What does entrepreneurship have to do with community pharmacy? Aren’t pharmacists a risk averse lot? In a December 2024 P3pharmacy interview, Essex contractor Baba Akomolafe told us that while many pharmacists are trained to be cautious – “we’re not taught to be entrepreneurial in university” – the ones that are best weathering the difficult financial headwinds of today are doing so by thinking outside the lines instilled by their training.

In many cases, they have applied themselves to unproven workstreams and worked hard to grow them into a service their patients love. 

That quality of risk tolerance comes up again and again when people seek to define entrepreneurialism. “In a world that’s changing really quickly, the only strategy that is guaranteed to fail is not taking risks,” Meta founder Mark Zuckerberg has said. As media entrepreneur Chris Oakley put it, an entrepreneur “sees an opportunity which others do not fully recognise, to meet an unsatisfied demand or to radically improve the performance of an existing business”.

Put simply, an entrepreneur is a self-made person who is willing to put their money where their mouth is. They are willing to take a calculated risk and back their calculation that it’s weighted in their favour.

They are a team player and will use all available resources in order to make something happen. 

Despite what many think, entrepreneurship is an acquired characteristic. Entrepreneurs are self-taught and self-made.

Anyone who is willing to recognise the characteristics needed, and who is then willing to work at it, can become one. 

Since we are all different, there are a range of characteristic entrepreneurial behaviours that you could choose to adopt to see where it takes you.