Incidents of people committing suicide because of financial crises have become frequent these days. A horrific component of this is that they are often doing so with family members – wife and children. Obviously, this done because they do not wish the family to suffer the difficulties of being left without support after their death. This is an indication of the multiple stresses modern day consumerist existence inflicts upon people. There is no backup of any kind if loans are taken to launch businesses and cannot be paid back owing to setbacks. This is why, while it is easy to advise today’s youngsters to become entrepreneurs, failing at it can prove very costly. It is only natural, therefore, for people to prefer being employees, particularly government ones, rather than taking risks that can have such tragic consequences.
One of the reasons why certain communities excelled at doing business in the past is that the risks were shared, and in case of failure, help was available to tide over the bad times. Now, particularly in the case of individual entrepreneurs, there is no backup of any kind. The financiers, banks and other agencies, are bound by rules and regulations to provide just limited flexibility.
It is important under the circumstances that wannabe businesspersons learn the practices that provide greater security. These should certainly be included in business management courses – simple formulae to balance the risk. It is obviously dangerous to jump into the deep end without previous experience of profit making from a certain activity. Much of what is learned in BBA and MBA classes is based on principles developed from western experience and practices. In many ways, the Indian business environment is very different and requires a deeper understanding of the local methodology. Previous experience in a particular domain on a smaller scale is preferable before taking bigger risks.
It would help if the general environment were also made enterprise friendly. Many of those who take the extreme step are also doing so because they cannot adjust to the changed financial circumstances. Trying to live up to a certain image in a middle-class world often becomes an unsustainable burden. The humiliation of taking one’s children out of a private school and admitting them to a government one is unbearable. In matters like this, people should be made aware of the success stories of successful businesspersons, almost all of whom have struggled through major setbacks to come back even stronger. India needs a serious mindset change in this regard!
