Is an entrepreneur an individual or a group? Discuss.

This issue of an entrepreneurs being an individual or a group has make nuisance in the nose of most of the writers. But we can define an entrepreneur with both the terms. As both the terms goes with the entrepreneur. Let us have a clear discussion from the articles below: -

Individual as entrepreneur        

There is always a strong debate as to whether an entrepreneur is an individual or group. Many popular writers on entrepreneurship accept that entrepreneurs are individuals. According to a recent study, an entrepreneur is someone who specializes in taking hypercritical decisions about the harmonization of limited resources.

Group as entrepreneur

Some writers on entrepreneurship, however, consider the entrepreneur as a group. For example, in the words of Cole, ‘entrepreneurship is the purposeful activity of an individual or a group of associated individuals, undertaken to initiate, maintain or aggrandize a profit-oriented business unit for production or distribution of economic goods and services’. Following are the reasons for the argument that an entrepreneur constitutes a group:

• It is the group of individuals that qualifies itself as an entrepreneurial group, since the groups with a higher differentiation have the ability to respond.
• The entrepreneur constitutes, in essence, an institution that comprises of all the people required to perform various functions. Such people not only introduce innovations, but also apply the necessary adjustments in production units when they expand, in response to changes in market conditions. They also foretell opportunities inherent in a given situation, and even make opportunities out of a given situation.
• Entrepreneurial functions are more efficiency carried out by a group of persons specialized in their respective fields. Such entrepreneurial functions are filled by a corporate body, and not embodied in a single person. This is evident from the modern business experience that a corporate enterprise comprises of several person who put their efforts and skills together to achieve the common goals of the organization. Hence, the promoter may be a group rather than an individual.

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