Many entrepreneurs starting up their own business have a great idea, but they fail because they haven’t spent enough time planning how to carry it out. In this book, a team of successful entrepreneurs, business advisors and subject specialists lay out the process of planning and starting your own enterprise, introducing you to the world of entrepreneurship and advising how to grow a business. Drawing on their personal experiences in the different phases of start-up and establishing their businesses they add valuable hands-on information.

Entrepreneurship – An African Perspective is a theoretical as well as practical guide on how to develop business ideas to establish a successful enterprise. In it you will find:

• the procedure the entrepreneur must follow before establishing a business
• guidelines on identifying a feasible business idea
• how to conduct a viability study
• how to draw up a business plan
• a comprehensive introduction to the world of business and its most important role-player, the entrepreneur, specifically in the South African context
• basic business concepts that explain the business environment and business in general
• African case studies and examples of what successful entrepreneurs do and what contributes to successful entrepreneurship
• essential business management functions relevant to a start-up and new business, such as marketing, finance, operations, human resources and purchasing.

The authors use an accessible approach to guide readers to be positive yet critical, and creative yet practical in their research and analysis of a business idea, and ultimately to develop a business idea that will be profitable.

• Chapter 1: Entrepreneurship and small, medium and micro enterprises in perspective
• Chapter 2: Basic business concepts and the business environment
• Chapter 3: The identification and development of business ideas
• Chapter 4: The viability of a business idea
• Chapter 5: The business plan
• Chapter 6: Financing the capital requirements of a small business
• Chapter 7: The break-even analysis 
• Chapter 8: Budgets
• Chapter 9: Setting up a business
• Chapter 10: Entrepreneurial skills in perspective
• Chapter 11: Self-confidence and positive attitude
• Chapter 12: Business achievement and goal setting
• Chapter 13: Assertiveness: An active way of shaping your own life
• Chapter 14: Time management
• Chapter 15: Networking
• Chapter 16: The role of leading and teamwork in the management process
• Chapter 17: Creativity and creative problem-solving
• Chapter 18: Innovation
• Chapter 19: Confrontation and conflict
• Self-evaluation questions, references and further reading and legislation, if applicable
• Appendix A: Sample business plan
  • Executive summary
  • Business description
  • Marketing plan
  • Location
  • Management plan
  • Financial plan
  • Critical risks
• Index

The book will be of great value to undergraduate students of Entrepreneurship in Africa as well as the less experienced and nascent entrepreneur.