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| News / CEMP 2008 |
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| "ENTREPRENEURS", EDITORIAL PIECE BY ENRIQUE LACALLE PUBLISHED ON LA VANGUARDIA |
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| Friday, 09 January 2009 |
| Please find attached the editorial piece by Enrique Lacalle published on La Vanguardia on January 5th. |
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When you read the definition of an “entrepreneur” in different dictionaries, the one that might adjust more to reality is the following: “A person that assumes the responsibility and the risk implicit in a business with the intention of obtaining a profit”, and it goes on: “Usually, the entrepreneur decides what to produce, buys the installations required or rents them and gathers the working force, the capital and the materials necessary for this production. If the business is successful, the professional obtains profits; if it fails, he assumes the costs”. In summary, he puts himself at risk. At this time, when the businessman is very often criticized, I would like to pay him a tribute, since it is not easy being a professional especially in times of crisis, when the sales decrease, there are more unpaid people and credit is more restricted, and, according to the industry, at limits never seen before. A clear example is the real estate industry, that has been the country’s engine for many years. The businessman is risking his personal assets and, even if his company is small, medium or big, he has the responsibility of paying each month the salary and the suppliers, sometimes even with money from his own pocket. Lately, people have been looking for the anecdote, giving an image of the entrepreneur that is frivolous and very little adjusted to reality, forgetting the years, the risk, the effort and the courage necessary to build up a company, with its corresponding sleepless and worrying hours. The entrepreneur is the main axis from where the company revolves around and the one who finally decides the path to follow, facing a patrimonial risk and, in case he is mistaken, losing everything or part of what has been so hard to build and, depending on his age, with little will or even health to start again or keep on fighting. It is many times forgotten that, at extreme situations, many risk everything to a last card, because their company has been their life, their work and their thrill. That is the reason for these loud voice reflections, in order to valuate in fair terms the figure of the businessman, the promoter and tireless fighter that creates and puts himself at risk, that generates job posts and richness, that does not surrender, like most of these brave people are, who have believed in an idea and have developed it with all their consequences. In the last years it has appeared as part of the business partnership the family office, worth of praise, since it is the continuity of a creator’s project by his family, strengthening the initial project, widening and diversifying it; we have very close examples in Catalonia with family offices that are an example of management where the baton is passed on to the next generation.
A country without good entrepreneurs does not go forward, it doesn’t work, it doesn’t create job posts, it doesn’t innovate. That is the reason for my reflections on the vital importance for the economy of a good professional class that pulls the country forward. At this time, more than ever, this figure that is so necessary must be valued in fair terms and supported, since, without it, nothing would be the same. The foundations of a country that works are sustained on its entrepreneurs’ capacity of dedication, imagination, assuming of risks, sacrifice and braveness. It is only fair to reckon it.
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