Global Accessibility Awareness Day
Entrepreneurship
Check out the latest startup news and analysis from Europe:These 12 startups want to convince Venture Capitalists that disability tech is where they need to put their money
The State Of Business In Ontario
- Current and aspiring entrepreneurs are striving for a future with reduced barriers and specialized, accessible support. They are calling for more accessible funding, clarity of available support, and specialized education. This report illustrates the ongoing and urgent need for improved funding for Canadian small businesses. The report shows that entrepreneurs are struggling in areas such as marketing and sales expertise, lack of curated and specialized educational materials, mentorship and advisory support, lack of networking and connection mediums, strategic business planning, hiring and retaining talent. The government and the private sector and entrepreneur support organizations must ensure that Canadian entrepreneurs are fully supported and that Canada becomes the best place in the world to start and grow a business.
Startup Canada 2022 Entrepreneur Census - It is the assessment of the 4th Reviewer that leadership on accessibility, and the AODA, has been absent for 17 years. Without leadership, there can be no accountability. This has certainly been the case with the AODA. It is the assessment of the 4th Reviewer that even with engaged leadership, as it stands today, accountability would be a significant challenge. A key reason is there are no metrics for what success looks like. Based on what was heard, combined with a fulsome jurisdictional scan, the 4th Reviewer has organized their assessments into four primary buckets: outcomes, governance, leadership, and accountability. It hardly needs repeating that AODA outcomes have been poor. Ontarians with disabilities continue to report disappointment in the AODA since its inception, and as has been indicated in previous reviews, progress has been painfully slow and uneven. The 4th Reviewer has identified two main drivers of these poor outcomes: a reliance on standards, and the absence of enforcement/incentives. As a conclusion, the Reviewer is obliged to highlight that the Premier of Ontario and his Cabinet have yet to meet the basic needs of a group of people totaling over one fifth of its population. Do you care? The Reviewer has been haunted by this question since having candid discussions with senior government officials early in this review process.
Interim Report, Fourth Review of the AODA, by Rich Donovan, entrepreneur, March 1, 2023
Characteristics of Successful Entrepreneurs
PERCH: Planning, Endurance, RightPeople, Confidence, Hold FastEntrepreneurs are doers, not dreamers. It starts with a big idea, takes shape through innovation and creativity, and is a success through hard work and customer understanding.
Entrepreneur perseverance and dedication to the big idea is the single biggest success factor. There are many entrepreneur success stories that demonstrate the determination to succeed.
Successful entrepreneurs do not think of failure. Goals must be realistic, attainable, and measurable. The entrepreneur must then be able to establish a vision of success.
Entrepreneurs are not intimidated by challenging problems, but focus on resolutions to overcome barriers that will lead to success.
Entrepreneurs are decision makers and are aware of time and costs in pursuing a goal. Understanding issues, engaging partnerships and exploring alternatives is a key success factor.
Entrepreneurs learn from both successes and failures. Instead, they analyze the causes and learn from them. They know why they were successful and how to build on that success, why they failed, and how to prevent a similar failure in the future.
Entrepreneurs feel confident they can achieve their objectives. The difference between confident and arrogant is a mindset, as confidence leads to success and arrogance leads to failure.
Entrepreneurs prefer to take moderate, calculated risks, not ones so large they will lose everything or so small as to be a sure thing. Where risk is involved, they prefer to share it with partners, investors, banks, creditors, suppliers, or others.
Entrepreneurs make effective decisions under conditions of uncertainty. They take change in stride, view it as a challenge, and appear to thrive in that type of environment.
Entrepreneurs recognize they are not able to build a business by themselves and actively recruit and build teams by sharing responsibility and credit. They are capable of building self-directed work groups.