New Jersey Enterpreneur - Small Business, Entrepreneurs and Venture Capital

This is the final article in our four part series on the key factors for Entrepreneurial Success. Our first article presented the three key factors for Entrepreneurial Success: Vision, Resolve and Talent. And we explored each factor individually each subsequent article in the series. Our second article discussed “Entrepreneurial Vision”, what it means and ways to see if you have it. Last month we discussed Entrepreneurial Talent and some of the personality traits and skills associated with an individual who works well in the unstructured and challenging start up phase of a business. This last article in the series will be on Entrepreneurial Resolve and it reviews some of the challenges faced during business startup and the level of determination needed to succeed.

What many people fail to incorporate in their thinking as they start up a business is the impact it has in the short term on their reputation and standing that has been built within their employment, whether a small or big company. When you start up a business, be prepared to lose that feeling you get when you go to work each day and ten people are setting up meetings with you or customers are calling you for assistance. During the early months of a business startup you will have the humbling experience of not having your phone calls returned since you may have just a few customers. In fact many of the contacts that you thought were “tight” when you were in the “big company” fall away as your new position is no longer as important to their jobs. This is one of the more unanticipated experiences of entrepreneurship as that feeling of importance existing in prior employment is lost as you take on the isolating experience of starting your business. There will be at least one week where everything will have gone wrong and it will begin to eat into your emotions about yourself and your decision to take on this large of challenge. So it is important to realize it is more than just “the money” when you are leaving a well paying position to work for yourself.

Once you are in the start up there is often not much opportunity to go back to your prior career. You are now far enough down the road to see there is a chance of success , but you are just far enough away from your prior career that a reverse direction will cost you just as much time and effort. Yet things are still not gelling. This is the uncomfortable feeling you are getting when you realize that your plan or expectation of success is pretty off schedule----will this mean more money in? longer without having a paycheck? A need for an outside investor? Your energy is still there, but you are realizing the push is a lot more than you expected. The challenge is becoming a marathon, not a sprint. Big day to day stress is emerging and no pats on the back are coming to make you feel good. Do you think you can handle this?

At this juncture it is passion that will carry you forward. That is the one reason why people who are familiar with entrepreneurship will tell you to start a business that will permit you do something you are passionate about. If you do not have passion, obstacles and hurdles are seen differently?more daunting. A person with passion will go the extra step, stay up late the extra hour and be more assertive which over time adds up. So passion is closely tied to having the necessary resolve and determination to see your venture through hard times.

If you are anticipating starting a business, it may help to look back on some of your experiences to see how you handled challenge and periods of significant stress. Did you stay calm? Did you overcome the odds? Prior experience gives you the tools to manage yourself better when you become an entrepreneur--and enables you to enter this arena with possibly a shorter learning curve that will also improve your chances for success.

Too much resolve may also hurt you as the marketplace is a great arbiter of your venture and sometimes poor performance is reality and the venture may need to be ended. This is a crossroads often not readily seen by the owner who is in the trenches and results in excessive amounts of additional investment to a business that may never be successful. There is a difference between being determined and being pigheaded. Having outside support in some form is important to help the business owner from making too many decisions in a vacuum and to make sure your determination does not become a weakness rather than a strength. It is important to set realistic milestones and know when it is time to give up.

The rewards for successful entrepreneurship can be great. A financially successful business will often yield financial rewards and security far greater than can achieved as an employee. In many instances, it may lead to less reward and less security. That is truly the risk an entrepreneur is assuming that an employee never does and often will never understand. There are other rewards as well. As a business owner, one has a different type of control over one?s day to day time and long term goals. Many people mistakenly think that business ownership gives you more control, but that is not true. The stresses over what you are able to do are simply different, as well as who you answer to ?.customers, investors, bankers, a board of directors?.all are a different version of “the boss”.

Go into Entrepreneurship knowing that the challenges you will face will be far greater and much different than any other challenges you have had previously.  It is not for the faint of heart and requires enormous determination and resolve to be successful.  

As we conclude our four part series, I hope that our exploration of three important factors for success in Entrepreneurship:  Vision, Resolve and Talent has helped the readers of this column gain some perspective on what they are doing or their future plans to enter this arena.