6 Major Struggles Faced by Indian Entrepreneurs

Entrepreneurs serve as a one-man army for their new venture. From juggling between multiple departments to pulling five all-nighters in a row, they go through a bunch of challenges while starting their business. While the career option comes with a truckload of rewards once the enterprise takes off, there are some common struggles that most entrepreneurs face in the initial stages of their endeavors. In this article, we shall look at the 6 major struggles faced by Indian entrepreneurs.

Entrepreneurship in India

With Make in India campaign and Startup India initiatives creating a favorable environment for budding entrepreneurs to unlock their true potential, entrepreneurship has seen drastic growth in recent years in the Indian economy. A few factors that have fueled this growth of Indian entrepreneurship include the growth of the middle-class workforce, easier access to the latest technology, and the rise of digital platforms. Unicorn startups valued at over $1 billion have increased enormously over the last five years. Investments from global giants namely, Google, Facebook, and Amazon have additionally propped the entrepreneurial ecosystem and motivated more entrepreneurs to explore and grow their businesses.

Despite the immense support being raised for startups to blossom in India, several challenges still exist on the entrepreneurial road. Some of the commonly faced challenges include the difficulties of obtaining funds, lack of guidance and resources to grow, and complex regulatory environment to operate. These challenges have been faced by most entrepreneurs to date, and they continue to create roadblocks for the upcoming generation as well.

6 Struggles in Indian Entrepreneurship

1. Difficulties in Obtaining Funds

One of the common struggles for Indian entrepreneurs is the scarcity of funds for operations. New businesses struggle in getting a steady flow of cash for their day-to-day operations. Along with their working capital, startup founders also need a portion of buffer cash to support the highs and lows of business.

It is crucial to understand the accurate ways of obtaining funds as per the business goals and managing your finances to sustain the survival of your enterprise. You must formulate a strong business strategy and keep aside a contingency fund at all times for worst-case scenarios. Moreover, you must focus on maintaining and constantly improving your business quality to maintain a steady cash flow.

2. Improper Business Planning

As it is rightly said, when you fail to plan, you plan to fail. Planning is a crucial element for any startup's survival in the competitive market. Most Indian startups face an unforeseen death due to improper business planning.

Your business strategy must cover all ends of your enterprise, from obtaining and allocating funds to generating sales, marketing your business, and overcoming market threats. It is also important to create a backup plan for unforeseen circumstances. While strategizing your business, you must read the upcoming business trends and plan for any industrial opportunity or threat that may arise shortly.

3. Finding the Right Talent

Hiring the right people for the right job is a head-scratcher for all entrepreneurs. It is challenging to align the goals of the startup with the skills of your employees until you have the right set of individuals for handling your operations. Indian startups often face huge fallouts due to wrong hiring and job allocations. In addition to this, recruitment is an expensive affair and often costs the startup founders a fortune to conduct multiple hirings.

You must identify the skills and talent you need to grow your business. It is vital to onboard the employees after careful examination of their skills and experiences. As a startup founder, you must also invest in the training and development of skills for yourself and your employees to polish their experiences and retain them in the long run.

4. Limited Budgets for Marketing

A common mistake made by most entrepreneurs is ignorance towards marketing activities. As a new business, you need to invest in visibility campaigns to create awareness for your brand. It becomes difficult to invest in expensive marketing activities when you have a limited set of cash at hand. Losing out on marketing avenues can negatively impact your business and put you behind your competition.

You must identify the optimum avenues where your business can invest for maximum returns based on your availability of funds. You should analyze your marketing activities and optimize your fund allocation based on your results regularly. Moreover, you must have alternative strategies to promote your business via unpaid marketing methods such as word of mouth and personal references.

5. Lack of Business Infrastructure

A significant challenge for most Indian entrepreneurs is the lack of proper business infrastructure. Being new in the field of business, it becomes difficult for entrepreneurs to know about the right industrial resources to utilize for their benefit. The lack of funds also adds to the difficulty of obtaining the latest business tools for the everyday operation of businesses.

Finding a group of peers can help you arrange the relevant infrastructure you need for your business. Peers can help you withthe industrial resources and guide you toward their right usage. You must identify cost-cutting methods while obtaining business infrastructures such as business tools, machines, and office space. Joining coworking spaces and renting business machines in the initial days can also help you save your funds while generating sales.

6. Handling Feedback and Criticism

Startups are always bombarded with feedback and criticism from all corners. It can be overwhelming for the entrepreneur to handle multiple criticisms about his business, especially when it is in the beginning stages of launch. Not knowing how to deal with criticisms and feedback is burdening for most budding entrepreneurs.

Right mentorship in your course of entrepreneurship can help you understand how to analyze criticisms. You must find a mentor who can foster tier knowledge and expertise in your business to promote its growth. Mentors can help you analyze the feedback and pivot your mind from those that are irrelevant to your business. Moreover, they can help you formulate your next course of improvement based on such criticisms.

Conclusion

Entrepreneurship is a challenging race, but the reward of winning this race can bless you with fruitful experiences. Challenges are the part and parcel of every entrepreneurial journey. Knowing how to navigate your business from these challenges can sustain prolonged growth for your business. You must analyze your strengths and weaknesses before starting your endeavor and keep learning along the way to improve your entrepreneurial skills.