Once, a
friend of mine went to a school for a survey, part of his MBA curriculum! He
had a brief questionnaire out of which one question was ‘In your opinion, what
is the reason to start business?’ Survey was to be conducted for 10+2 students,
future of India
Students were not at fault. They
just replied what they observed. Majority of people in India
In spite of this, there are many
people (although still in minority) who want to do the business. They want to do the business just because its their dream. But sometimes, the surrounding and some
misunderstandings distract such people and they too, start preferring job.
Have you ever thought about doing
business? I always do! But like most of the people, I was not much aware about
“what the business is and how to do the business and all”. In the process, I
learnt many things which I never knew before. Let’s discuss all this in series
of some blog posts. I will start with business idea in this part. Again, discussion
is expected to be spread in several blog posts and this is the just first part.
I will not discuss anything about
“why you should do the business” or “What personality traits are required to be
an entrepreneur”. Very much online sources are already available for it and I
am assuming that readers have already made their minds to do or not to do the
business.
Capital, Manpower, Market there are
so many things one needs to do the business. But the most important thing
required to do the business is ‘the mind’. Mind is required to manage business as
well as to establish it. An innovative business idea can create a magic! Right
from Google to Facebook, all are innovative business ideas!
Innovative business has its pros and
cons! As the business is innovative, you don’t have any established competitor
at initial stage. It can also easily establish your brand identity. Being
innovative business is itself an attraction of customer. Its an advertisement
in itself. Cons include, innovative business may find it hard to win trust of stakeholders. Right from financiers to employees, people hesitate to trust
innovative business idea. Also, there is no tested formula or rules book for
such businesses. Business owners have to trust their intellect or implement
trial and error where it is not harmful. Risk is high, gains are high!
Innovative business idea is
generally discovered or implemented by those who start their business almost
from zero. Those people, who have sufficient capital, generally try to play
safe and go by rules book. Those who don’t have anything to lose prefer
innovative business!
From where do these ideas come?
Well, there is no school for this. No book or predefined set of innovative
ideas is written. Source of innovative ideas is your own surrounding and your
‘Mind’. But how come this ‘Mind’ develops these ideas?
Long back, all deals were done in
commodity exchange. I have a cow and it gives milk, then I will offer milk in
appropriate amount to purchase other goods like wheat, rice or services like
barber etc. It was not easy to decide this appropriate amount. There was no
standard behind it. A wheat-seller would be required to fix rate for his wheat
in form of all the goods and services acceptable to him. E.g. 1 kg wheat would
be given for 1 kg rice, half kg pulse, ½ liter milk, one time hair cut etc.
moreover, what commodity he received may not be having same quality. E.g. 1 kg
wheat might be given for ½ liter of milk with different standards of purity. If
wheat-seller not at all required eggs and eggs are the only thing I have, it
will involve 3rd person in transaction who accepts eggs and has
commodity or service acceptable to wheat-seller. There was no standard defined
for transactions and nothing was uniformly acceptable commodity or service,
which anyone won’t deny.
What was
the solution? Solution was actually simple. A dummy commodity was created. It
was made by default acceptable by all (please see the footnote). Instead of
defining rate of each commodity with respect to every other commodity, rate of
all commodities were defined with respect to this commodity only. It was named
as Money. It served as standard and it brought acceptability in transactions.
Any good or service was valued with respect to money like, 10 coins for wheat,
5 coins for haircut etc.
It was simply for the convenience that concept
of ‘money exchange for goods and services’ was formed. But, this money concept
itself gave birth to thousands of businesses. People realized that more money
means more availability of goods and services and ultimately, more comfort.
Everybody wanted money. Everybody wanted to increase money with them. Some
people wanted money to start their own production of goods or services. Some people
wanted to keep money safe. Some people wanted to transfer it to our close ones
living far. All these needs gave birth to banking business and it eventually
became the backbone of any country.
Moral of the story is simple, innovative
business ideas take birth from changes in society system or needs of people.
One needs to be very alert and has to keep eyes open to look what people around
you need.
An introduction to simple law can generate many businesses.
Government implemented tax system and it created business for tax consultants.
Even in latest scenario, when Government of India implemented Unique Identification System, many big info-tech companies grabbed this opportunity
and provided service to generate unique identification of individuals in
different areas.
There is a very basic sort of formula to new
business idea. People in the world try to find comfort. Comfort here means
easiness. People try to make things easier for them than earlier. Seek the
situation where people are not so comfortable or their comfort can be
increased. That’s all!! If you have a practical idea to provide something which
can raise comfort level of people, you have a business idea!
Its an art to find where people can be made
more comfortable in their life. One needs to develop abilities to sense what
others are feeling or expecting in particular situation. Nevertheless, you are
also among the people and the best source to detect situations where people can
be made more comfortable. A person’s wife had a beautiful dress which she
wanted to wear for a party but, she had become thin and dress was fitting lose.
Husband got an idea; he shaped an iron wire in such way that it was able to
hold dress tightly and fitted well. This particular shape was later known as
‘Safety pins’. Two research scholars found it difficult to remember all
websites they visited frequently in order to find study material for their
research work. They simply created a computer program to index all such sites and this
program soon became our favorite, Google.
So, you yourself are the most important source
to find discomfort and idea to overcome it. Do it, before anyone else can.
In order to achieve this comfort, social system
makes changes in itself. Introduction of money is nothing but change in system
to achieve more comfort. This change can be of any form like change in customs,
traditions, practices. Generally, change in law (introduction of new law) or
changes in technology (technical advancement/ introduction of new technology)
bring the most significant and fast changes in social system and hence are the
best source of innovative business ideas.
Law is enforced and technology is ready to
provide comfort hence they work so fast and fast change launched by them
creates some new discomforts for people or opens way to overcome earlier
discomforts. Android operating system opened ways to many tech-developers to
develop apps which may help Smartphone users in their day-to-day tasks. Most of the
hi-tech society is still unaware about potential of Smartphone or android,
hence, there is still huge scope of business ideas in this field.
Law made it mandatory to keep computerized
records of business accounts. Many small businessmen were not able to maintain
separate accountant or even clerk to handle this. Some people provided service
to convert manual transactions to computerized accounts records.
Development in information technology and
generation of business ideas is the very long topic in itself. Information
technology made it possible to store and utilize large information or data.
Several businesses generated right from providing storage to data, providing
systems to deal with stored data (database management software vendors) up to
professional services analyzing data.
Another simple example, as the URLs of website
became complex and hard to remember or even copy-paste everywhere, idea of
shortening or simplifying URL was invented. Discomfort was identified in
remembering or copy-pasting complex URLs and it was overcome by providing
simplified URL. A business named ‘Tinyurl’ simply stores this complex URL and
gives simple URL which will redirect you desired website. Before redirecting,
tinyurl displays advertisement for a few seconds and earn revenue. For more
information, visit Tiny URL official website or Wikipedia Article for the same.
A week before I am writing, new version of
android was announced to be named as “KitKat”. A person in my knowledge
instantly registered some domain names like “installkitkat.com,
updatekitkat.com” for some 300 INR. Now he is expecting that some firm advising
on KitKat matters will purchase it for more money as these domain names are
highly desirable, being attractive and relevant. I don’t know how much legal it
is, but yes, he is doing a business! (If you find very innovative idea making
large amount of money in short time, please verify how much legal it is!).
Further, even the firm that will advise technical matters related to “KitKat”
and will purchase these domain names; they will put advice on their site and
earn revenues with advertisements, just a business!!
To summaries this post, I will say, people
generally seek comfort. Any new idea providing them more comfort means new
business idea. This comfort seeking attitude forces social system to change and
changes in social system brings either new discomforts or provides ways to
overcome such discomforts. Changes can be of any type, law and technology being
the most effective. So, be the aware of changes around you and try to find
where you can raise comfort level of people in society relevant to these
changes. You yourself are the best source to investigate this!
I will discuss about innovative ideas more in
next blog posts in series. Let’s discuss some more technology and law changes.
Till then, keep looking for the changes! (To be cond.-)
Footnote: There is famous concept ‘Liquidity’
in finance. A commodity is said be more liquid if it is more acceptable in
market. Money is acceptable as it is by all hence it is the most liquid. Gold
is widely acceptable and hence, gold is very much liquid. Old vehicle, old Tv etc
are rather difficult in market to exchange, hence they are less liquid.
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