93% of all businesses in Finland are micro-enterprises. That number alone really shows how important they are for the Finnish economy. Still, being an entrepreneur is something a lot of people say they could never do. Even though the number of enterprises has been on the rise through out the 20th century, there is still a scary stigma around running a business. According to some statistics, every other business started in Finland is no longer running after 5 years. Of course the reasons vary, but striving for growth too fast is what makes a lot of companies fail.
When talking about starting and running a business, Finnish people tend to only talk about the hardship. How a business owner never has free time and lives in constant stress. How the government loves to add expenses and tax that only concern entrepreneurs. Although some of this may be true, I personally feel like the biggest problem is in our attitude towards entrepreneurship. Finland needs more small businesses in order to employ the population, but when there is a “go big or go home” attitude tied to owning a business, a lot of people think they don’t have what it takes to even try.
Working in a small family business myself, I run into this mindset pretty much every time the business comes up in a conversation.
“Oh really! Have you thought about when you’re going to expand the business?”
“You know there’s this laundry place near where I live, maybe you should buy that one too!”
My answer to all these questions is always the same, that we’re actually quite happy where we are right now. The business supports me and my mom, and even a third part time employee. Now that I’m studying my mom could even take care of the business herself but chooses to employ a friend of mine, just to give everyone some free time too. Especially other entrepreneurs find it crazy that our CEO can take 2-week vacations, two or even three times a year. So why would we give up that freedom? To have more money, but less free time to spend it?
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