Probability, People and Profits

Author: Pranay Reddy

Some days ago I asked a friend, “What is your chance of becoming the next top shot entrepreneur running a billion dollar company”. He replied, “Its 1/2, either I’ll become one or else I won’t. Suffice it to say, either he has it in him to be the next Jobs or else he’s destined to bite dust. The point to be highlighted as per him is that, his chances of reaching those heights are as high as 50%, so are the chances to fall in glitch. If the aforesaid, dictum is true then what do you have to say for snowing in Delhi. Well, as expected we have an identical answer, probability of snowing are as likely as 50% i.e. either it snows or it doesn’t. Weird isn’t it? The explanation of the aforementioned paradox is the property of probability, known as chances of an event occurring should be equally likely. This explains for the reason why it doesn’t snow in Delhi, because the chances of such an occurrence are close to zero. Similarly, if we speak of chances of rain in Mumbai during monsoons; because the conditions are so favorable it is as high as 90%.

For the sake of argument, what are the chances, of an aspiring entrepreneur to achieve stardom, now that we know the property of probability of ‘Equally likeliness’?  Let’s apply some basics of mathematics: The chances of you attaining success in you entrepreneurial sojourn is say, m/n, where m is the no. of successful entrepreneurs and n is the total no. of entrepreneurs. But, as we know n>>m, i.e. n is a much larger no. then m the fraction m/n is close to ZERO. Does that mean that chances of your entrepreneurial journey ending up as a success is close to zero? The big and the obvious answer to this question is a big fat NO. But sane people have said and I quote, “Logic seldom lies, and math never”. So the only solution to this problem is to reduce the burgeoning no. n exponentially. 

This calls for some introspection and some sound strategizing. It is indispensable to have an idea, which is unique, robust, ingenious and off course scalable if you’ve to reach heights. If you have such an idea, next step is implementation, and that too you need an ecosystem for your idea to thrive and veritably hard work, will power and dedication as quoted by Legend himself, Milkha Singh. Inspite, of stuffed with truckloads of abovementioned attributes, the trick that entrepreneurs miss are there people.

Irrespective of the domain of your industry viz. services, manufacturing, etc., whatever you create, you do it for people. Gurucharan Das once spoke, the best form of R&D must involve taking in the opinion of your customers, and the best way to do that is to involve your own people. It is the people who create things not machines. Suffice, to say if your workforce is motivated, supported and happy, they are in amicable condition to spell a magic in your venture. Always remember, only humans can think of what humans want, not machines.

So, I cannot guarantee the causal of entrepreneurial Yahoo, but can promise lots of correlations. Apple Inc. who’re committed to their workforce recently overtook Coca Cola, as the most valuable brand, and they did that without incurring any cost in advertising!

Author
Pranay Reddy - PlugHR Pro