05/12/2018
Why Did You Choose Entrepreneurship?
entrepreneurship-bang-buck
Why become an entrepreneur? Is it the perceived freedom, the chance of significant wealth gain or is it the need to explore risk? Whatever the reason may be, I am sure you know this is a very ambitious lifestyle to consider pursuing. Notice I said lifestyle rather than career. This is because your entrepreneurial journey transforms into a very significant portion of your everyday life. This means your entrepreneurial endeavor is ongoing, never to cease unless you choose to end its existence. Translation: you will work hard constantly and almost around the clock.
So again I ask, “Why did you choose entrepreneurship?” Many people choose this lifestyle for the wrong reason and end up with negative results. This is because they are too focused on the rock star lifestyle without realizing the background work that preceded such results. That is the first critical mistake of aspiring entrepreneurs. Basing their path on another person’s path they never walked within. Entrepreneurship is like a high demand sport that facilitates many different calibers of players. That means different players posses different skill sets which affects their overall performance. You cannot compare Jeremy Lin to Lebron James because their individual skill sets are vastly different and so are their natural talents. Now, focusing on you, what makes you believe you have the skills and talent to enter into entrepreneurship?
This question has to be asked because unsuspecting people are blindly going into entrepreneurship without the proper knowledge of what it takes to be involved in its ambiguous environment. When your attentions are solely focused on the gain without acknowledging the sacrifice you weaken your starting position. We all want to get to the big picture but let’s not forget that steps must be taken along the way to reach that point. People forget the small steps because they are not the sexy, appealing side of entrepreneurship. By doing so you void out your potential for success and in turn increase your rate of headaches and frustration. You have to remember that entrepreneurship is beyond your wants, you have to services other’s needs and wants. So are you getting into entrepreneurship to solve people’s problems or to create a get rich quick scheme?
If you are chasing the later, then be prepared for short gains to be even shorter lived. Shortcuts only get you ahead for so long and with entrepreneurship they expose your willingness to cheat the marketplace and the consumers. This is not characterized as entrepreneurship; it will be seen as greed and deception, causing your reputation to be severely damaged. You see, entrepreneurship is a very delicate process. This is because the interaction between all parties involved is very fragile and can be easily fractured. Why is this so? Because entrepreneurship cannot develop and evolve without people. You need people to spread the word about you, you need people to purchase from you and you need people who will help you grow. If you are not thinking about this though being an entrepreneur will be very tough for you, making for a very stressful journey.
Know what you are getting into when pursuing entrepreneurship. The process of it all is more intricate than just making big money for providing products and services. If you are getting into entrepreneurship, do so because you have a passion to make a beneficial change for others. Be prepared to do a lot of grunt work before you arrive to the bright lights and even then you cannot slack or let up the tiniest bit. Summing it all up: have passion, constantly work hard and provide value and you should do fine as an entrepreneur.
