So, lets assume that you are a ‘successful’ Mumbai Road Contractor:
These are some of your Entrepreneur traits
POSITIVES
– Power of Relationship building
Not everyone gets to be able to influence multi million $$$ contracts their way. You have something in you that brings such large deals your side.
– Ability to service Relationships
Everyone gets lucky with a couple of orders. If you are able to get business repeatedly over the years, that means that you really know how to service your client and extract repeat business from them, despite the intense competition to oust you out.
– Understanding chains of decision making and working them.
Given that building roads is a completely corrupt business practice in Mumbai, its not EASY to keep everyone involved happy. Politicians get greedier & new decision makers pop out from here and there. If you repeatedly get business, you really know how to work the chain of command from the top to the bottom and you prevent getting sidelined over for new contractors etc. You know whom to please and how.
– Making Profits
It may SEEM easy to be intensely profitable in a corrupt business, but that really NOT always TRUE. Since everyone knows your modus operandi and margins, demands keep soaring – kick backs increase and also there is a bigger and growing demand from the corrupt ‘eco-system’ that tries to feast on you (Say in the Mumbai roads business, besides politicians you will ‘directly’ bribe, the folks from service tax, income tax etc get more aggressive and hence need special tackling). Despite all these demands, if you can make money each year, you really know HOW to do business.
– Keep stress under control
I mean you really know how to take it easy in your head! Just living with the fact that you can get raided, sealed, arrested or just black listed any time – any day and YET to continue to stomp on, requires LOTS OF GUTS and pure entrepreneurial courage!
NEGATIVES
– You think Small
The reason you build bad roads is that they get damaged and hence give you repeat business. Thats such MYOPIC thinking! I mean if you build great roads and got a stamp of approval for the work you do, then you could be the next Hindustan Construction Company (the guys who build the Sea Link) and be listed in the stock markets and be building roads and bridges and dams and flyovers ALL OVER the country and even in different parts of the world! Your Company can be worth billions of dollars – and not what was left behind after everyone ate what was on your table.
– You hang out with the wrong Company
If you do business with corrupt people, and eat, drink and party with them – then you are ruining your entrepreneurial energy.
Bad people restrict your thinking and dont let you soar. They don’t let you IMAGINE or dream or speculate on what could be – coz you are just concerned with what is easily available.
– Your sense of Morals are f***** up.
If you can make people suffer daily and ruin their health and country’s productivity, then your sense of Morals are not in place. If not set right fast, the big REAL WORLD of commerce and trade will reject you. In a few years you will realize that you cant THINK CLEAN – and that’s why you cant GROW BIG.
So decide what would you rather build:
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Maybe you aren’t building Mumbai Roads,
but if you are doing anything similar – chuck it and think BIGGER!