Karnataka and Kerala Rains: 3 Things You Could Do to Help as an Entrepreneur Use your entrepreneurial skills in times of natural crisis

When you are an entrepreneur, or are desirous of turning one soon, catering to societal causes through smart solutions and models undoubtedly offers maximum satisfaction when monetary profits are put over. In this regard, your entrepreneurial models could also bring out the societal side of you provided you cater to actual causes smartly.

Now, with the damage that the recent rains have inflicted on parts of Karnataka and Kerala states are an opportunity for you to delve into entrepreneurship (even for the first time is fine) irrespective of your societal status. Opportunity to cater to societal causes is at an high now; you could even choose to turn first-time entrepreneur in these circumstances and lend helping hands.

Opportunity to truly showcase your entrepreneurial skills – stand up for a cause

The devastation in parts of Karnataka and Kerala is unimaginable, and irreversible; however, formulating and deploying entrepreneurship during these crisis times should enable the feeling of oneness and belonging among those affected. This is where the entrepreneur in you could take over and held a helping hand.

"As an entrepreneur, this is the time to show your real skin. Every good entrepreneur has many networks that they can be tapped into at the time of need," says Chaitanya V Cotha who is Executive Director at C Krishniah Chetty Group of Jewellers.

The takeaway here is that, you need not be an entrepreneur to leverage networks; you could simply tap into your business contacts and leverage these to create a positive impact on the people affected by the natural calamity.

If you are an entrepreneur, you need not even wait to offer your bit (relief in any form) smartly such that it reaches the recipients who you have intended.

Now, remember that apart from money you could chip in with your expertise. These could include aspects such as low-cost construction techniques – for enabling people to rebuild homes; low-cost yet effective construction supplies; smart agricultural solutions for enabling farmers to harvest again and start farming after the flood ravage, technology-enabled healthcare techniques such that the needy can be given enough and best medical care, and more.

You could even potentially resort to setting up (quickly) a smart retail store that dynamically analyses the need of people and lists essential supplies. The whole of this store could be concept-driven by technology such as the Internet-of-Things (IoT), Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning (ML), and Deep Learning.

The above represents true potential opportunities which could be tapped into; in addition to contributing money and essential supplies to the afflicted.

Offer true and smart "hope'

Offering hope during crisis is definitely the in-thing. As entrepreneurs, you should remember that there is always a societal responsibility to shoulder apart from business ones. Hence, offer hope to people that they can rebuild their lives (and homes) effectively and ensure that this stays on even if there are future occurrences of natural disasters.

Here, stimulate the entrepreneur in you to create long-term smart solutions that can at least withstand certain vagaries of nature.

"It is our duty to solve real-life issues along with our business ones. As a business leader, we have to lead by example and also help solve the issues which occur outside our business. This can only happen when we empathize with people's problem," states Abhinav Krishna who is Co-Founder and CEO at OurHealthMate.

"In this situation, helping people rehabilitate and rebuild their lives will go a long way in enhancing the brand image," adds Krishna.

Undoubtedly, offering monetary help goes a long way in rebuilding peoples' lives, but it is the smart solutions which you offer as entrepreneurs that offer hope of sustainability in terms of crisis. Hence, it is always good that you develop smart solutions with a societal bent of mind.

Long-term success

While working towards the welfare of people affected by natural calamities, experts advise to develop long-term impacts as much as possible.

"If you implement eco-friendly policies and activities whether carbon footprint reduction or energy conservation, it ultimately drives us to get success in the long term. It ultimately results into successful sustainable businesses," advises Parveen Kharb, Co-Founder and CEO at Twenty Two Motors.

Kharb emphasizes on the aspect of effective research; this can be carried out through technical elements viz Predictive Analytics and even Artificial Intelligence to potentially make solutions natural calamity-proof. Government participation could also be engaged in this regard.

Hence, the onus is on you as an entrepreneur to not only extend a helping hand, but also ensure people have at least a layer of proper protection when natural calamities strike.