What makes you to be your own boss?.

Abstract

Entrepreneurship, as a subject and as a career has drawn attention from different segments of people around the world. Consequently, today, entrepreneurship has become a discipline by itself. One of the important aspects associated with entrepreneurship is ‘innovation’. Both innovation and entrepreneurship go hand in hand. As the pace of technological development increases, especially with the digital technology advancements, every aspect of the society has changed, thus innovation economy is shifting its focus to societies around the world. With the beginning of innovation in the tech industry, the demand for quality of life, new business models, product and services, and universally accessible knowledge has been increased. In this technological development process people, have begun to find ways to fulfill their demands. As a result, technology driven business models and products have entered the market. With the technological disruption taking place, it is interesting to see that people holding corporate leaderships are moving out from their careers and are eying to start their own business ventures, to bring innovative solutions for the problems faced by the society. Therefore, it is an interesting phenomenon to understand; what makes the corporate leaders to quit from their positions and become their own bosses. People have dreams. Sometimes, the childhood dreams sprout out and grow through the adolescence, and it becomes the mainstream goal in their lives and they work hard towards achieving such dreams. The intention of achieving such dreams is generated during childhood or as a result of an accidental situation, they have faced. “After I read an international magazine, I wanted to be a computer scientist rather than a doctor” was the intention in her mind during her childhood of Shahani Markus, founder of Emojot Pvt. Ltd.“When I was a twelve year old child, studying at Royal Collage, I was very interested in computers and programmed games”. This was the very first entrepreneurial behavior that Shanil Fernando come across in his childhood. “At the age of nineteen, I started my fist venture to assemble computes”,was the starting point of KanishkaWeeramunda’s entrepreneurial journey. This shows that attitudes, beliefs and values of a person plays a major role influencing the intended outcome in life. At the same time, courage of a person acts as one of the most important antecedents, for achieving their planned or intended behaviors in life. In various situations, the intentions created in the minds at the childhood is considered as the most effective predictor of their future behavior. In achieving their behavior, factors that are internal to a person, drive the courage, while external factors influence the courage. Cultural barriers and social impacts may affect in achieving the intended future tasks of a person positively or negatively. Pressure from these external factors, strengthen the intention if they have higher levels of confidence. However, with more and more exposure to different scenarios, the knowledge and experience gained through such exposure have helped them to develop the measures to control such negative attitudes and transform the intention to a desired goal. Looking at the historical background of corporate leaders, who have moved out from corporate leadership, in order to create their own ventures, reveal that the intention generated in the minds at the childhood, was a stepping stone to be their own boss at the later stages in their life. They have worked in the area they have selected at the childhood and have mastered it while in the corporate career. Some children, who had the enterprise thinking at their childhood, have created an intention, to continue in the entrepreneurial career. But, the colonial thinking of traditional Sri Lankan parents have blocked their intention by pushing them to be a white-collar worker. While serving as a lecturer at the University of Moratuwa, Shahani Markus, who is probably the first female ICT entrepreneur in Sri Lanka, founded global venture Emojot Pvt. Ltd. This firm is engaged in creating software tools to capture emotional- connection of specific context of a person.“Sri Lankan parents, lacked confidence, when their kids take up an entrepreneurial career” was a real societal issue which Shahani Markus highlighted comparing her experience in the United States. KanishkaWeeramunda found his successful venture PayMedia Pvt. Ltd, to provide services for banking automation, after ending his corporate career as a Chief Information Officer at Laugfs Holdings. “I went through the same agony, just like others to go for a job”, recalledKanishkaWeeramunda, founder of PayMedia Pvt. Ltd, his memories at the age of nineteen. It shows, that the lack of confidence and the lack of enterprise thinking of Sri Lankan parents, acts as a barrier for accepting disruptive ideas of their children. This barrier has resulted for them to join the corporate world. Even though, they work for a company, they show their enterprise behavior at every facet of their corporate life. Enterprise thinking, developed as a corporate leader and the lessons learned from failures in life, was helpful to challenge the status quo and be the own boss. “Open up your own company, is the best option anyone can have in their life”. It was the intention that Shahani Markus gained while in the USA, the place where the start-up ecosystem started. After her graduation, working in the Silicon-Valley gave her the intention to be her own boss. The intention to be a computer scientist and leading the field of technology by disrupting the industry was developed in her mind during her childhood. As Kanishka said, “Corporate leadership position was very vital to get an opportunity”. However the intention generated in his mind at the age of nineteen to start his first venture in assembling computers, were sharpened with the strong desire to be his own boss. The enthusiasm developed in the mind of this child, eventually ended-up being the rule breaker in the industry. Shanil Fernando was very keen in bringing disruptive ideas to the industry through his successful venture, Leapset Pvt. Ltd. Today, he is the Managing Director of Sysco Labs which is a leading software company in Sri Lanka with its headquarters in Silicon Valley. He has developed rule braking behavior at the age of twelve, as a Royalist by programming games and selling it to his friends in the school.Attitude of a person helps to predict their future behavior. It shows that attitudes, values and feelings, developed at the childhood directly affect in creating a mindset. Along with this mindset, different experience, knowledge and skills gain as a corporate leader was instrumental for these entrepreneurs to excel in their entrepreneurial career. In Sri Lankan context, it is an interesting phenomena to analyze whether intention develop in the minds at the childhood is strongly associated with the outcome of the life.