How many different articles have been written on being a successful entrepreneur?
Tons.
If you’re reading this post, you are probably an entrepreneur who is serious about starting and growing your business. You’re well aware of the fact that it’s not easy to start a business. You may even be just starting out and you’re still trying to figure this whole “entrepreneurship thing” out.
It’s not easy, is it? It can feel like you’re trying to assemble a jigsaw puzzle using pieces that have been scattered all around a huge room! Gathering these pieces and figuring out where they fit can be a challenge.
Figuring out where to get started can be an issue.
There are many things you will need to learn in the years to come as you grow your business. However, for the purposes of this post, the issue isn’t digesting every single little entrepreneurial lesson you can learn. The issue is learning some of the most important fundamentals to successful entrepreneurship.
When you read this post, consider how you might begin applying these principles in your own life. When you do this, you will see and understand how much easier it can be to build your business.
Perseverance
Perseverance is arguably the most important skill an entrepreneur can have. Without perseverance, no other skill or quality will matter.
Why?
Because perseverance will push you to keep moving forward no matter what challenges and obstacles you face. It’s absolutely crucial to your success.
Unfortunately, this quality is often neglected. People think it’s more important to possess smarts, experience and business acumen. Of course, these qualities are important. You have to have them in order to succeed. but the issue isn’t becoming a super entrepreneur. The issue is knowing how to push forward no matter what happens.
Here’s the thing: if you don’t know how to handle obstacles, all of your other skills won’t matter because you’re going to continually give up when things get rough. How many people have you heard of who have accomplished great things without going through numerous challenges?
Exactly.
When you learn how to persevere, you find that you are able to use your obstacles to propel you forward. You will see how tough you have become when you look back over the obstacles you have conquered. When you have grit, you experience greater success and more satisfaction.
Manage Your Cash Flow
You decided to become an entrepreneur, which means you want to build a thriving enterprise. Chances are, one of the main reasons you’re embarking on your entrepreneurial journey is because you want to create and build wealth.
However, when you’re building a business, it’s not only about making more money, it’s about building wealth by learning how to handle your cash flow. Makes sense, doesn’t it? After all, what’s the point of making a ton of money if you just end up losing it?
There are oodles of tips and strategies for learning how to build and manage wealth. You could spend hour upon hour studying this subject (and you probably will).
But one of the things you will need to understand is where you currently are in your quest for greater wealth. When you identify the stage you are in on your way to earning more, you will see what you need to do to get to the next level.
You don’t want to ignore this part. If you’re not great at understanding the financial part of running your business, it’s best to hire a professional who can give you the guidance you need.
Become A Better Influencer
Yes, I know this is my favorite subject. If you read most of my other pieces, you will find that I’m passionate about the subject of influence.
There’s a reason for that.
I consider influence to be important because most of your life as an entrepreneur will be spent trying to get others to do what you want. It’s a reality you must embrace in order to accomplish your objectives. When you realize how important influence is, it can help you overcome most obstacles that stand in the way of your success.
Simply put, you can’t succeed if you don’t know how to move others to action. While this is true in every profession, it’s especially critical if you’re an entrepreneur.
You will need to convince prospects to become paying customers. You have to know how to motivate your team by persuading them to buy into your vision. You need to become better at negotiations with other parties. You may also have to know how to get investors to fund your business.
Here’s the good news. Influence is not a quality that one is automatically born with. Many people believe the myth that you have to be a “natural salesperson” in order to be great at persuading others.
I agree that there are certain personality traits that lend themselves well to the art of sales. I’d even argue that there are people who have these traits without even knowing it.
However, the reality isn’t that you have to be born with the right personality to be great at influencing others. The reality is that influence is a skill that can be learned and mastered over time. What do you think will happen if you were to commit yourself to learning how to influence others?
When you take the time to train and hone the skills you need to become a better influencer, you will experience a much easier time getting others to do what you want. You will see how it enables you to have an incredible impact on those you interact with. You will be glad that you took the time to see how learning persuasion could benefit your business.
Don’t Do It Alone
One of the biggest mistakes entrepreneurs make is falling into the trap of doing everything themselves. They believe that the only way to achieve success is to wear themselves out by trying to wear as many hats as possible.
They want to do it all themselves. They try to do sales, marketing, finance, website design, procurement, IT, and many other functions.
Sounds pretty exhausting, doesn’t it? That’s because it is.
Nobody can wear all of these hats over a long period of time while staying sane.
This may work for right now, but eventually, you will need to rely on others to get the work done for you. The time will come when you have hire others who can wear these hats for you.
You need a team.
One of the key points to remember about building a team is that you need to hire people who are strong where you are weak. After all, you can’t be great at everything, can you?
We all have our strengths and weaknesses, don’t we? So the smart thing to do is to get people who are able to perform the tasks that you either dislike, or have trouble with.
Another thing that is important to remember is that you need to make sure the people you hire have the right attitude. Many hugely successful leaders will tell you that they prefer a great attitude over great skill.
Why?
Because you can help people develop their skills, but you can’t get someone to change a horrible attitude. Figure out the type of culture you want to build and bring on people who reflect the values of your culture. You will see how much stress relief you will experience because you were smart enough to have a great team supporting your efforts.
Conclusion
As an entrepreneur, you desperately want to succeed. You want to build an enterprise that makes an impact on your customers. This means that you also want to make sure you’re doing everything you can to set yourself up for success.
By implementing these keys, you will find that you will have a much more rewarding entrepreneurial experience. You will come to understand how awesome life can be when you’re building a wildly successful enterprise.
[“source-smallbiztrends”]
