The Power of Synergy in Entrepreneurship

Synergy is the interaction of multiple elements in a system to produce an effect different from or greater than the sum of their individual effects. The term synergy comes from the Greek word synergos, meaning "working together”. “The collaboration could be between and amongst things, ideas and people. The collective energy of soldiers in a battlefield is a quintessential victory tool” (Kuenyefu, 2013). In much the same way, the collective efforts of entrepreneurs is a success tool that can be harnessed to defy all odds’.

Most entrepreneurs like wish to go solo in their entrepreneurial pursuit because of the sharing of profit, potential disagreements and other cons associated with collaboration.  Others who tempter into it seek weak partner whom they think they can cheat. Synergy is not and shouldn't be a double-dealing tool!! It must be formed with competent, hardworking and diligent people in order for its mystical powers to be fully unleashed. Synergy, when harnessed very well, can be a springboard for the attainment of higher heights. As the adage goes, “Two heads are better than one”. Mother Theresa once said, “You can do what I cannot do, I can do what you cannot do; together we can do great things. Since ideally a team consists of persons with unique and diverse skills, there is division of labor and specialization in the resulting enterprise and this increases its efficiency and effectiveness. As opposed to the so called profit sharing con of synergy, synergy increases the overall profit of the enterprise and as such the individual earnings thereof. After all, 20% 0f GH₵10000 (synergy earnings) is better than GH₵1000 (solo earnings).

However, one must consider a major caveat in synergy: one must collaborate with like-minded people who share one’s vision and not with unlike-minded people even if they are family members. The collaboration with unlike-minded people especially family members or relatives has led to the downfall of many enterprises. Collaborating with like-minded people will go a long way to reduce disagreements and conflicts if not eradicate them.

The collaboration of the trio of Ken Ofori-Atta, Keli Gadzekpo and James Akpo (now Togbe Afede XIV) to form Databank which today has become a leader in the financial market activity both in Ghana and on the African continent as a whole illustrates the power of synergy. They began with a borrowed money of $25000 together with their integrity and experience gathered whilst working in the states. The collaboration of an initial people has today served as a source of employment to many, made investors better off, raised capital for corporate entities and deepened the financial market activity in Ghana and beyond.

 In a nutshell, “collaboration is great, collectivism is marvelous and teamwork is results-yielding. Great achievements have been forged on the anvils of team work and collaboration throughout history. Synergy gets you there faster than solo effort” (Kuenyefu, 2013).

Reference

Kuenyefu, P. L. (2013). To the Zenith. Aflao: Selawokah Digital Shinning Colors Limited.

Walk The Talk

It is not enough for one to talk the talk. One must go further to walk the talk. In other words, one must practice what one preaches. 

In the same vein, knowing that entrepreneurship is the key to Ghana’s development is not sufficient. Ghanaians must develop an entrepreneurial culture which will enable them engage in entrepreneurial activity. “The entrepreneurial culture can be nursed by devising programmes for the youth, retired and entrenched workers on enterprise building skills. The entrepreneurial culture takes better root when introduced early enough alongside formal education to develop motivation and management skills for small enterprise operations” (Baume 2012).

After the entrepreneurial culture has taken root in us, we would be good to go. To be able to walk the talk effectively, we must always think outside the box and see things from different perspective. We must see the glass as half full rather than half empty. A story is told of a man who sent two servants to go to a nearby town to see whether there is a potential market for the shoes that he has produced. After the survey, one servant reported that the residents in that town do not wear shoes and as such there is no potential market there. The other reported that the fact that the residents in that town do not even wear shoes, makes it a good business opportunity that his master must capitalize on.

            Furthermore, many a times, business ideas flash into our heads from nowhere but we just let them vaporize from our heads and they do not return again. Most, if not all of such ideas can be capitalize on for entrepreneurial purposes and as such they should be written down. These ideas should later be assessed in order to rule out the non-feasible and the non-viable ones.

Finally, conceiving a business idea without incubating it is no good than not conceiving it at all. After cross examining the ideas, the rest which proves to be prospective should be then converted into workable/marketable products or services. One must take the bull by the horn and must also be innovative and creative to be able to bring these ideas into reality. One mistake most people make is that they want to figure everything out completely before implementing their ideas but those ideas never materialize since their minds wander on 1000 reasons why the idea will not work although the business idea is feasible and viable. Don’t be afraid to experiment after all entrepreneurs are risk takers. Start small but think big! As the adage goes, “If you fail to plan, you plan to fail.” One must also have a business plan which serves as a blueprint for how you are going to start, manage, grow, and finance your culinary venture as well as a communication tool or instrument to communicate with other stakeholders. It is an undeniable fact that financial constraint has become a hard nut to crack for many upcoming entrepreneurs since the banks are reluctant to give out loans to people of such caliber. One can start investing a portion of one’s income (chop money) whilst in school and/or part of their national service salary into lucrative investment portifios so as to accumulate enough funds to finance one’s own venture.  

Do you have a business idea? Is it feasible and viable? Is it prospective? If your answer to these questions is “yes”, then what are you waiting for? The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.” – Chinese Proverb

The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.” – Chinese Proverb    

Reference

Buame, Samuel. Entrepreneurship: Entrepreneurial Education, Venture Creation and 
    SME Management in Ghana. Weija-Accra: University of Ghana Business School,
    2012. Print.

.

The Entrepreneurial Tripod

Entrepreneurial tripod is a term used to refer to the three main pillars of entrepreneurial success. For an entrepreneur to succeed, he/she must stand on three “legs”.

The Entrepreneurial Tripod

The first leg is the entrepreneur’s personality. The entrepreneur must have requisite qualities,   attributes, attitudes and experience in order to succeed. These attributes and characteristics includes:

Creativity: “Creativity is the spark that drives the development of new products or services, or way of doing business. It is the push for innovation and improvement. It is the continuous learning, questioning, and thinking outside the box (Buame, 2012).”

Risk-taking: Successful entrepreneurs are risk takers. They take risk, certainly – because without risk there is no challenge – but they only take risks they believe they understand and can manage. They think seriously about all the risks inherent in any venture (not just financial risk) and ensure they have understanding or control over the downside before undertaking it.

Vision: Helen Keller, an American author, political activist, and lecturer, who was the first deaf and blind person to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree once said, “The only thing worse than being blind is having sight but no vision.” Any successful entrepreneur knows where he or she wants to go. He or she has a vision or concept of what their firm can be. For example, Steve Jobs of Apple Computer fame wanted his firm to manufacture microcomputers that will be used by every tom, dick and harry from school kids to business people. He also wanted it to be an integral part of a person’s life in terms of learning and communicating. This propelled Apple to be a major competitor in the microcomputer industry. Not all entrepreneurs have predetermined vision for their firm. In many cases, this vision develop over time as the individual begins to realize what the firm is and what it can become.

Flexibility: Here, flexibility is the ability to adjust quickly in response to changing market. A story is told about an entrepreneur who started a fancy shop selling only French pastries but customers wanted to buy muffins as well. He in turn modified his vision to accommodate their needs instead of risking the loss of these customers. This is flexibility in action!

Self-confidence: Self-confidence relates to self-assurance in one’s personal judgement, ability, power etc. It usually emanates from thorough planning, which reduces uncertainty and risk level.

The second leg is the business opportunity identified by the entrepreneur. It must be prospective, viable and feasible. Prospective means the business opportunity must be able to thrive for about two to five years. A business opportunity is said to be feasible if it is possible and practical to do easily or conveniently.

The third leg is the nature of the organizational environment. The organizational environment is the set of forces surrounding an organization that have the potential to affect the way it operates and its access to scarce resources. This must be well understood, enabling, friendly and supportive.

Just as a three-legged chair needs all three legs in order to stand well, an entrepreneur must stand on these three legs (the tripod) at the same time in order to succeed.

Reference

Buame, Samuel. Entrepreneurship: Entrepreneurial Education, Venture Creation and SME

Management in Ghana. Weija-Accra: University of Ghana Business School, 2012.  Print.

Entrepreneurship: The Key to Ghana’s Development

There have been a number of attempts to conceptualize the phenomenon of entrepreneurial processes and activities but no consensus has been reached about what entrepreneurship is (Buame, 2012). In fact, Joseph Schumpeter’s definition of entrepreneurship seems to have been universally accepted since it has somehow stood the test of time. Joseph Schumpeter (1934) defined entrepreneurship as a new process where a group of people or an individual creates something new, and that something new could be: a new product, a new method of production, a new source of material or a new market hitherto unexploited. For practical purposes, Buame (2012) define entrepreneurship as, "An innovative process where a prospective individual identifies and seizes opportunity (be it an idea, or business); organises existing resources to convert those opportunities into workable/marketable products or services; thus by adding value through time, efforts, money, or skills for the benefit of society; assumes the risks of the competitive marketplace to implement these ideas; and realises the rewards from these efforts."

Ghana has been plunged with developmental difficulties. Unemployment (especially graduate unemployment) is on the rise. The value of our currency is depreciating at an increasing rate. “Dumsor dumsor” has become the order of the day. The antidote to these and other similar killer diseases that Ghana has been afflicted with is entrepreneurship. “Entrepreneurship is the driving force that transforms and renews economies in the wake of the collapse of communism. It is an engine of growth, with entrepreneurs assuming the driver’s seat” (Buame, 2012). The transformation of Malaysian economy by entrepreneurship attests to this assertion.

It should be pointed out that the fact that Malaysia and Ghana attained independence in the same year (1957), have similar climatic conditions and even similar natural resources makes the former the best country for this comparative analysis. Malaysia and Ghana are both producers and exporters of palm oil in the world. Their industrial path diverged in the early stage of development, and eventually went in opposite directions. Malaysian oil palm industry has been dynamic and successful, whilst that of Ghana has been inactive and limited notwithstanding the fact that oil palm tree is indigenous to West Africa. The first oil palm plantation and mill was established in Ghana by the British Alexander Cecil Goff in the early 1900s. The British in Malaysia went to Ghana to learn more about the culture of oil palm plantation and production and cultivation techniques. Consequently, Malaysia began dominating the world market for palm oil in the early 1970s with 573,000 metric tons exported per year and has maintained their dominion thereafter. One may argue that since the British were managing the oil palm plantations, the domination of palm oil market can be attributed to the efforts of the British and not the Malaysians per say but according to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization’s statistics in 2013, Malaysia was the number two exporter of palm oil in the world after Indonesia. This proves that the Malaysians’ entrepreneurial activities has played a major role in their domination of the oil palm market.

 Furthermore, Malaysia’s economy used to be dominated by agricultural products. As a result, during the 1970s, its neighbours perceived it as a resource of rubber and palm oil. Of course, it should also be pointed out that the country became popular for its capability to provide supplies of tin. As the decades passed, however, the nation’s gross domestic product’s “composition” slowly shifted away from the traditional to modern-day offerings such as electronics and services as opposed to that of Ghana which is still over depending on the primary sector. Without a doubt, the country has undergone an economic transformation and this can be largely attributed to their entrepreneurial activities.  Malaysia’s palm oil products for example, now merely take up eight percent of the nation’s total export whilst electronic devices account for roughly 30 percent of the country’s overseas sales. In this regard, it would also be best to hammer on an interesting fact: the services sector continues to generate considerable profits, proven by the fact that almost half of the country’s GDP comes from it. Malaysia’s relatively high entrepreneurialism is reflected in its entrepreneurship and innovation rank by the Legatum Prosperity Index: 28^th out of 104 economies. Malaysia’s performance is boosted by a flourishing high-tech industry. High-tech exports constitute over half of total exports. Moreover, high levels of royalty receipts indicate that Malaysia is able to capitalize on its innovations, according to the Legatum study. She is considered as one of a group of fast developing countries known as 'Newly Industrialised Countries' or NIC's. NICs are countries whose economies have not yet attained developed country status but have, in a macroeconomic sense, outpaced their developing counterparts. Another characterization of NICs is that of nations undergoing rapid economic growth (usually export-oriented). Ghana, on the other hand, is still a developing country.

 Tony Fernandes is a famous Malaysian entrepreneur whose success story became the headline in some newspaper and websites. Tony Fernandes is the backbone of AirAsia’s journey to world domination. With RM1 (RM- Malaysian currency), he purchased a defunct carrier, along with over RM40 million in debts, and created Asia’s most successful budget airline company. From an ailing and financially-stricken company, AirAsia went through a remarkable turning point and made its first profit merely after 7 months of operation. From thereon, it began to grow in leaps and bounds. Although Ghana also has some entrepreneurs such as Albert Ocran, the impact of their entrepreneurial activities has not been really felt since these agents of change are just a handful.

In a nutshell, no nation can develop without an army of entrepreneurs and as such it is high time that we as a nation harnessed the magic potion of entrepreneurship.

References

Buame, Samuel. Entrepreneurship: Entrepreneurial Education, Venture Creation and SME

Management in Ghana. Weija-Accra: University of Ghana Business School, 2012. 

Print.

Entrepreneurship.org. The State of Entrepreneurship in Malaysia. Web. 17 June 2014.

<http://www.entrepreneurship.org/policy-forum/the-state-of-entrepreneurship-in-malaysia.aspx>

GhanaWeb. Ghana Draws from the Asian Experience. Web. 17 June 2014.

<http://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/NewsArchive/artikel.php?ID=26396>

Matthew Barsing. LinkedIn. Economic Transformation: Malaysia’s Evolution through the

            Years. Web. 17 June 2014.

<https://www.linkedin.com/today/post/article/20140408212633-11653081-economic-transformation-malaysia-s-evolution-through-the-years>

Savewrko. The Most Famous Malaysian Entrepreneur Success Stories.

Web. 17 June 2014.

<http://www.savewrko.com/the-most-famous-malaysian-entrepreneur-success-stories >

Studymode. Comparison of the Palm Oil Industry in Malaysia and Ghana. 

             Web. 17 June 2014. <http://www.studymode.com/essay/Comparison-Of-The-Palm-

              Oil-Industry-40572145.html.>