Entrepreneurship: A Cautionary Tale

Being good at something will automatically make you successful in business, right? Well, not so but we’d all like to think that. Many of us go into business for ourselves with a particular skill set that we have nurtured and mastered. Now that we’re experts, the next logical step is to start a business. Isn’t it? Here’s the problem with that logic. Knowing how to do a job and knowing how to run a business are not the same.

The deciding factor is this – you’re either in business to keep your job or in business to do your job. If you’re only interested in keeping your job, then perhaps it would be wise to return to a company where you can do just that without the added pressure of managing a business. You’re good at what you do, but it takes more than technical skill to grow a business. If you’re in business to do your job, perhaps you realize that your technical skill is important, but only a part of the equation. You should be looking beyond today and visualizing how successful your business will be in ten years. With that image in mind, trace your steps back to how you’ll get there. Develop a plan that supports that vision. I encourage those I coach to create a dream board and pin everything you want for your business on it. Some I’ve seen show smaller goals like a new laptop or office furniture. Others show skyscrapers or fancy offices. Post it up! Look at it daily and study it. Curse at it! Take it down and hug it. But own it.

I watched Jerry Maguire this week. Love that movie. We all know the story, Jerry woke up in a panic to pen his vision for a new philosophy, a new way of doing things. Fewer clients. Better relationship. Unfortunately, this concept was met with little enthusiasm at his firm and he found himself unemployed holding a goldfish and stealing the girl. Of course, by the closing credits, things worked out for Jerry. Not because he was good at his job. He was and could have chosen not to write that mission statement. He could have chosen to keep his job. But that fateful night, Jerry realized that he’d been so busy keeping his job, that he’d neglected to do his job. Like every entrepreneur I know, that’s our story. We wake up, either literally or mentally, and realize, that we can do more, should be doing more and if we can’t exercise the entrepreneurial freedom to do more where we are, we move on. We build. But, as we are building, often starting with one crazy client, we must be mindful that our technical skill will only get us so far. It will require more.

**Buzzworthy:  Dance in Bloom. Destiny Smith, Owner