Are companies ready for employees with the new attitude?
There are as many organisation cultures as there are companies. But how many of them do really support entrepreneurial attitude? Are the employees expected to take the initiative? Do the business cultures and policies even support employees to act as entrepreneurs? Or are schools just going to "produce" employees with entrepreneurial mindset only to hit a brick wall once they go to work life?
I can share a true story with you. I once worked in a small company where most of the workers were men. My style is to come up with new ideas and develop procedures. So there I was trying to make things in a new way with some of my colleagues with same kind of attitude. Unfortunately my boss was not happy with that, and he started to act in an unprofessional way. I am happy I did not stay there long enough to see how they would have reacted if I had ever made a mistake...
I am sure my experience is not the only one. There are many companies where even the CEO's may not have the required skills. So how can we expect them to let their employees for example to be creative, take risks and think DIFFERENTLY?
We should also educate the existing companies and their employees in entrepreneurship
Since we budget in educating youth in entrepreneurship, we should also think how to support the existing companies. Otherwise we will loose quite a bit of the benefits from educating our youth. Some of them may learn to be passive and "just do their jobs", and the ones who keep thinking differently may face difficulties like I did. I am sure it would be in everyone's favor to support the change in the companies already now, and not just wait something to happen for generations.
I do not know if there are any EU / national projects or funding to train companies and help them to change their organisation cultures to be open for employees with entrepreneurial mindset. Maybe there could be a business opportunity there...
If some of you know about this kind of projects or existing funding or even consultants that are training companies to support entrepreneurship, please let me know.
i was actually writing a short post today about this, from the standpoint of knowledge not being shared inside workplaces.. people holding on to crucial info that they serve in order to gain sth personally. There is a business opportunity here, when you have the optimist glasses on. Old stuctures are hard to change.. but the optimist glasses are the ones we should have on!
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comment! We should focus on change and be optimistic: otherwise there won't be any development and companies will always remain small and national. You can teach new tricks to an old dog if the prize is tasty enough! ;)
ReplyDeleteHi Kat,
ReplyDeletein my personal experience it happened the same. Here in Finland :(
what I did then? I just shared my idea of things could be done differently and they didn´t even consider me. Yes, that was not either my job. It would be nice to have that kind of situation where people can share their thoughts freely. But is it utopic? people don´t want to take risks especially in such crisis time. Maybe we really should think to settle a business together after these studies ;)
I think it's the organisation that looses the most if it doesn't listen to its workers. I can tell you more about my experience one day, but face-to-face =)
ReplyDeletehey kat, interesting what you wrote about, it reminds me about what someone told me about Steve Jobs. I haven't read his biography, but a friend who was reading told me that in the book, there is some criticism of the way he was as a person and his attitude towards 'self initiators'. Apparently, if as an employee you went up to him with a good idea, he would turn it down and some days later, he would re-introduce it in the company as though it were his own:) I have heard almost similar stories on CEO's whether they are owners or employed. I wonder if the greatest inhibition is the management's fear of competition, being replaced, losing face..etc.
ReplyDeleteIt's an interesting topic to discuss since there is such a drive for entrepreneurship today. While many things can be taught like Finance, Business, etc. But how do you teach Passion, Innovation, Risk taking? Those are elements that are necessary in entreneurship and essential in the personality of an entrepreneur. Collaboration is the lifeblood of ideas and innovation is driven by sharing those ideas. Part of that is also learning to play nice with others.
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comment Nancy! Good questions! Here you can find a post concerning teaching those elements. http://studyingmummy.blogspot.fi/2012/11/teaching-entrepreneurship.html
ReplyDeleteBriefly, I think the teacher's attitude and example plays a major role. The teacher has to show creativeness and risk taking in his / her work. It is also important to see failure as an opportunity to learn from it. It is not the end of the world! I am quite against the traditional exams. I would rather see the students making a portfolio, where they can see their learning process (and even the failures).
I am not sure one can teach passion. But once again - the teacher should be passioned about the subject taught! And the teacher should help the students to find their passions..
Collaboration can be taught by selecting teaching methods carefully.
It is great if we can help the students to learn these skills which are not important just for entrepreneurs but for everyone in today's world of work. The question is though: Are the companies ready for employees with such mindset? How do they for example treat an employee, who takes risks and sometimes fail? There are obviously different business cultures, but I personally think that a failure is too often seen as a weakness in Finland.
And how could we change the companies to be more open for ideas, risks, even failures, and collaboration? (We can't just wait for the new generation of directors...)
ReplyDeleteI wonder if the external funding from institutions like Tekes make the companies to concentrate too much in the funded projects than getting the basics (strategy, vision, business culture..) right first. What's the point in all these fundings if the companies don't even know where they are going to and how. This is a completely other topic but still.. I think the companies should get the basics right if they want to be successful; keeping the company going with such fundings will not create a sustainable business. I hope this is not a case with too many companies though! =)