We all know that 2020 was a very chaotic year. Considering things such as the pandemic, protests, and the past presidential election, life has been a little hectic for all of us.
But, to look at it from another perspective, these past events have also had some positive effects such as a surge of innovation, a growing focus on mental health, and an increase in empathy. And it has affected the workforce and economy in a number of interesting ways as well. However, I am going to be focusing on a different area that has been positively impacted by the pandemic, and that is entrepreneurism.
What Is Entrepreneurism?
When most of us think of entrepreneurism, we may think of some self-made millionaires who have built successful businesses completely from scratch (like Apple, Facebook, and Tesla). However, this fails to look at what entrepreneurism really is at its core.
To an observer, an entrepreneur is someone who builds a string of businesses in order to gain a profit. But it’s something more than that. I believe that something that I learned in college gives a simpler and more accurate solution. And that is that entrepreneurism is the act of identifying a problem (or a pain point) and finding a solution to it.
So, when I say that the pandemic has led to a boost in entrepreneurism, I don’t mean that new companies with thousands of customers have increased. But rather, that there has been an increase in entrepreneurism by the “common man” (which has mostly occurred in the form of side hustles and new small businesses ).
Examples of Entrepreneurship
During this time of uncertainty, people have filled in the gap to help people with problems like:
- Delivering household goods and groceries to those who are social distancing
- Offering rides in their 4-wheel drive vehicle to help those who couldn’t drive through the snow and ice
- Offering freelancing services like writing, editing videos, and designing graphics in order to help those who were trying to scale up their business.
But let me stop waxing on about it. Although entrepreneurism is all about finding a solution to an existing issue, it doesn’t mean that a profit can’t be made in the meantime. For instance, some of these individuals have earned enough money to quit their regular job. On the other hand, for some people, they were only able to boost their monthly income by a few hundred dollars. Yet, each party was able to experience some form of profit.
Conclusion
So, although these moments have caused despair and uncertainty, they show that nothing will be able to limit you if you do not let it. The correlation between the pandemic and entrepreneurism truly demonstrates that ambition, creativity, and perseverance can get you far!
