The Entrepreneurial Age is here. Are you prepared?

Almost every man, woman and child carries a smartphone – essentially a powerful handheld computer – with them day and night; it is perhaps surprising to hear that the Information Age is over. However, consider that the internet provides unlimited access to petabytes of information with more content created every second. Smart phones provide a pocket-sized interface with which to create, access and share content with anyone, anywhere on the planet. We have the ability to upload and download information from a cloud while literally flying in the clouds aboard an airplane. Perhaps most importantly, information technology has become so commonplace, so ubiquitous, that even children - especially children - create, compute and communicate competently and comfortably.

Thanks to the Information Age, we have free information, ubiquitous storage, programs and platforms and a population that is empowered and connected. There is not an industry that hasn’t been transformed if not transfixed by the promise, potential and problems associated with sourcing, implementing and using information technologies. Indeed, industries such as publishing, telecommunications, retailing, broadcast media, transportation, shipping, recording and entertainment have been radically changed, and industries will continue to change as a result of increasingly sophisticated, easier to use, faster or more engaging information technologies. However, it is the ubiquity of these technologies which signals the end of the Information Age.

Information technology is not going to disappear or be replaced like iron replaced stone or mechanization replaced labour, but as a driver of social, cultural and economic progress, its reign is over. Enter the Entrepreneurial Age! Long Live the Entrepreneurial Age. It might seem inconceivable that Big Data and the Internet of Things are being supplanted by entrepreneurship – or more accurately entrepreneurial thinking. It might seem incredible that the next big thing is actually something that has been a driver of economic, social and cultural progress throughout history. But, it is less surprising when one considers that the conditions that fueled the growth of North America’s manufacturing sector during the last century - a perfect storm of economic, geographic and cultural factors have been displaced by outsourcing, the shift to a service economy and the information age.

Clayton Christensen, Harvard professor, and an expert on innovation argues that most North American businesses have focused on the kind of sustaining and efficiency innovations that lead to product and process improvements. Unfortunately, innovation such as these typically have a net negative impact on an economy as mechanization, outsourcing, and economies of scale and scope lead to layoffs. Differentiated doesn’t always mean desired, so many of the innovations intended to sustain a business actually have the opposite effect. Innovation strategies such as this are, in part, why businesses find themselves producing the highest quality, least expensive or most fully-featured DVD player in a world that has shifted to Video on Demand, livestreaming and PVRs for the capture/storage and retrieval of television programming and movies. Unlike the sustaining and efficiency innovations, these latter technologies might be considered disruptive innovations in that they offer value to a much broader marketplace.

However, it is the economic, social and cultural impact of disruptive innovations that are most important because these businesses not only hire employees but prosper. For example, personal computers fueled the growth of firms like Apple and Microsoft that not only employ tens of thousands of people worldwide, but also enabled their founders, men like Bill Gates and Steve Jobs, to donate literally billions of dollars to support universities, arts and culture organizations, and charities around the world. This is the power of Entrepreneurial Thinking and the promise of the Entrepreneurial Age because disruptive innovation is not about technology but rather the innovation of business models. For example, Henry Ford’s production line was the disruptive innovation that made the Model T accessible to the masses. Although, mass production is an example of within industry disruptive innovation, according to Clatyon Christensen these are relatively rare with most industries being disrupted by innovations from outside the industry.

So, what is the promise of the Entrepreneurial Age? First off, large firms are not going to disappear, but the nature of work and the associated labour market will continue to change. For example, contract workers are now the norm in the construction, telecommunication, transportation, oil and gas and IT industries often representing the majority of a firm’s workforce. While, a contractor workforce definitely provides these industries with expertise and flexibility, in many instances the decision to use contractors is merely one of economics – an efficiency innovation – a way to unload the high cost of benefits associated with having employees. Demand for labour in these industries is cyclical, seasonal or perhaps situational and therefore the decision to use contractors is a legitimate and often necessary with the firm’s very survival dependent on these savings. However, if we examine the supply side of this labour relationship we see the contractor as an entrepreneur. In some instances, the contractor is a firm with employees, and in others, the contractor in terms subcontracts with contract workers – entrepreneurs.

Many people would balk at the idea of labelling both a self-employed contract worker, and the founder of a temp agency or a contracting firm with employees, as “entrepreneurs.” And yet, if we consider anyone that owns and/or operates a firm that he/she founds as the definition of entrepreneurship, perhaps we might reconsider. Regardless, the entrepreneurial age demands a smaller more nimble work unit with leaders and employees who not only survive, but thrive in dynamic market conditions and ambiguous environments. The Entrepreneurial Age will be defined by those with the ability to generate innovative solutions to significant problems; solutions that offer social, cultural and economic value. Entrepreneurial Thinking is the mindset that will allow for the identification of the market opportunity hidden within every environmental, social, cultural and business problem or challenge.

To demonstrate its importance, Entrepreneurial Thinking is now embedded in the undergraduate and graduate programs at the Haskayne School of Business. It is also offered in a variety of Executive Education open and custom programs designed to prepare managers and business leaders for the Entrepreneurial Age. Specifically, these programs introduce participants to the tools and methodologies necessary to de-risk business development and growth by identifying market-driven products and services that are both valuable and sustainable. However, the key to all of these programs is a focus on action and the practical application of concepts, tools and frameworks. Success in the Entrepreneurial Age will require leaders and a workforce that is engaged and active – those with an entrepreneurial mindset.

Haskayne’s Executive Education Entrepreneurial Thinking programs runs November 26 – 27, 2015.  In this program participants will learn how to innovate new products and services and how to identify areas of business development and process improvement to remain competitive in today’s economy.