The latter provides five traits to observe: Openness to experience, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness and neuroticism. It is accepted that the scores of agreeableness and neuroticism among entrepreneurs are significantly lower than the scores among managers. On the other hand, the score of openness to experience and conscientiousness among entrepreneurs are significantly higher than in managers. Interestingly, the score of extraversion suggests that entrepreneurs do not differ from managers on this dimension of personality.

During my four years of experiments, recruiting and co-learning with proto-entrepreneurs, I found fewer than 2 percent end up becoming innovation-driven entrepreneurs and 5 percent choose to become small, medium enterprise (SME) entrepreneurs. Despite those small numbers, when the intangible entrepreneurial thinking is measured, 80 percent of them graduate with more entrepreneurial thinking than they had before.

It is worth noting if no recruitment criteria are applied, the population will comprise 93 percent who work in their linear industry of study, 6 percent wish to enter state enterprises and only 1 percent wish to become entrepreneurs. Reality checks then suggest that those proto-entrepreneurs account for fewer than 2.5 percent of generation Z and millennials who pursue their studies in state universities.

Those are unpleasant numbers and brutal facts.

The good men and women who have promised to create hundreds of thousands of entrepreneurs per year in a province or thousands of entrepreneurs per year in a large university in this country must humbly learn from Adm. Stockdale “You must never confuse faith that you will prevail in the end, which you can never afford to lose, with the discipline to confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be”.

Just like in the development of any other skills and talents, for example in performance and creative industry, or sport, the training starts at the early stages of life, as young as in the womb. Entrepreneurs must undergo a long, robust, stringent curriculum of learning, which occupies most of their brains before finally creating a neuron pathway in their brain for the rest of their lives.

Another option, if we forget the long search of recruitment, we can shortcut by applying a one- to four-year robust learning process that normally will create a mass of ready-to-go people in a certain industry.

While most of my work has focused on the later part, I became increasingly curious about the beginning of the process that lies in the planting of innovation culture as basic, not just espoused, values. The process of converting espoused values into basic values requires a lot of experiment and long-term commitment from all stakeholders. “It takes a village to raise a child,” so goes an African proverb.

There are innovbation values espoused in this country related to openness to experience, high conscientiousness, low agreeableness and low neuroticism. I limit my readings to Javanese culture as it represents the most prevalent values shared in the archipelago.

Openness to experience is expressed in the following Javanese proverbs, guru bengawan weteng segara (always be willing to accommodate any criticism or aspirations from all walks of life), aja rumangso bisa, nanging bisa rumangsa (always feel the stupidest in the room, so one can always have room to learn hungrily), manunggaling kawula gusti (maintain the vision and mission in line with the aspirations of the team), nglurug tanpa bala, menang tanpa ngasorake (do not always apply the tactic of frontal assault but rather consider many tactics around love and passion and welfare of the people), mikul dhuwur mendhem jero (always remember the teachings and wisdom of predecessors and always remember their graciousness) and sepi ing pamrih, rame ing gawe (complete tasks responsibly for the greater cause of improving people’s lives and welfare, without short-sighted motives of fame or monetary reward).

Conscientiousness; landhep panggraitane (be intelligent, make good sense and have a sharp mental model in addressing all problems),  gemi, nastiti, ngati-ati (be structured and organized, careful and in compliance, conscientious and do not take wild risks), ajining dhiri saka lathi, ajing raga saka busana (always be careful with the choice of words, reflected in the choice of outward expression), ngilo githoke dhewe (always project the impacts of actions on others) and alon-alon waton kelakon (despite misconceptions of being slow and laggard, analyze the risk and provide options and feedback).

Low agreeableness; ora gumunan, ora kagetan, lan ora sumuk (do not be carried away with ideas too easily, do not react too swiftly) ngeli nanging ora keli (be receptive yet do not get carried away, especially when it comes to principle or reason) and becik ketitik ala ketara (uphold ethics and integrity at all costs, reputation matters).

High emotional stability; neng, ning, nung, nang (always be mindful in actions, peaceful in the making and maintain a raison d’étre) and rukun agawe santoso, crah agawe bubrah (strive to apply happiness in pursuit, instead of being obsessed with an objective that in the end will sacrifice the morale and the mental health of the team).

The country may one day become an innovative nation, thanks to the nobly espoused values that support the traits of the entrepreneur. However, having espoused values is not enough to mobilize a country to achieve a greater cause. It needs to be translated into muscle memory and a mental model. In other words, making them basic values that become reality automatically, intuitively and with little effort.

This starts at the nucleus of the family, expanding into the schools and peers and exposure during adolescence. What is myelinated afterward is an exposure that creates an electrical reaction that makes certain parts of the come brain alive.

Without having the correct basic values, a culture may vanish when confronted with other more inundated cultures. We will fall victim to global domino effects and become a laggard in innovation yet be incredibly early adopters of consumerism.

Do we have the right sub-culture? Japan, China, the United States, South Korea and Singapore have, therefore they are ready when facing industrial change. Investing in human capital is their theme, and it takes generations, no shortcuts.

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The writer is a lecturer in industrial entrepreneurship at the School of Electrical Engineering and Informatics-Bandung Institute of Technology (STEI-ITB).