When should I start my own business | Turtle Credit | When should I start my own business

When should I start my own business?

By Turtle Credit Team

Many people dream of having their own business, but many people simply cannot overcome the psychological and financial barriers that stand between them and their own business. Starting a business is not an easy task. It should not be rushed through. A lot of entrepreneurs make the mistake of rushing through the initial process. That process is absolutely vital for a business and then end up coming across deficiencies that are hard to correct once the business has been set up.

A few indicators or traits should be considered before a person is ready to set up their own business. So let us look at them now and try to understand what it takes to become an entrepreneur.

Idea

The most important thing for starting up a business is an idea that has convinced you. Having a basic idea is a fundamental requirement for any business. Without a vision, a business would not have its purpose or direction. The idea, however, must be appropriately conceptualized and developed into a workable plan. For instance, Spotify was conceptualized as a platform for the music industry to overcome the piracy problem in 2006. Back then, streaming platforms were not common, but this idea defined what Spotify was to become. The whole superstructure of the Spotify brand was built around it.

The owner needs to have a clear understanding of the idea because unless you, as the owner or the entrepreneur, are not convinced by your idea, you will not be able to sell your product and convince the investors.

Workable Plan

As mentioned above, the idea must be built into a workable plan. Having an idea and turning it into a workable plan are two very different things. Anyone can develop a world-changing revolutionary idea, but it requires expertise to turn that idea into a workable plan.

Entrepreneurs need to make sure that they have the right team. This is why mentors teach entrepreneurs to surround themselves with people who can make them grow. You need to have a team of capable experts who can turn your idea into a workable plan. This may involve technicians, engineers, doctors, financial and legal experts.

Leap of Faith

It goes without saying that becoming an entrepreneur to start your own business requires a leap of faith. Anyone earning a stable income from a regular nine to five job will find it difficult to leave a well-paying job to start a business that initially has no guarantee of providing successful returns. This is a leap of faith that every entrepreneur has to go through, and this is why it is absolutely vital for an entrepreneur to be completely committed to their idea. Unless an entrepreneur is committed to their idea, they will not turn their idea into a successful business venture. Every entrepreneur must be ready to make the leap of faith when the time comes.

Connections

On the surface, it may seem that starting up a business only requires a good idea that has been worked upon thoroughly. Still, there are some traits of successful entrepreneurs that decide whether a business venture is going to succeed or not. Entrepreneurs are basically resource gatherers. They can bring together the four production factors and make the idea work.

Although personal connections may not count as a factor of production, they are perhaps as important. An entrepreneur without connections in the industry or the relevant market will have a more challenging time getting exposure to their idea. As the saying goes, it is not what you know but who you know.

One of the most essential advantages of having good connections is helping the business idea grow exponentially. Every first-time entrepreneur is inexperienced and therefore having good mentors, partners, and connections can compensate for the lack of experience. Furthermore, it is this personal repo that can play a crucial role in securing funding from investors.

There is a viral story of Bill Gates helping out Steve Jobs save Apple.inc from going bankrupt by funding the company at a very crucial time. Both Gates and Jobs knew each other, and it was this connection that saved Apple. Entrepreneurs need to understand that human interaction is the key to success.

Risk-taking attitude

The definition of an entrepreneur has a key trait that we did not mention in the last point. Entrepreneurs are risk-takers by nature. A risk-averse individual can not become a good entrepreneur. You need to be bold with a risk-seeking attitude to become a good entrepreneur. Why? Because for an entrepreneur, every step is a step into unchartered territory.

Innovation stems from a risk-seeking attitude, and it is the key driver of the industry. While it is true that every risk does not pay off, this also does not mean that entrepreneurs take risks without any contingency plan. No, that would be foolish, but a degree of risk-seeking is required.

The degree of risk is perhaps directly proportional to the reward that it will carry. Elon Musk took a significant risk when he pushed SpaceX to the limit to make the reusable landing rockets work. The flight tests kept failing, and SpaceX came on the brink of bankruptcy before it finally worked, and the reward was in the form of a new age of space exploration.

Learn from failure

The one factor that perhaps defines an entrepreneur is learning from their failures and moving on. As we discussed earlier, a risk-seeking attitude is essential for an entrepreneur, but a risk-seeking attitude brings both success and failure. For an entrepreneur, there is no such thing as a smooth road towards success. The entrepreneurial road is lined with failures, and the most important skill for an entrepreneur to have is resilience. Resilience is the ability to learn from their failures and turn them into success.

An entrepreneur can make up for the lack of technical skills by hiring experts. Similarly, the lack of connections can also be made up by hiring specialist firms, but if an entrepreneur cannot look failure in the face and learn from it, then they will never be successful.

Every successful person and entrepreneur has come across multiple failures in their careers. Sometimes entrepreneurs fail to get the right idea and need to carry out trial and error to get the right idea. Sometimes entrepreneurs just cannot sell their idea to investors and fail to get funding. At times they fail to create that magic formula to create an effective team. All of these failures can be turned into success, but only if the entrepreneur can do so. Therefore, these are the traits or indicators that must be present in a person before they can start their own business. Are you up to the challenge?

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