepreneurs believe that they have a duty to meet the needs of their businesses by insisting on the production of goods and in the generation of services that improve the lives of the consumers. Moreover, value oriented entrepreneurs seek to enhance the quality of life for their workers while developing a robust network of suppliers to ensure financial viability across the spectrum (Carsrud and Brannback 2007, p. 10). These undertakings together guarantee resources for innovation, and development for the businesses, while delivering great returns to the investors.
Features of the chosen entrepreneurs
The concept of entrepreneurial principles is not unique to the modern day management practices. According to Darr (2010, p. 7), the development of these principles can be traced back into the history of human civilisations that characterised the earliest forms of management and leadership. Other traces of management principles have been documented as early as from before the Prussian administration in the 15th century under the reigns of Empire Frederick the great. The modern-day management principles have their foundation during the pre-industrial period management of the early 18th century that called for the new world order (Carsrud and Brannback 2007, p. 25). The wave of industrial revolution that swept the world in the early 18th century, challenged, changed, and shaped the ways of early management, entrepreneurial, and leadership practices. During and after the 19th century, another wave of change in management popularly as known the post-modernist management emerged (Darr 2010, p. 8). The theories and perspectives that inform the contemporary entrepreneurial systems are poised against the backdrop of massive economic, technological, and political changes that has driven the world over the years. Both Yajun and Jobs developed their entrepreneurial ambiences through these principles and theories (Carsrud and Brannback 2007, p. 27).
Principles of management and their application to entrepreneurship
After studying human behaviour for a long time, Fayol came up with various leadership principles for managers to follow when handling workers. He argued for the replacement of tiresome work methods with scientific based modes (Rodrigues 2001, p. 885). He encouraged managers to systematically select, train and develop individual workers and invest greatly on their cognitive skills. He also saw that cooperation with workers is an essential factor that streamlines organisational undertakings. In addition, he advocated for equitable division of labour between managers and employees to maximise on performance (Rodrigues 2001, p. 886). Both Yajun and Jobs espoused leadership context are effective in achieving the desired outcomes through administrative management principles that seek to emphasise on worker motivation. The espoused leadership principles suggest that different strategies can be applied through action to procure the intended outcomes (Burdus 2010, p. 35). Much of Yajun and Jobs entrepreneurial work dwelt on leadership behaviours that shape management. Principles displayed by Yajun and Jobs aim to determine employees’ perceptions of their leaders’ instructional management behaviours and perceptions. The integrative frameworks of these entrepreneurs hold that organisations adopt policy of risk minimisation espoused by principles that manifest themselves. According to Burdus (2010, p. 37), the risk of sharing offers the ideological incentive of mutual advantages within the organisation, and this ensures that employees work in collaboration with their leaders to protect the organisation from falling apart.
Relevance of the two entrepreneurs
The capacity as well as the enthusiasm to organise, manage, and develop an organisation or a business venture alongside any of its perceived or real risks in order to bring the profit into the business makes entrepreneurship unique to certain types of individuals and businesses (Jong and Marsili 2010). The most forceful example of a scenario of entrepreneurship is the ability to establish a new business al together. Generally, the mainstream economics combines land, labour, capital, and natural resources as key features that have the capacity to deliver a profit to businesses. According to Jong and Marsili (2010), the spirit of entrepreneurial has its characteristics based on innovation, risk taking with the cumulative element being its efficacy on the national ability to excel in an increasingly competitive global market and in an ever-changing business environment. Considering Yajun and Jobs contributions to the development of the corporate world, it becomes easy to characterise them as very abled bodies that fit the bill of being entrepreneurs (Carsrud and Brannback 2007, p. 28). Within the definition of an entrepreneur, the key characteristics involve individuals with the capacity to combine the already existing resource frameworks and expand them into creative businesses (Mueller and Thomas 2000, p. 65). Entrepreneurs drive businesses for a variety of reasons, the outstanding one being creating value both for profit maximisation and for competitive advantage.
In the contemporary knowledge based society, entrepreneurs learn to engage their teams more effectively through innovation. In keeping with the market trends, entrepreneurs focus on generating new knowledge while seeking to increase on external collaboration to bring about value to their offering (Rodrigues 2001, p. 888). Accordingly, the value that companies seek to create is normally a measure of both short-term profits as well as how such entrepreneurs sustain the conditions that permit them to flourish over time (Schumpeter 2010). Business managers, therefore, seek to deliver more than mere financial returns. Through creating value, corporate leaders build enduring institutions that make them compete well in the markets. Great entrepreneurs, according to Schumpeter (2009), seek to make money though in their choices of achieving this, they prioritise on building enduring institutions. In doing so, they invest in the future and over time, they become aware of the needs to build individuals, the institutions, the society, and the countries in which they operate (Carsrud and Brannback 2007, p. 32).
Conclusion
Overall, entrepreneurship is the most important factor of production in a business structure. Acknowledging and reconstructing the cadres that informs good entrepreneurial management are key elements for the success of business organisations and institutions that aspire to yield better results. All nations around the world, economies, communities, organisations, and businesses look upon entrepreneurs to transform them in ways that inspires development and sustainability. In many organisations, the lifeline of their success is increasingly becoming more characteristic with management principles and leadership approaches. As such, entrepreneurs who have the interest of their organisations at heart should always attest to the willingness to embrace the various principles and perspectives that informs good management to better their organisations’ chances for growth and competitive advantage. The ability of entrepreneurs to manage their corporations efficiently mirrors the success of those organisations and the people they lead. Accordingly, the need to identify and develop well-rounded entrepreneurs for the future, with a purposeful global focus, involves the recognition of the fact that organisations can reap from transfers of knowledge, expertise, skills, and experiences.
Most importantly, however, is the balancing act, the success of various entrepreneurs is their ability to balance between global, regional and local needs for their businesses to succeed in their markets. The balancing act is the extent to which entrepreneurs allow their organisations to reach out to the optimal matrix of local, regional and global and meet their consumer needs alongside the established business standards that have become commonplace in modern day management. Entrepreneurs as has been the case of Yajun and Jobs must always be individuals with the capacity of innovation and be able to drive change and take cognisance of these innovative and visionary management perspectives in anticipation of greater organisational output.
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