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Entrepreneurial employees (View Comments)
Unnati Narang
Posted On Wednesday, February 18, 2009 at 02:59:46 PM
There are only two ways of having a successful career. One is to have complete knowledge of the what, how and why of your field through the best quality education and the second is to gain unmatched street-smart experience in your field that will give you the deepest understanding of the nitty-gritty of the industry.
Today, our executives combine the best of both worlds. They are experienced in handling a vast variety of the most unforeseen situations, applying the best of their knowledge and learning over the years. However, at some point of time, every organisation needs something out of the routine, a change, a new direction and a new perception. Fast growing, entrepreneurial organisations all the more, need employees who can regularly demonstrate entrepreneurial characteristics.
Pratyush Pundir, director - sales, OnStage Retail Ventures, is only 23 and last year refused to join his job placement in a leading IT company. So, how is he with Onstage? “I took it up as a summer job and before I knew, I was working with Onstage fulltime, managing their sales, stocks and even accounts. Sometimes you have to move out of your comfort zone and a secure life in order to achieve something bigger. At Onstage, we are a small team with loads of energy, teamwork and multitasking!” His young team is always up on their feet, working late hours even after the stores have closed down, holding meetings and providing a strategic direction to their work.
Today’s organisations are competitive and call for active participation of the employees. Many start-ups and even established organisations today look to hire entrepreneurial employees, who can take initiative, handle and support change as also operate effectively in an environment of risk. Along with offering opportunities for growth, the HR of high performing organisations strives to create a sense of belongingness in their employees.
One of the models that may be followed in growing organisations can be in pursuit of the ideals set by Edward Hess in his book “The road to organic growth”. Among other features, it points out that employees who promote organic growth usually belong to the middle management level. These growth managers have usually had a varied experience early in their career. As pointed out earlier, knowledge/experience allows them to innovate and have entrepreneurial bent of mind. Such employees strive to look for learning opportunities, love challenges and take action. They are team players and build teams where every member is accountable and at the same time they are able to inspire them to passionately and collectively take up new ventures.
Then there are those who go beyond the conventional application of knowledge in a secure job environment by thinking out of the box and start their own enterprise. Ankur Gattani, the 24-year-old CEO who created www.lifeinlines.com feels, “The idea of entrepreneurship is tempting for youngsters, more so in the face of the current job market situation. Being an entrepreneur requires a lot of patience. You have to be fairly confident to start something of your own.”
Swapnil Chugh, formerly an equity research analyst at Goldman Sachs, is presently pursuing his big business dream. He’s in the process of launching ‘Serene Woods’, an e-commerce site for talented authors (self-publishers), photographers and other artists. “The entrepreneurial culture allowed people to come up with innovative ideas, some of which were actively implemented by the firm. But I wanted to move one step ahead and start my own enterprise around something closer to my heart.”
Many organisations have direct idea generation processes. Google's policy to allow people 20 per cent of their time to pursue their own independent projects is well known. The employees need to be intuitive and take risks when the situation calls for it. Out of the box thinking takes an organisation to new levels of growth, achievement and prestige. The expectations from work life are changing, rendering success a whole new meaning. Though many entrepreneurial employees often leave organisations in pursuit of new ambitions, it is also the entrepreneur within an employee that often makes work a fruitful endeavour, and the organisation’s growth a smooth sail through the tide.
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