New paradigm for youth entrepreneurship

Rean A. Goulbourne, Contributor

The global business environment is in a constant cycle of change driven primarily by technological innovations, opportunity-based entrepreneurship, and multinational trade agreements. For a sustainable competitive advantage, this global trend effectively makes it important for us to broaden the reach and range of our goods and services while simultaneously enhancing quality.

In the past decade, successive governments have made entrepreneurship an explicit policy priority, as it is a key component for a competitive national economy, which Jamaica desperately needs in order to stimulate economic growth. Though the importance of entrepreneurship is established, there is the challenge to strengthen the drive for the creation of opportunities and the provision of the relevant support services to promote the growth of the small-business sector and its accessibility to Jamaican youths, locally and in the diaspora.

Most youths would probably tackle the country's entrepreneurship blues from an economic and policy-based point of view. However, there are also social issues stemming from our own conditioning which need to be addressed, or brought to the fore, at the very least, to achieve any lasting change in our approach to entrepreneurship.

Fewer corporate jobs

Our youths have become accustomed to the ideal of getting a quality skill or education to secure a good job and climb the shrinking corporate ladder. The side effect of this is that they have grown to become individuals who, for the most part, see entrepreneurship as the next-best alternative to traditional employment, or something only for those individuals born with a 'golden spoon'. Many of us, therefore, only venture into the business arena as an action forced by the necessity for survival rather than a clear-cut grasping of new business opportunities.

Evidence of this can be seen across the island with the plethora of stalls and corner shops per square mile, and the periodic promotion of entrepreneurship as a means of job replacement. Evidence can also be seen in the fact that our youths account for approximately 25 per cent of the population, and that approximately 59 per cent of our youths are currently unemployed. The reality is that focusing on traditional employment may have been relevant 10 years ago. However, we now need a new focus to effectively compete in our current global business environment.

While the powers that be work with alacrity in addressing economic and policy issues to add the well-needed nutrition to the spirit of entrepreneurship, youths should also begin to seek a fundamental paradigm shift within themselves. If we do not begin to develop our own self-awareness and initiatives (entrepreneurial or otherwise), we allow other people, as well as our own circumstances, to shape our lives.

Begin at the root

We can host seminars and give motivational speeches to achieve a positive change in our outward attitude towards opportunity-based entrepreneurship. However, trying to change our outward attitude towards entrepreneurship has very little effect in the long run if we fail to address our own line of thought, which is the source of our attitudes and behaviour.

Therefore, in changing our approach to entrepreneurship, we can begin at the root by seeing it as an area of first choice and priority, as opposed to traditional employment. It will require the development of new habits and greater proactivity. It will also require the overhauling of our education system to one that produces bright entrepreneurial minds. The significant changing of our paradigm will, of course, take time, but it is inevitable.

Let us make it a habit to critically assess the various needs of consumers in the Jamaican marketplace and identify viable business opportunities to solve them. Let us think deeply about the removal of most barriers to international trade in our globalised world, capitalise on our resources, and create a value chain that allows us to compete effectively in the global marketplace. Let us begin to see the future of CARICOM as an avenue to pool our regional resources to create quality products at internationally competitive prices. Let us engage the paradigm change by thinking of business as first priority.

Rean Goulbourne is national youth ambassador, chief of mission - business. Email feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com and r.goulbourne@yahoo.com.