Encouraging Small Business Entrepreneurship through Knowledge Development

Small business and entrepreneurship are hot topics in the U.S. economy and it is believed they will make significant contributions to America’s reemergence as a nation of opportunity and growth. A study of 200 small business entrepreneurs in the U.S. and India help highlight how education, personal development and focus contribute to growth (Scales, 2014).  There is an increasing need to teach entrepreneurship and small business development in college to match skills to knowledge needed in the market. He argues:

• 1.      The need to teach the difference between small business development; and,
• 2.      The actual behaviors of entrepreneurs and small business owners.

Education can play a significant part in developing and growing the entrepreneurial class. Small business owners should move more toward an entrepreneurial orientation and seek to further reach the next level in business volume. They will need new knowledge to function at their maximum capacity.

This requires business owners to shift their approach and move more towards understanding technology, developing their structures, and handling greater volume and capacity. These skills are considered adaptive and help push small business to a growth strategy.

Adaptation is required because it destroys older systems and develops new systems as a core component of entrepreneurial activity. All businesses are in a continual process of decline and rejuvenation. Growth oriented businesses can find a way through these cycles by becoming stronger in their management approaches and business development activities.

Because successful small businesses are heavily influenced by the personality and ability of the owner a greater weight should be placed on entrepreneurial personalities. Entrepreneur traits include the desire to achieve, internal locus of control, need for independence, risk-taking behavior, creativity, drive to success, problem solving, goal directed, responsible, performance oriented, and ambitious. 

The author contends that entrepreneur education has been more focused on the economics of entrepreneurship but should also include small business growth. The educational process may be better serviced by focusing on the differences between small business development and entrepreneurship. New research and literature can be used in an emerging educational field and has great potential to impact the sector.

Scales,T. (2014). “Interactive Business” Risk, Reward and Reality. Academy of Business Research Journal, 1.