the business ladder

By Rory James MacLaren-Jackson (First published 01.07.07 - updated 12.12.08)

It is human nature to try and predict the next ‘big thing’ or popular trend. In fact, it can be very profitable for marketers to get such a prediction correct. However, at the same time, it is usual in the media to describe the next big thing in relation to a previous trend.

For example, you may have heard that ‘Thursday is the new Friday’, and many of you will remember the colour brown being pronounced ‘the new black’ by fashion designers several years back.

However, nothing grabs hold of the popular consciousness like the suggestion that something is, or may be, the next ‘rock and roll’. Recently, the rise of the celebrity chef has seen even cookery being proclaimed in these terms, but with the mainstream success of TV shows like ‘The Apprentice’ and ‘Dragons’ Den’, it is the turn of enterprise to become a buzz word. Once misunderstood and even more often mis-spelt, the entrepreneur is back in the limelight, having finally shaken off the outdated image of the Eighties yuppie, all brick-sized mobile phone, loud shirt and ‘all or nothing’ risk-taking.

In fact, the rise of the Internet in business has created a new breed of ‘online entrepreneur’ where the next generation of Richard Bransons and Alan Sugars is just as likely to be your next door neighbour’s fifteen-year-old son or daughter, busily building a billion dollar social networking or auction website from their bedroom.

So, why are people talking about enterprise now?

The steady and significant rise in house prices in recent years has created considerable wealth for many from an investment that they would usually have made anyway. With a growing number of people now suffering from the correction and downturn in the housing market, many are looking for other ways to ensure their financial security. With significant falls on the Stock Exchange and low interest rates for savers, many people are now looking to other ways to make money and safeguard their future wealth.

This trend can also be explained by the average person being far more concerned with the issue of control of their financial destiny than in days gone by. The idea of a job for life, even a job for five years, is alien to the present generation; and with little faith in the provision of state and private pensions, there is a strong feeling that if you want a secure financial future then you have to take control of it yourself. Instead of being tied directly to the rise and fall of the property, equity or bond market, why not start your own business concern and be your own boss, keeping all of what you are worth and not the fraction that you are paid as an employee?

Enterprise is, however, about more than just leaping feet first into self-employment. In fact, quite the opposite is true, in that the principles of enterprise can be applied just as successfully in the employed sphere as when running your own business. For example, in my corporate sales and motivational training, I often tell individual salespeople to treat their desk like their own business, not just somewhere they ‘clock in and clock out’ each day. Becoming an entrepreneur is very much about attaining a mindset and developing an approach to business that puts you firmly in control of your future and financial rewards. Therefore, there is much to learn from the concept of enterprise without having to necessarily become a fully-fledged, full time entrepreneur yourself.

For clients of one of my businesses, it is financial trading that has become the entrepreneurial component of their financial plan. Whether full time in place of their job or part time for additional income, like myself, this is the entrepreneurial side of their wealth-generating activities, the part they control themselves both in terms of effort expended and gains made.

Of course, just like in rock ‘n’ roll, the reality can be very different from the stage image. Entrepreneurs like myself know there can be a fair share of heartbreaks, sleepless nights and downright failures before success is achieved and even then, one faces the constant battle to maintain this success in the face of competition and the ever-shifting marketplace.  However, I think my energy when I present and coach gives away the fact that I am passionate about being an entrepreneur and would not want to be in business any other way.

So, if enterprise is the new rock ‘n’ roll then make sure you have the strategy in place to be more than a ‘one hit wonder’ in your chosen business and instead enjoy the long term success of being a genuine star in your field!

© Copyright 2007-2008 The Business Ladder (UK) Limited

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