Entrepreneurship assignment reviewing the entrepreneurial journey of Jeff Bezos

Question

Task: Critically analyse in your entrepreneurship assignment a current entrepreneurship and his/her entrepreneurship journey, and propose suggestions for future directions.

Answer

Introduction
The world is currently facing high level of economic uncertainties. One of the major reasons behind this challenge is the outbreak of the pandemic. Over several decades, entrepreneurs are saving the business world from collapsing. As per the research in the entrepreneurship assignment when an individual creates a new business by overcoming each and every challenge and risk then they are known as entrepreneurs. The term entrepreneurship is closely associated with innovation (Berger, et.al., 2021). The leadership qualities of entrepreneurs help them to grab opportunities from the industry and launch new product or service in the market that further satisfies the internal and the external stakeholders of the firm. This entrepreneurship assignment aims at choosing one entrepreneur and describes their leadership qualities and approaches.

Discussion of the background of Jeff Bezosin the entrepreneurship assignment
Jeff Bezos is a renowned USA based entrepreneur. This individual considered in the entrepreneurship assignment is known for establishing one of the e-commerce giants i.e., Amazon. Currently he holds the position of executive chairman in Amazon. Bezos had started this company from his garage in Seattle and now it has turned into a million-dollar firm. Jeff Bezos was born to a lower middle-class family and in his early life he used to work in the ranch of his maternal grandparents. Father of Jeff bBezos migrated from Cuba and it was very difficult for their entire family to fit into the culture of the USA. Jeff Bezos in one of his interviews said that resilience and optimism are in-built characteristics of most of the immigrant (Entrepreneur, 2022). These two characteristics of Bezos mentioned in the entrepreneurship assignmentalso helped him to become one of the most successful entrepreneurs in the current business world.

Entrepreneurial traits and Characteristics
According to the innovation entrepreneurship theory, entrepreneurs become different from business man because they have the drive to take risks and launch unique products in the market that further makes live of customers easier. Entrepreneurs who follow this theory also believes that innovation can be one of the major reasons behind societal development (Shu, Ho and Huang, 2020). One of the primary characteristics of Jeff Bezos considered in the entrepreneurship assignmentcan be aligned with this theory. Jeff Bezos is highly creative and experimental. He has leveraged technology and make shopping experiences of customers easier and convenient (CIO Look, 2022). Moreover, amazing web services provided by Amazon is also surprising the world in various ways. On the contrary, Jeff Bezos considered in the entrepreneurship assignmenthas been accused of controlling his employees in a negative way. He has always focused on enhancing customer experiences at the cost of anything. He was accused of brutally insulting his employees if their performances were not up to the organization’s standard. He always believes in negative reinforcement and is not concerned about the well-being of his employees. This trait of Jeff Bezos in the entrepreneurship assignmentcan be aligned with autocratic leadership theory. When each and every decision are made by the leader within the workplace it is known as autocratic leadership theory (Solihah, Budiawan and Nugraha, 2021). This trait of Bezos has increased several problems within the workplace.

Opportunity recognition in the entrepreneurship assignment
Renowned entrepreneurs are known for recognizing opportunities and leveraging the opportunities to launch new product or service in the market. In 1994 as per the entrepreneurship assignment, Jeff Bezos first got the idea to start an enterprise by leveraging internet. He was searching of new places for investment and while researching he got to know that the usage of World Wide Web (WWW), was growing by almost 2300% in one month. Bezos immediately understood to start a buying and selling business through online platform (Entrepreneur, 2022). This is how Bezos identified the opportunity in the market, grabbed it and started Amazon. This trait of Bezos considered in the entrepreneurship assignmentcan be aligned with the Opportunity based entrepreneurship theory. This theory was proposed by Peter Drucker and in his theory, he said that entrepreneurs who can manage turbulent by using available opportunities can be marked as opportunity-based entrepreneurs (Laszlo, Cooperrider and Fry, 2020). Thus, it can be said that the ability to understand the growth of internet made Bezos a successful entrepreneur of this time. On the contrary, many scholars of entrepreneurship assignmentand stakeholders think that Bezos has exploited several opportunities. Amazon believes in monopoly. A company named diapaers.com were doing good business in the market. When Bezos came to know this, he met the founder and wanted to buy the business. Once, the founder disagreed with this proposal, Amazon decided to decrease the price of diapers by almost 30% to decrease the sales of diapers.com (Marx, 2021). This method as per the entrepreneurship assignmentis known as predatory pricing and it is also marked as an anticompetitive tactic. This is how Bezos has been exploiting his opportunities over a period of time.

Competitive advantages
One of the major strategies that Bezos applied as per the entrepreneurship assignmentwas that obsessing over customers and not competitors. There are very tech companies across the world who look after strategies adopted by their competitors. On the other hand, Bezos have always focused on disrupting the market to make the lives of customers better. The Amazon web services (AWS) were built by Bezos by gathering feedbacks from customers (Mullaney, 2017). This trait of Amazon can be easily aligned with creative theory. According to Schumpeter’s creative theory creativity is an important driver that further help entrepreneurs to understand the need of consumers and make decisions accordingly. Schumpeter has also said that creative destruction can only be possible by entrepreneurs who intend to disrupt the market (Guler and Ozer-Imer, 2019). Thus, it can be said in the entrepreneurship assignmentthat Bezos have emphasized on meeting the needs and demands of the customers and this strategic action of Bezos have helped him to gain competitive advantage.

On the contrary, Jeff Bezos was accused of destroying his competitors in several ways. He adopted predatory pricing technique. When a price is set too low or too cheap to gain competitive advantage it is known as predatory pricing (Zaid, 2022). Bezos as per the entrepreneurship assignmenthave been accused of destroying various new entrants and substitute e-commerce firms to gain competitive advantage with the help of this pricing technique.

Recommendations
It is highly recommended in the entrepreneurship assignmentto the future entrepreneurs to focus on business expansion. According to the tortoise theory when business is expanded in different phases based on the break-even point then it can help the business sustain for a longer time period. This theory is generally followed by entrepreneurs who are action-oriented (Lomberg, Thiel and Steffens, 2019). Expansion of business has been recommended in the entrepreneurship assignmentbecause the current business environment is witnessing lots of challenges especially due to the outbreak of the pandemic. Thus, business leaders must be very dynamic and must focus on expanding their businesses in various parts of the world to overcome challenges. Moreover, Dynamic business help business leaders in addressing uncertain factors and this also enhances the flexibility of the business (Kalibatiene and Vasilecas, 2021). This is how leaders can flourish amidst economic uncertainties and societal problems.

Conclusion
The aim of this entrepreneurship assignmentwas to undertake a business leader and critically analyses his/her entrepreneurial characteristics. From the report, it can be found that Jeff Bezos has been taken into consideration. The findings of the entrepreneurship assignmentsuggest that Jeff Bezos is well known for his creativity and he always intended to disrupt the market. Moreover, Bezos can also be labelled as an opportunist who decided to grab opportunities from the market and make lives of customers easier and convenient. The creative theory adopted by Jeff Bezos have helped Amazon to become one of the leading players in the e-commerce industry. On the contrary, Bezos considered in the entrepreneurship assignmenthave been accused of only looking after the needs and demands of the consumers. He has not undertaken any strategic actions to enhance the well-being of employees within the workplace.

Reference List
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CIO Look, 2022. 5 traits of Jeff Bezos that makes him an influential person. [online]. Available at https://ciolookindia.com/5-traits-of-jeff-bezos-that-makes-him-in-influential-person/ (Accessed 01 August 2022).
Entrepreneur, 2022. Jeff Bezos. [online]. Available at https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/197608 (Accessed 01 August 2022).
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