Week 3 – Understanding the Entrepreneur: Personality, Leadership and Creative Identity

Reflecting on personality traits and how they influence my role as a designer and future entrepreneur.

This week’s session focused on the role of identity and personality in entrepreneurship. We heard from an industry professional about their entrepreneurial journey. Later, we completed personality assessments to better understand our individual traits and how to leverage them to benefit our businesses. The session encouraged me to reflect on how personal characteristics and past experiences influence entrepreneurial behaviour and decision-making.

My personality test result was ENTJ, a type associated with leadership, strategic thinking, and strong goal orientation. This result was not surprising, but what I found most interesting was that several years ago,o I completed the same test and received ENTP as a result. Reflecting on this difference made me realise that some aspects of personality remain the same over time and are ingrained in us, while others evolve through experience and maturity.

Figure 7: Results from the personality assessment completed during the workshop. The ENTJ profile highlights leadership, strategic thinking, and strong goal orientation.

This idea connects with experiential learning theory proposed by David Kolb, which suggests that individuals develop through cycles of experience, reflection and adaptation (Kolb, 1984). Through professional and personal experience, certain traits, such as decisiveness or organisational ability, may have been strengthened through repeated practice.

One trait that strongly resonated with me was leadership. As the oldest sibling in my family, I naturally took on the role of leader and role model from a young age. This experience instilled confidence in my decision-making and my ability to take responsibility for outcomes. I often feel comfortable taking the lead on group projects and communicating my vision clearly when presenting the concepts behind my designs.

However, this reflection also revealed some potential challenges. I tend to trust my own abilities more than others', which can make collaboration difficult. Effective entrepreneurship often requires teamwork, partnerships, and trust in others’ expertise. Recognising this weakness has made me aware that developing stronger collaborative skills and knowing when to let go of control will be important for building a successful fashion brand. 

Another insight from the Get2 test was my relatively low risk-taking score compared to other entrepreneurial traits. Unfortunately, this felt accurate because I naturally gravitate toward routine and certainty. I tend to work best within structured environments. Since entrepreneurship is often associated with high risk, I will need to learn to balance risk-taking with careful planning and preparation.

Overall, this week helped me better understand the relationship between personality and entrepreneurship. By recognising both my strengths, such as leadership, and my weaknesses, such as limited trust in others, I can begin developing strategies to improve as both a designer and a future entrepreneur.

Personality Trait	Impact of Collection Development	Reflection for Future Practice
Leadership (ENTJ)	This helps me clearly and confidently present the idea of modular lingerie and tailoring when explaining my designs to others.	This strength will help when pitching my brand or communicating creative ideas with collaborators.
Strategic Thinking	Encourages me to design garments as a connected system rather than isolates pieces.	Strategic thinking supports long-term collection planning and brand development.
High Achievment	This motivates me to refine my pattern pieces and construction details to meet a high technical standard.	Setting high standards can build a strong design identity, but I need to make sure perfectionism does not hold back progress.
Risk Aversion	Makes it difficult to eliminate ideas during design stage because I worry about losing valuable concepts.	I need to become more comfortable taking calculated creative risks.
Limitied Trust in Others' Abilities	Can make collaboration complicated during creative projects.	Developing trust in collaborators will be important when working with manufacturers, stylists or marketing teams.
Preference for Structure and Routine	Helps with organised processes like pattern making and garment construction.	I should still remain open to experimentation and unexpected creative outcomes.

Table 1: Reflection on how my personality traits influence my design process while developing collections