Successful entrepreneurs share some qualities, some which are inborn and some which are learnt, this is a topic we often discuss at Appworks. I read this article named “5 Signs From Childhood That You Were Destined to Be an Entrepreneur” from Entrepreneur.com yesterday. John Rampton, who himself is an entrepreneur, talked about a couple of signs someone shows when one is still in school, that he thinks has to do with success in entrepreneurship later in life. I found it to be very interesting.
Today I am going to adapt this five points of his to present the points using situations Taiwan would understand better, and talk about my view on the matter.
Your scores are always hovering around the 70 percent mark.
An entrepreneur has to be smart, and yet can’t be the kind of good student that always follow the rules. So he won’t score 50, but probably won’t score 90 either. So for people who do not put too much effort in their studies, and yet can find a way of preparation that give them the greatest rate of return, and cause their results to fall between 60-80 every time, there is a very high chance that they are entrepreneur material.
You always perform well in group projects.
An entrepreneur has to be an excellent team worker, especially the kind who would focus on the team’s winning and not his personal success. When participating in group projects at school, if you could always not care about how much personal effort you put in and encourage everyone in the team to contribute their strength to achieve something really great together, then by the time you start up your own business, you would realize you already have acquired a very useful team-leading skill.
The stall you set up during the fun fair did very well.
Setting up stalls and selling stuff at a fun fair is the closest thing to entrepreneurship for students in Taiwan. They have to predict what do the students and parents like, prepare the materials, and sell as many products as possible on that day, so as to reclaim the cost and profit. If even only one part of it went wrong, like choosing the wrong product, setting the wrong price, overstocked, not placing enough people to take care of the stall… and so on, it would cause loss to the whole class. It is so hard to find someone that is born a businessman, but people who have the gift to perform in a fun fair when they are still students, might just be one of the very rare born-to-be-good business man.
You have many ideas to earn pocket money.
What I am most grateful to my parents for, is they have always given me very little allowance money, and it cultivated in me a good habit – to adapt to circumstances and come up with solutions. In order to have more spending money, I have to come up with various ways to earn and save money ever since I was young. When I was in primary school I would send game guides to gaming magazine for publication, use different creative ways to collect lottery receipts, check visitors’ tickets upon their entry in the Tower. When I was in junior high, I only signed up for tuition classes that offer scholarships. Starting senior high, I began to work part-time in tuition classes. When I was studying in university, I worked part-time at fast food restaurants and American restaurants. Come to think of it, I realized all this experiences have developed my entrepreneurial skills and built my character.
You always sacrifice for your friends.
Be it Google, Facebook, YouTube, WhatsApp, AirBnB, or Uber, modern entrepreneurs often set out to promote the welfare of others. They first create great values for subscribers, only after that do they reap the benefits from it. That is why people who often help out without asking for return and are even willing to sacrifice themselves when they are young- people like them, who are born with such an altruistic spirit, I believe, are better able to create a new landscape in this world.
This article is originally written by Jamie Lin, a well-published author based in Taiwan. The article is translated from Chinese by Loh Sin Yee and is reproduced here with permission. Images were added into the article for visual purposes.