Entrepreneurial traits: Observant

According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the adjective, observant, can be defined as an individual that pays a lot of attention to things and notices more about them than most people do (2010, p.1499).
In this highly competitive society, entrepreneurs should always be observant towards their business surrounding. By having proper observation, entrepreneurs can predict the type of products or services that may improve people’ lives in that community and this will direct them to achieve their business goals.

There are some observant entrepreneurs that can be the role models. First, Bryan Loo Woi Lip, the CEO of Chatime Malaysia. He is listed as one of the Malaysia's top entrepreneurs under the age of 30 (Bervin, 2015). In October 2010, Bryan had brought Chatime, a Taiwan-based tea store chain to Malaysia. Bryan was aware that most of the Malaysians were focused on drinking coffee and the market for tea was still very underdeveloped. Therefore, based on this reason, Bryan believed that the market for tea is bound to be profitable. Today, there is almost 200 Chatime outlets nationwide (Chatime, n.d.).

Second, Dato’ Aliff Syukri, the founder of D'Herbs Healthy Marketing. It is a company that produces health and beauty products. D'Herbs Healthy Marketing realised that the recent market is lacked of good quality but cheap health and beauty products. Therefore, it has become the main vision of D'Herbs Healthy Marketing to provide customers with products lauded for its quality and reasonable price tags that are affordable to everyone (Sulaiman, 2014).

Third, Ryan Loo Chung Fong, the owner as well as the CEO of Container Hotel Group. Container Hotel Group used the concept of recyclable materials, mainly container in designing their hotels (Wong, 2013). This is because Ryan was alert that the world is getting sick. Thus, by using recyclable materials, people are able to care for the earth (Bervin, 2015).

Lastly, Tan Sri Dato' Seri Vincent Tan Chee Yioun, the founder of Berjaya Group. He is a very intelligent and observant person as he believes that one should not put all eggs in a basket. Berjaya Group with his lead has a wide scope of businesses, such as golfing, property, resort, and other (Berjaya Group, n.d.). Due to this strategy, Berjaya Group is still well-known until today.

All in all, business is not a gamble. A thriving business means a carefully planned business that requires a businessman to be observant of its own strengths and weaknesses as well as the need of the market. An observant businessman is able to make opportunities out of bleak situations by being decisive about decisions that make or break a business.