In every business, either small or large, innovation is the key of success. In my opinion, innovation is not only a new idea or technology that allows company to gain a competitive advantage among others, but it can be just a small feature that differentiate the business from other competitors.

From my perspective, innovation is changing from simply a great brand new business idea to a customer-focused goal. While many people claim that being an innovative entrepreneur means that he/she creates a need for the market, studying what the customers really want and figuring out a best and different way to meet their need can also be innovation.

For instance, Dell is very successful not because it has the newest technology or idea; instead, its success is due to its focus on achieving customers’ wants – Low cost and great quality.

While most computer technology companies were competing to provide the most high tech product, Dell realized that none of them tried to attract the customers by bringing the cost of a computer down. Since many buyers (especially organizations and school) are just looking for computers with basic and simple operating function, Dell computers’ low cost but complete function features seem extremely appealing to the buyers. As a result, Dell became the most innovative company in the computer technology industry.

Having new idea is great, but realizing what customers’ needs are not satisfied by the business world yet is the best way of being innovative and successful.

People may think that a small business owner is considered as an entrepreneur. However, in my opinion, an entrepreneur thinks beyond the tiny box of the small business owner, in other words,entrepreneur think outside of the box.

Entrepreneurs not only have great idea, they think big as they not just want to open a small business, but they are willing to take risk to expand their business in order to become the leader in the industry in the future. It is true that the reason that both entrepreneur and small business owner open a business is because they have a great idea. However,  entrepreneur would not be satisfied of what they have. Instead, they keep looking forward and working towards their big goals. That makes them different from others and also drives them to success.

In starting a company, I will be willing to share control with others if that will help the company grow. I believe that sharing control not only can help the company’s financial growth, but also provide more positive advice to the company growth since different people may see different improvement that can be done. However, one thing I would like to have in my business is that even though I will be sharing control with others, I am still on top of the organization and have the authority to make the final decision. It is because if there is no leader in the firm, the numerous opinions from different leaders will just damage the company since it will be hard to reach compromise.

One of the biggest issues that entrepreneurial companies face is risk. It is a well-known theory that the higher the potential return is, the risker this project/decision is. In entrepreneurial businesses, since they see growing the business as their main goal, there are a lot of times they have to take risk when expand the businesses. As a result, in order to grow the business and be competitive in the industry, entrepreneur must learn how to manage the risk of the operation; otherwise, the risk may be high enough to destroy the whole firm.