A businessperson, also referred to as a businessman or businesswoman, is an individual who has founded, owns, or holds shares in (including as an

angel investor An angel investor (also known as a business angel, informal investor, angel funder, private investor, or seed investor) is an individual who provides capital to a business or businesses, including startups, usually in exchange for convertible de ...

) a private-sector company. A businessperson undertakes activities (commercial or industrial) to generate

cash flow Cash flow, in general, refers to payments made into or out of a business, project, or financial product. It can also refer more specifically to a real or virtual movement of money. *Cash flow, in its narrow sense, is a payment (in a currency), es ...

, sales, and revenue by using a combination of

human Humans (''Homo sapiens'') or modern humans are the most common and widespread species of primate, and the last surviving species of the genus ''Homo''. They are Hominidae, great apes characterized by their Prehistory of nakedness and clothing ...

financial Finance refers to monetary resources and to the study and Academic discipline, discipline of money, currency, assets and Liability (financial accounting), liabilities. As a subject of study, is a field of Business administration, Business Admin ...

intellectual An intellectual is a person who engages in critical thinking, research, and Human self-reflection, reflection about the nature of reality, especially the nature of society and proposed solutions for its normative problems. Coming from the wor ...

, and

physical capital Physical capital represents in economics one of the three primary factors of production. Physical capital is the apparatus used to produce a good and services. Physical capital represents the tangible man-made goods that help and support the pr ...

to fuel economic development and growth.

History

Medieval period: Rise of the merchant class

Merchants emerged as a

social class A social class or social stratum is a grouping of people into a set of Dominance hierarchy, hierarchical social categories, the most common being the working class and the Bourgeoisie, capitalist class. Membership of a social class can for exam ...

medieval Italy The history of Italy in the Middle Ages can be roughly defined as the time between the collapse of the Western Roman Empire and the Italian Renaissance. Late antiquity in Italy lingered on into the 7th century under the Ostrogothic Kingdom and ...

. Between 1300 and 1500, modern accounting, the

bill of exchange A negotiable instrument is a document guaranteeing the payment of a specific amount of money, either on demand, or at a set time, whose payer is usually named on the document. More specifically, it is a document contemplated by or consisting of a ...

, and

limited liability Limited liability is a legal status in which a person's financial Legal liability, liability is limited to a fixed sum, most commonly the value of a person's investment in a corporation, company, or joint venture. If a company that provides limi ...

were invented, and thus, the world saw "the first true bankers", who were certainly businesspeople. Around the same time, Europe saw the " emergence of rich merchants." This "rise of the merchant class" came as Europe "needed a middleman" for the first time, and these "burghers" or "

bourgeois The bourgeoisie ( , ) are a class of business owners, merchants and wealthy people, in general, which emerged in the Late Middle Ages, originally as a "middle class" between the peasantry and Aristocracy (class), aristocracy. They are tradition ...

" were the people who played this role.

Renaissance to Enlightenment: Rise of the capitalist

Europe became the dominant global

commercial power Economic power refers to the ability of countries, businesses or individuals to make decisions on their own that benefit them. Scholars of international relations also refer to the economic power of a country as a factor influencing its power in ...

in the 16th century, and as Europeans developed new tools for business, new types of "business people" began to use those tools. In this period, Europe developed and used

paper money Paper money, often referred to as a note or a bill (North American English), is a type of negotiable promissory note that is payable to the bearer on demand, making it a form of currency. The main types of paper money are government notes, which ...

cheque A cheque (or check in American English) is a document that orders a bank, building society, or credit union, to pay a specific amount of money from a person's account to the person in whose name the cheque has been issued. The person writing ...

s, and joint-stock companies (and their shares of capital stock). Developments in

actuarial science Actuarial science is the discipline that applies mathematics, mathematical and statistics, statistical methods to Risk assessment, assess risk in insurance, pension, finance, investment and other industries and professions. Actuary, Actuaries a ...

and

underwriting Underwriting (UW) services are provided by some large financial institutions, such as banks, insurance companies and investment houses, whereby they guarantee payment in case of damage or financial loss and accept the financial risk for liability ...

led to insurance. Together, these new tools were used by a new kind of businessperson, the

capitalist Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their use for the purpose of obtaining profit. This socioeconomic system has developed historically through several stages and is defined by ...

. These people owned or financed businesses as investors, but they were not merchants of goods. These capitalists were a major force in the

Industrial Revolution The Industrial Revolution, sometimes divided into the First Industrial Revolution and Second Industrial Revolution, was a transitional period of the global economy toward more widespread, efficient and stable manufacturing processes, succee ...

. The

Oxford English Dictionary The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' (''OED'') is the principal historical dictionary of the English language, published by Oxford University Press (OUP), a University of Oxford publishing house. The dictionary, which published its first editio ...

reports the earliest known use of the word "business-men" in 1798, and of "business-man" in 1803. By 1860, the spelling "businessmen" had emerged.

Merriam Webster Merriam-Webster, Incorporated is an American company that publishes reference books and is mostly known for its dictionaries. It is the oldest dictionary publisher in the United States. In 1831, George and Charles Merriam founded the compa ...

reports the earliest known use of the word "businesswoman" in 1827.

Modern period: Rise of the business magnate

Frank-carr-businessperson-common-history

The newest kind of corporate executive working under a

business magnate A business magnate, also known as an industrialist or tycoon, is a person who is a powerful entrepreneur and investor who controls, through personal enterprise ownership or a dominant shareholding position, a firm or industry whose goods or ser ...

is the manager. One of the first true founders of the management profession was

Robert Owen Robert Owen (; 14 May 1771 – 17 November 1858) was a Welsh textile manufacturer, philanthropist, political philosopher and social reformer, and a founder of utopian socialism and the cooperative movement, co-operative movement. He strove to ...

(1771–1858). He was also a

in Scotland. He studied the "problems of

productivity Productivity is the efficiency of production of goods or services expressed by some measure. Measurements of productivity are often expressed as a ratio of an aggregate output to a single input or an aggregate input used in a production proce ...

and

motivation Motivation is an mental state, internal state that propels individuals to engage in goal-directed behavior. It is often understood as a force that explains why people or animals initiate, continue, or terminate a certain behavior at a particul ...

", and was followed by

Frederick Winslow Taylor Frederick Winslow Taylor (March 20, 1856 – March 21, 1915) was an American mechanical engineer. He was widely known for his methods to improve industrial efficiency. He was one of the first management consulting, management consultants. In 190 ...

(1856–1915), who was the first person who studied work with the motive to train his staff in the field of management to make them efficient managers capable of managing his business. After

World War I World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

, management became popular due to the example of

Herbert Hoover Herbert Clark Hoover (August 10, 1874 – October 20, 1964) was the 31st president of the United States, serving from 1929 to 1933. A wealthy mining engineer before his presidency, Hoover led the wartime Commission for Relief in Belgium and ...

and the

Harvard Business School Harvard Business School (HBS) is the graduate school, graduate business school of Harvard University, a Private university, private Ivy League research university. Located in Allston, Massachusetts, HBS owns Harvard Business Publishing, which p ...

, which offered degrees in business administration (management) with the motive to develop efficient managers so that business magnates could hire them with the goal to increase productivity of the private establishments business magnates own.

Salary

Salaries for businesspeople vary. The salaries of businesspeople can be as high as

billion Billion is a word for a large number, and it has two distinct definitions: * 1,000,000,000, i.e. one thousand million, or (ten to the ninth power), as defined on the short scale. This is now the most common sense of the word in all varieties of ...

s of

dollar Dollar is the name of more than 25 currencies. The United States dollar, named after the international currency known as the Spanish dollar, was established in 1792 and is the first so named that still survives. Others include the Australian d ...

s per year. For example, the owner of

Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company, technology conglomerate headquartered in Redmond, Washington. Founded in 1975, the company became influential in the History of personal computers#The ear ...

Bill Gates William Henry Gates III (born October 28, 1955) is an American businessman and philanthropist. A pioneer of the microcomputer revolution of the 1970s and 1980s, he co-founded the software company Microsoft in 1975 with his childhood friend ...

makes $4 billion per year. The high salaries which businesspeople earn have often been a source of criticism from many who believe they are paid excessively.

Entrepreneurship

An entrepreneur is a person who sets up a business or multiple businesses ( serial entrepreneur).

Entrepreneurship Entrepreneurship is the creation or extraction of economic value in ways that generally entail beyond the minimal amount of risk (assumed by a traditional business), and potentially involving values besides simply economic ones. An entrepreneu ...

may be defined as the creation or extraction of

economic value In economics, economic value is a measure of the benefit provided by a goods, good or service (economics), service to an Agent (economics), economic agent, and value for money represents an assessment of whether financial or other resources are ...

. It is generally thought to embrace

risks In simple terms, risk is the possibility of something bad happening. Risk involves uncertainty about the effects/implications of an activity with respect to something that humans value (such as health, well-being, wealth, property or the environ ...

beyond what is normally encountered in starting a business. Its motivation can include other values than simply economic ones. In general usage, because the distinction is not clear-cut, the term 'entrepreneur' may be used as a (self-)promoting

euphemism A euphemism ( ) is when an expression that could offend or imply something unpleasant is replaced with one that is agreeable or inoffensive. Some euphemisms are intended to amuse, while others use bland, inoffensive terms for concepts that the u ...

for 'businessperson', or it may serve to objectively indicate particular passion and risk-taking in a business field. Still, the distinction is only one by degrees.

References

{{Authority control Business occupations * Entrepreneurship