Make Entrepreneurship Day more than a note on your calendar
November is Entrepreneurship Month, the third Tuesday of the month is Entrepreneurship Day, and Entrepreneurship Day caps off Global Entrepreneurship week.
It’s a slightly odd situation: Although a day, a week, and a month are dedicated to entrepreneurship, actual business starts are down, and they have been trending down for many years. In fact, closures are more numerous than openings in the U.S. today.
That is not the path we want to be on if we honestly desire to boost middle-class income and give our fellow Americans a path out of poverty.
Use Entrepreneurship Day to evaluate your relationship to entrepreneurship and take action:
- If you’re a business owner feeling the pressures of your position, remind yourself why you decided to start your business and renew your commitment to your vision.
- If you need some inspiration, grab a biography of a successful entrepreneur.
- If you’re successful, look for an entrepreneur you can help, either through angel funding, advice, or better yet: both.
- If you’re established and growing, start an internship program and show young men and women that they can make their dreams a reality.
- If you’re a local business owner, bring together other business owners in your community and find ways you can cooperate to make all of your businesses stronger.
The media love to publicize problems businesses have. When the economy goes south, we hear about the closures. When a business has an accident or mishap of some kind, the local TV crews are there reporting on it. Whenever a business is featured in a Hollywood movie, it is virtually always in a negative light.
When you add all of those things up, we shouldn’t be surprised that business openings are down. Take this day, this week and this month and let your community know that being in business is a good thing. You provide jobs. You provide stability. You pump money into the community. You provide benefits. You support local charities and youth groups.