Confession of an Entrepreneur: Seeing the Unseen

As a country with a population of approximately 234, 2 million people, Indonesia needs at least 4 million entrepreneurs to build the economy of this nation.

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Andry Panjaitan, Irvan Koharja, Era Soekamto, and Nico Wisnu Budi.

As a country with a population of approximately 234, 2 million people, Indonesia needs at least 4 million entrepreneurs to build the economy of this nation. The fact is, this requirement is fulfilled as much as 0.2 percent only. While actually, it is proven that business sectors that can survive during the economic crisis in 1998 were the ones run by entrepreneurs. For that reason, the Career Development and Alumni Centre (CDAC) UPH, invited entrepreneurs from various fields, to participate in a discussion “Confession of an Entrepreneur: Seeing the Unseen” at UPH campus (30/3).

“The economic crisis has caused an increasing number of unemployment, be it unreal unemployment, open unemployment, as well as educated unemployment,” said Nico Wisnu Budi, the founder of Synergy 66. Entrepreneurship can be one of the best solutions for Indonesia. The problem is that, since  a long time ago Indonesian education system has not been directing graduates to be job creators, but job seekers. Students must be willing to change their mindset to create jobs, be creative, innovative, courageous, and independent.

Then, what is needed to be a successful enterpreneur? “Creativity that is packed with the commercialization vision, is called entrepreneurship” added Wisnu. According to him, learning to be an entrepreneur takes time, and there must be a willingness to directly do things on site. An entrepreneur must understand the so-called natural risks in his life, said Irvan Koharja, an Independent Professional Training & Coaching Professional. This is important, because there are possibilities of downfalls and successes experienced by an entrepreneur in the first 5 years. “Well, a successful entrepreneur is the one who can get back on his feet when falling down, and able to make the previous failure as an opportunity to create something new in his works,” said Irvan.

That statement was justified by Era Soekamto, Urban Crew licensee in the field of fashion. “Business is best run according to our passion. Thus, in any situations, we will not easily give up but to continue our business. By working with passion, creative ideas will always emerge. Era suggested 4 attitudes that must be nurtured by an entrepreneur: choose a life you love, embrace your passion, live a life of action, and build our nation.? An entrepreneur must have big dreams, willing to realize his dreams, and then eager to build this nation,” added Era.

There are several phases that must be gone through by future entrepreneurs. It is highly recommended to learn directly from mentors, in order to know the  ?a to z? of a real entrepreneurship. Future entrepreneurs could also join mailing lists, facebooks, or discussions which are often held by the entrepreneurship community.

This event was held in relation to the graduation ceremonies on May 8, 2010. “We’re trying to equip students and new graduates, to be more open minded and better prepared in entering the working world” said Dharamanita, Student Career Services Section Head, CDAC Dept.  The event was attended by nearly 300 students and new graduates. This event was then followed by an open recruitment companies under the Lippo Group, on March 31, 2010. (sar)

UPH Media Relations