In every crisis, there is always an opportunity. But, how do you learn to spot entrepreneurship opportunities in this current global pandemic and beyond?
The word “crisis” comes from the Greek word “krino”, which means “to separate, judge, or decide.” So, when applied to the pandemic, which has overturned many previously held societal structures, businesses, and ways of living, the challenge for entrepreneurs is to separate, judge, and decide what will last from what will not and what stays from what goes — and then to create entrepreneurship opportunities out of these.
As an aspiring entrepreneur, you want to train your mind to spot entrepreneurship opportunities amid the current seeming chaos. Entrepreneurs are, by nature and inclination, problem-solvers, so they are not easily cowed by crises. How do you do this in an organized way while still allowing room for the wisdom of intuition, insight, and creativity to flourish?
Here are 3 points to consider in spotting entrepreneurship opportunities amidst this pandemic and beyond:
Study Change
First, do not let the crises around you overwhelm you. Instead, use it as material for innovation and creation: step back calmly and study it.
What are the significant changes that are happening? List them.
How are people being affected, especially in terms of what needs are still being met, inadequately met, and not at all? Record all of these.
This will be your seedbed of ideas for what entrepreneurship opportunities to look out for, especially in terms of the needs that are being inadequately met or not met at all. These are the gaps you can potentially serve, given your resources.
In a The Future of Everything article, key thought leaders and entrepreneurs were asked in 2017 how they saw entrepreneurship in 100 years. The thought leaders pointed out these coming changes as significant to entrepreneurship:
- Job automation – leads to more entrepreneurship for more and younger people.
- The rise of location-independent companies – due to the increase in information and communication technologies.
- Leadership and producing results that go beyond generating profits – and increasing shareholder value but solve human problems and promote the common good will be crucial.
- Creating opportunities for more people and the planet to thrive will be critical.
This was before the pandemic.
With the pandemic, these changes have not only been accelerated but have become more prominent.
Identify Key Trends
Trends are changes that occur beyond a year (if changes happen and last for only less than a year, they are simply fads). Aside from studying the changes, you must also research and identify the key trends arising from these changes.
Dr Srikanth Gaddam, CEO of ERP Analysts, Inc., points to 3 key trends affecting entrepreneurship in the 21st century in the midst of the pandemic and beyond. These are the increasing social awareness of consumers and the rise of social enterprises, the significance of digital trends in driving consumption and business, and business platforms as one of the most effective business models.
Social enterprises are for-profit businesses that aim to generate profits and serve their owners/shareholders and all stakeholders in the industry: the employees, the suppliers, the communities they are situated in, the government, and the environment. In short, instead of achieving the single bottom line of profitability as the primary concern, social enterprises aim for the triple bottom line of serving people, the planet, and profits at the same time.
Entrepreneurs building social enterprises arose in the late 1970s and early 1980s to help address social problems using business as a tool. Still, consumers’ growing social consciousness and demand for more ethical and socially responsible businesses have made social enterprises and social entrepreneurs more welcomed and recognized since then.
The digital economy is the great river of 21st-century civilization. In ancient times, all world’s major civilizations arose from nearby great rivers through which people, goods, services, and economic exchanges flowed. Today these economic resources and activities flow through a digital economy that exploded along with the pandemic.
Therefore, industries close to or aligned with this new great river of the digital economy are the ones that now flourish: e-commerce, digital media, healthcare and telemedicine, online education, digital entertainment, technology-based food deliveries and other logistics, financial technology, and work technologies.
Meanwhile, industries far from or not aligned with this new great river of the digital economy are the ones that now suffer: location-based travel, tourism, and hospitality industries; restaurants, fashion, real estate, retail, transportation and automotive, and on-site events and entertainment industries.
Business platforms are businesses that depend on a large user-base to grow, achieve worldwide prominence, and build long-term success. Examples are global marketplaces like eBay, Amazon, and Alibaba, pre-loved clothing giant DePop, and online dating sites like Tinder, which all began as humble start-ups harnessing the power of information and communications technology.
With the growing millions of smartphone users and exponential growth in online shopping today, platform businesses have become the leading successful business models of the day.
Spotting Entrepreneurship Opportunities
After identifying key changes and trends, you can now brainstorm possible entrepreneurship ideas for serving people’s unsatisfied and unmet needs during the pandemic and beyond. A key question to guide your brainstorming is: how can you meet and satisfy people’s needs amidst the chaotic times? This is your value offering.
Then, brainstorm your answers to the following questions:• How are these needs currently being met by other businesses, and how can you do it better, faster, cheaper, and kinder to the planet?
- What, from your personal experience and resources, can be used to do these to meet and satisfy people’s needs?
- How can you align with and harness the key trends for your value offering?
- What products and services can you think of that will deliver the value that you offer?
- Who are other entrepreneurs and agencies you can potentially collaborate with to bring these about?
Start with your community. Most human problems and needs are similar all over the world. Ask the people in your community—to volunteer in efforts to serve people. Listen and observe, and record what you find out. Test your ideas out with the people in your community. Ask them for suggestions on improving your ideas. Then finetune them in response to people’s feedback.
These may be the worst of times, but they can also be the best of times — if you use these as an opening to innovate and create new ways of solving people’s problems through entrepreneurship opportunities.