These TV shows and web series might or might not be based on entrepreneurship but the lessons derived from them are invaluable.
As we are aware of the fact that visual impact is more powerful as compared to simply hearing or trying to remember things. An entrepreneur can aspire to learn various lessons from certain TV shows and sitcoms. These TV shows or web series might or might not be based on entrepreneurship but the lessons derived from them are invaluable.
Shark Tank
This American reality series is a no brainer which every entrepreneur should watch. The panel of judges referred to as “Sharks” decide whether to invest in an entrepreneur’s idea or not based on a 10-minute dramatic pitch. This show teaches us about the reality and pressures of a pitch presentation and also teaches aspiring entrepreneurs to evaluate their idea like the sharks.
TVF Pitchers
Developed by TVF, this TV series went viral in no time. This show trails the life of four friends whose lives change after one of them gets drunk and quits his job. He then decides to build on the idea which had always been at the back of his mind. He also convinces his friends to leave their jobs and join him in his venture. They reach the final round of NASSCOM start-up conclave which triggers a chain of events which explain the ground reality of setting up a start-up perfectly.
This show is a must watch for all entrepreneurs if they want to learn about building up on an idea.
The Profit
This popular series isn’t all happy and teaches you the ground realities of entrepreneurship. Featuring one of the biggest tycoons, Marcus Lemonis, who decides whether or not to invest in an idea, this show focus on the triangular mantra for success- People, Process and Product. Also, this is a great learning experience for viewers as it teaches what not to do as an entrepreneur in the first part.
Simply watching this show won’t give you profits but you could focus on Marcus’ profitable tips to succeed in your venture.
Game Of Thrones
The most popular HBO series which focuses on the fight between various contenders for the iron throne teaches a lot of valuable lessons to the aspiring entrepreneurs. Daenerys teaches us the importance of building a strong and loyal team, Tyrion and Lord Varys through their cunning acts remind us why knowledge is important and Jon Snow reminds us why we should never underestimate ourselves in any situation.
How I Made My Millions
The popular CNBC original show focuses on common people who made it big with their idea and hard work. The show focuses on the whole journey from the start and then moves on to the various transitions and finally how the entrepreneur tastes success. This is a must watch for every entrepreneur aspiring to make million through his idea as stories of common people are bound to inspire him.
Orange Is The New Black
You might be shocked to see this Netflix series listed for entrepreneurs. But the series which focuses on lesbians in prison can teach you a lot about entrepreneurship through Galina ‘Red’ Reznikov. She is smart and builds a kick-ass supply chain to promote her innovative idea and ends up making profits in prison!
Lessons from Richard Branson, Phil Libin, Jack Dorsey, and other successful CEOs.
The successful CEOs of any company try to achieve more in less time. However, not every CEO is uber-productive and successful. Some are, because of well-guarded secrets. However, we bring to you the secrets behind these CEO/Founders’ success:
1. Richard Branson, Founder of Virgin
“In Virgin’s case, we fly the same planes as our competitors and our gyms offer much of the same equipment as other gyms. What separates our businesses from the competition? Our employees.”
“Like everyone else, I used to just work on airplanes—I’d use that as a time to catch up on things. And I stopped. I basically said when I’m on a plane, I won’t work. I’ll read, I’ll play video games, I’ll sleep, I’ll watch movies, but I don’t work. It makes me look forward to flying. I can get off a long flight, and actually be kind of relaxed.”
3. Steve Gefter, MD of IDDS
“Serial entrepreneurs have a mindset unlike anyone else; they are entrepreneurs on steroids. A ‘get it done’ work ethic is the most essential trait. Starting a business takes a lot — financially, emotionally and physically. To start one business requires a ‘roll up your sleeves’ mentality, so imagine what it takes to start five or 10. You either have it or you don’t; and the most successful serial entrepreneurs do.”
To keep things focused and brief, she has co-workers add agenda topics to a Google Doc spreadsheet before a meeting, and then she prioritizes them. “If it’s not on the Google Doc, we don’t talk about it.”
5. David Goldin, President and CEO of Capify
“You need to be constantly thinking of how to enhance and grow your business because your competitors are doing the same. Remember that losing is not an option and when you’re in stressful situations, you’ve got to figure out ways to navigate and overcome the obstacles. If it was easy to be an entrepreneur, then everyone would be one. The best entrepreneurs need to be resilient and bounce back from anything.”
6. Beerud Sheth, co-founder and CEO of Teamchat/Webaroo
“After my first start-up, I stopped riding the emotional roller coaster inherent in the start-up journey. In start-ups, the highs are higher and the lows are lower — the emotional swings can drive you crazy. I learned to stay level-headed, even-keeled and focused on the longer term.”
7. Jack Dorsey, Chairman of Twitter
Dorsey’s secret to success is that he “themes” his days, devoting a different day each week to different types of work.
“Mondays are for management, Tuesdays are focused on product, and Wednesdays are for marketing and communication, and so on. It sets a good cadence for the rest of the company.”
If you want to be successful in your life and business, you need to know how to safely set both on the balance beam.
If you want to be successful in your life and business, you need to know how to safely set both on the balance beam. Two years ago I started an online business. I was thrilled and scared at the same time; the thought of strangers paying me to implement solutions I recommend was far from what my 5+ years of college education taught me.
But that excitement was short-lived. While I was inaugurating my online business, I started a new life as a graduate student in an accelerated nursing program. Now my life consisted of these things: writing blog posts, social media promotion, interviewing guests, studying for classes, going for clinical rotations, working my almost full-time job, and launching an online business.
For the first time in my life, I was diagnosed with critically low vitamin D levels. My memory suffered as I could not keep up with the demands of school, running a blog, and creating a course. Finally, I crashed. It has taken me 2 years to regain my mind-body balance and get back in the game.
Here’s 5 things that I’ve learned about the recovery process after burnout:
1. Check where your intention is coming from
With the number of online entrepreneurs closing down shops, pivoting to other business ideas, and just getting burned out in general, it is important to address your WHY.
Making money is cool but ask yourself why you’re really doing this. Are you in business to cash in on the next marketing fad or organically working your way towards building an audience? Are you just concerned with conversion tactics and traffic instead of selling with integrity?
This sounds very trivial, however, the only thing that would keep you from pulling the plug on your business on days you don’t feel like showing up is your WHY. Your intentions for starting your business will always find a way to become relevant when you’re stuck with indecision. When you feel like you’ve lost your voice in the sea of entrepreneurs who operate in similar niches like you, checking in with your intention will give you a boost in clarity.
“Self-awareness is your most important attribute.” –Gary Vaynerchuk
Before you jump on the next popular challenge to create a video or audio series, know your body and mind more than anyone else. At some point during my burnout period, I was sitting in front of my laptop for 12 hours straight.
There were social media posts to schedule, lead generation systems to automate, CSS and HTML to be learned, and tons of webinars to sift through. If anything, what your passion needs right now is serenity. Delete the multiple checklists on your desktop to allow serenity to prevail.
3. Pivot to a business model that works for YOU
In July 2017, I exited the online copywriting scene with relief. Prior to that, I listened to some coaches and online mentors who want you to do things exactly the way they envision them, with their exact blueprints, in their exact language. If this makes you cringe or makes you want to claw your way to freedom, I’ve got good news for you.
It is okay to only do work that excites you. It is absolutely okay to be brave enough to hold pause on a product that seems like a cash cow but locks you in an unsustainable lifestyle. If producing monthly content for a membership site gives you anxiety every month, you need to examine why you think you need this in your life. You should never sacrifice your health or relationships for money.
4. Develop tiny sustainable habits instead of to-do lists
For the longest time, I hated to-do lists and always found procrastination more fascinating. To me, these lists were never ending and was always a sign of busyness and lack of freedom. So I did away with all lists and what every marketing expert said I should do.
This sounds like a controversial way to be productive but it soon paid off. Instead of sticking to lengthy to-do lists and schedules, I focused on little incremental changes I could manage and track.
For example, waking up an hour early than my usual time made me realize that my thoughts flow better when there is less chatter around me. Before I wasn’t aware of this but this realization now comes handy when I need to schedule time for content creation.
So, ask yourself, “Would I be able to do this thing for the next 21 days, unhindered?” Commit to little tiny steps to get in the habit of respecting your time and energy. As a result, you will know where your margin is and how you can optimize this creatively and productively.
“Meditation is not about stopping thoughts, but recognizing that we are more than our thoughts and our feelings.”–Arianna Huffington
5. Seek a community that embraces and supports the entrepreneurial spirit
If you are currently navigating the space between being an employee, a hustler, and a full-time business owner, the realities of what it takes to be an entrepreneur can be frightening. There are days when you will question your calling and be tempted to quit because you aren’t making sales. Maybe your most recent promotion flopped despite all the careful planning and expenses on a strategy coach.
In moments like this, I have found membership in a community that embraces the fragile dynamics of the entrepreneurial life to be comforting. Sharing and marketing your work can be scary, soul-draining, and make you want to hide under the covers. Yet, as an entrepreneur, you simply can’t do it alone. Just as you would feel compelled to share your wins and successes, you need a community of like-minded people who will rally around you and encourage you to take the next adventure.
Recovering from my burnout has taken over two years but it has now equipped me with the strategies I need to thrive as a creative entrepreneur.
Have you ever experienced an entrepreneurial burnout? How have you recovered from one? Please share your thoughts below.
Margaret Olatunbosun is a writer and creative entrepreneur who helps passionate & creative misfits uncover profitable ideas so that they can design a life and business on their own terms and build meaningful brands that leave a legacy. Most of her work is dedicated to helping you find your path to creative freedom through her insightful weekly emails and free ultimate guide on how to create profitable offers dream clients want. Her thoughts on career and entrepreneurship have been featured on MSN Money, Thrive Global, The Huffington Post, Career Contessa, UYD Media, Inspired COACH magazine, and many more.
Find serenity to keep yourself from becoming insane.
Entrepreneurship is a very demanding job which requires you to be on your toes all the time. Apart from over-exerting yourself, you also need to multi-task which adds immense amounts of strain on your body and mind. Amongst the chaos of work, you need to slow down and find serenity to keep yourself from becoming insane.
Here are a few ways in which you can work serenity back into your life:
I. Meditate
Meditation is a powerful way in which you can get rid of the chaos around and inside you. All you need to do is close your eyes and focus on calming yourself down every morning for five minutes. Meditation puts your mind at peace and helps you focus and work better.
Everyone knows an entrepreneur multi-tasks and works very hard; this puts your mind and body through a lot of strain. To get rid of the strain, you should aspire to get a good night’s sleep for 6-8 hours. This sleep will help you get rid of all the stress that has piled up over the day and help you wake up with a refreshed and energised mind.
III. Go for a walk
Your brain needs a rest from staring at the laptop screen for hours which is why you need to take breaks frequently. Go out for walks during your breaks to breathe in the fresh air. This will help your mind clear out all the accumulated pressure and stress and ensure that you can go back to work with a fully charged, new-found enthusiasm.
This is a brilliant way to work back the lost serenity in your life. Pursue an old hobby or get a new one like playing an instrument as it helps you take your mind off certain work related distress and enjoy.
Why not put your skills to use to make some quick bucks to pump into your business?
Entrepreneurs are always in the dire need for money while setting up. So, why not put your skills to use to make some quick bucks to pump into your business?
Here are a few ways in which entrepreneurs can make some extra bucks:
1. Sponsored posts
If you are a social media addict with a huge number of followers on social media platforms, you can get brands to pay your to share their posts. You can also enter into long term agreements with companies to make those quick bucks in no time.
2. Sell photos
Again, you could use your amazing Instagram skills and your large number of followers to start selling photos on your Instagram.
Babysitting is an easy job which helps you earn easy money. As it is a concept which is catching on in the country, you can easily take up this job to make some extra money.
4. Pet sitting
If you are a person who loves animals, you can easily take care of pets of families who have gone out for vacations or short holidays. This way, you can make money and make furry friends.
5. Freelancing
Freelancing is a great way to earn money by making use of their skills like content writing, photo editing etc. Websites like freelancer.com, odesk.com etc have great opportunities which help you make money.
You can also help other people by teaching them skills that you possess. With online tutoring becoming increasingly popular, you can extend your skills to various students across the globe willing to learn.
7. Take surveys
Start filling in questionnaires and taking surveys online to make some quick, easy bucks. The best part of taking surveys is that you can take unlimited surveys to earn more and more money.
8. Watch videos and click ads
You can also avail these simple tricks to make quick and easy cash. Certain websites like swagbucks lets you make money by simply increasing the number of views and likes on videos and ads.
If you love shopping, you can easily avail jobs which require a secret (mysterious) shopper who shops for the client either virtually or in real life. Mysterious shopping is a great way to make money.
Here is why – your worst days come right before success.
If you are thinking about giving up right now, wait until you read this. Here is why – your worst days come right before success. There are some ways to never give up on becoming an entrepreneur.
Let’s go through each step together.
1. Stay alive. As long as you are alive, anything is still possible.
2. Lower your expectations.
Most successes are not overnight successes. It’s the job of every PR company hired by a newly successful startup to make that startup look like an overnight success. You hear things like, “They just hacked this in a couple nights on the weekend, and a week later got a million users” or “it was just a hobby they were doing on the side, but then one day the site crashed because of traffic.”
Some of these stories are true, but for most of them – you will never know the whole story. Guessing how others succeed is wasting your time. Paul Graham warns every batch of founders at Y Combinator that only 1% of them will experience success really fast. What ends up happening is founders all expect they will be that 1%. You can work for it. But you can’t expect it. Lower your expectations.
At times, you might privately think to yourself that you can’t handle the pressure. You have to persist. And just doing the same thing is not enough. You must try different things before you learn what works. Let’s say of the 99 things you have tried, nothing works well. Will you try the 100th thing? If you think about it, the 99 failures have almost no bearing on the success of the following one, as long as you trying different things.
4. Fake it. Other people will do the same. They will never give up, why would you?
Fake success. Everyone does. You should as well. Don’t lie, but act as if you already succeeded. It makes a difference.
5. Don’t compare yourself to people who already succeeded.
Never give up if Bob is doing great. You never know how he is really doing. Even if you think you know, you don’t.
After you have done all of this, you will fall into the dip. It’s the lowest point in your whole journey, a hopeless-looking place that comes right before success – Seth Godin wrote an entire book about it. If this sounds like baseless motivational talk, think again. When you fall really low, take a bunch of risks and fail people around you, you have nothing to lose – and that is exactly the time you are likely to take you biggest risk and possibly succeed.
Most people who look at this infographic think that they are stuck in the dip. The trick is that if you are stuck, you have to keep moving. And sometimes that means going back to square one. If nothing else, never give up because you only might have one last thing to overcome. Now stand up and say to yourself as loud as you can, “Never give up! Never Give up! Never Give up!”
If you want to become a successful entrepreneur, you definitely need to increase your influence over you team.
If you want to become a successful entrepreneur, you definitely need to increase your influence over you team. Increasing you influence doesn’t mean becoming autocratic, it simply means adopting some changes in your personality due to which people will perceive you as more impactful and significant.
1. Be Assertive
Being assertive shouldn’t be confused with being bossy or dictatorial. Assertiveness means being confident about your decision and willing to justify it with solid reasons. If someone counters your view, you should be able to answer them with logic and persistence and not raise your voice. Explain your part of the idea rational and logical reasons and in a calm, composed and dignified tone. This will create respect in the minds of your employees for you and because you know your stuff well, they’ll be more likely to trust you.
Everyone needs security in form of concern, love and care from others. When one is going through a crisis, you need to be emotionally curious and try and support that person in his hard times. If you can in a way manage to provide him emotional stability, you will be seen as a better leader and this will lead to an expansion of your ring of influence.
3. Be specific
If you’re indecisive about the company’s goals, visions, and meetings and practically everything, people are going to perceive you as unreliable and not very influential. Your decisions are what define you as an entrepreneur and a leader so make sure you decide on very reasonable and specific goals and methods to achieve them. Also, you should be aware of everything that goes on in your own company.
For instance, if there is a loss of 5% in the last quarter, you should know exactly what caused the loss.
You might be an assertive and logical person, but, if you don’t look the part, no one’s going to recognise your importance. Dressing is a powerful tool and needs to be used carefully in order to make an impression. A suit with a solid-coloured shirt and well-polished shoes defines influence in its entirety as opposed to a guy wearing a graphic tee and chappals. For women, wear crisp formals over casuals to make a statement and leave an impact. You accessories speak a lot about you; keep them confined to a watch or statement jewellery.
Instead of coming to office with a bored face, enter brimming with enthusiasm and with a contagious energy which inspires others to wake up as well. This is a very difficult skill to master but it is majorly dependent on an entrepreneur’s communication skills and depth of passion for what s/he’s doing. When leaders are excited about a project or a challenge, they tend to impart some of it to the presentation and employees as well which they should be able to positively use. Also, to inspire further, a leader must always stand by his team and constantly inspire, encourage and help his team to achieve their goals.
The surge of wanting to start a venture of your own is often referred to as “bitten by the entrepreneurship bug”
What is the entrepreneurship bug?
The surge of wanting to start a venture of your own is often referred to as “bitten by the entrepreneurship bug” as the bug is considered to be infectious because it affects people seriously. Often you are exposed to success stories of people rising from ashes to becoming millionaires or observe family members and friends close to you do very well in the entrepreneurial field, which inspires you to venture into entrepreneurship as well.
Earlier these pangs of entrepreneurship were shadowed by the fear of failure but with rising willingness and culture of start-ups, these fears are shrugged off and thus, we see more creative start-ups crop up daily.
When can the bug bite you?
The bug can bite you when you are very young or have crossed 60. It can also infect you through one mere incident or a situation which channels your inner entrepreneur. When the bug actually infects you, you shrug all feelings of failure and fear and start gathering resources and making plans on how to make your plan work.
How will you know if you have been infected by the bug?
The signs of being affected are very obvious and if you concentrate upon the symptoms a little closely, you will be able to find out if you are a victim. Listed below are a few signs:
• Every single day you get the urge to quit your stable job and build upon your creative idea. You now want to be your own boss.
• You are no longer scared of financial issues and failure. Moreover, you are willing to take the risks.
• Every day you brood over how you can actually build a company around your idea and you’re willing to invest long hours of work into making it count.
• You start building on the skills required by a leader and start mentally/physically devising a plan for your enterprise.
When the bug bites, your life is bound to change as you will follow your passion without thinking about the risks of failure involved. The bug will also make you more determined and relentless to achieve your dreams which in the long run will determine your real worth.
Managing finances is important for an entrepreneur and if your money skills aren’t strong, you might encounter problems in the later phases.
Managing finances is important for an entrepreneur and if your money skills aren’t strong, you might encounter problems in the later phases. However, managing money doesn’t come naturally to everyone and most entrepreneurs end up making some crucial mistakes.
Here are common financial mistakes made by entrepreneurs:
Faulty business plan
The biggest mistake you can make after starting a business is not having a business plan. It is essential for a business to have a plan to be sure about what the goals and missions are. If the goals aren’t set properly, the whole situation can result in a chaos.
Business plans also consist of a financial plan in detail without proper breakdown of fixed and variable costs. It also states how much money is required in each quarter by the business. If the financial section isn’t made properly in the business plan, it can lead to huge crises.
What distinguishes entrepreneurs from managers is the risk factor. Entrepreneurs have to undertake risks which do not have to be considered by a manager. Not managing risks properly can lead to the destruction of the company.
So, an entrepreneur needs to make sure they foresee the risks that one is likely to encounter in the future and take necessary steps to avoid the risks. Insure all your machinery, land and key employees so that if there is a bad situation, there isn’t much damage. Also, a separate amount of money needs to be set aside for risk management.
In your entrepreneurial career, you will always be confused as to where to invest. However, the worst kind of investment an entrepreneur can make is by investing in trend. A trend is something which is popular currently but will die in the future and be replaced by something else. Developments in the future are sure to displace today’s developments. Thus, investing in more secure deals is a safer option than investing in futile trends.
For instance, Warren Buffet invests in roads, insurance and electricity.
If your business is currently making profits, it is all the more reason to pump money back into the business and expand it. Some entrepreneurs let the money lie idle or invest it in banks. This won’t help your grow your business and money will just lie there.
The money can be spent on useful things like improving customer service or marketing for the company or research for a new variant or product.
Before sleeping, it is essential for eentrepreneurs to clear their mind if they want to get proper rest
Sleep is essential for an entrepreneur since s/he works hard all day and has to deal with stress and a lot of tasks. Before sleeping, it is essential for people to clear their mind if they want to get proper rest. Since, an entrepreneur works really hard; s/he needs rest to recover from all the stress they have been through during the day.
Reading is something most successful people do before going to sleep. You might not be a voracious reader but reading articles or features about success can motivate you and put you at peace. Also, when you read, you learn more and have a chance to educate yourself about a field better.
2. Spend quality time with your loved ones
Because an entrepreneur tends to be busy all day, s/he might not get enough time with their loved ones. However, it is important to spend time with your loved ones as they are the people you have on whom you can fall back on. Conversing or sharing things with your family will put you at peace internally and you can go to sleep with a lighter heart.
An entrepreneur has a million things to do in a day so it is always better to plan ahead. Before retiring for the day, one can make a to-do list for the next day to sort out their near future. Also, most successful people like to take calculated steps like ironing their clothes and getting important documents ready for the next day.
4. Meditate
Meditation is a great form of relaxation and can help you cleanse you of all stresses and problems you’ve faced during the day. Also, meditation is a great practice as it energises you for the next day. Your body and mind will be at complete peace after you mediate. For starters, you can begin with five minutes and go higher gradually.
5. List down your accomplishments
An entrepreneur needs to find motivation in the smallest of things as one might feel a little low when things don’t go well. Successful people usually make a list of small but important accomplishments throughout the day. On days, when you are feeling severely low, you can go back to reading those accomplishments and feel good about yourself. Also, writing down good stuff before you sleep helps you rest better.
If something needs to be done today; do not leave it for later. If a mail needs to be replied to, do it before you sleep because you might forget it later. Also, it is always better to clear your mind of tasks one needs to complete in a day. That way you will be able to work with a clearer mind the next day.
7. Go for a stroll
Walks in fresh air helps in reducing stress and anxiety as it helps you to get rid of all the workload. Walking is a mild exercise which helps you freshen your mind and get a better sleep at night.
8. Unplug from the world completely
Stop using your phone when you’re going to sleep because the blue light from your phone mimics the brightness of the sun, which tells your brain to stop producing melatonin, an essential hormone that regulates your circadian rhythm which tells your body when to wake and when to sleep. Unplugging from social media and work completely ensures a deeper sleep at night.
Ninad Vengurlekar shared an inspiring story of Rambhau, who used to work in his garden and now is a successful entrepreneur.
If given an opportunity, there are many who would do better than the current work they are doing. Many of us want to run our own businesses, but are we ready to grab the opportunity when it comes knocking at our door?
Ninad Vengurlekar shared an inspiring story of Rambhau, who used to work in his garden and now is a successful entrepreneur:
4 years back he was tilling the soil on the side of a road inside my complex when a site engineer asked him if he would like to build my house garden. He hurriedly came running to me and agreed to do whatever I wanted him to do and for whatever I was willing to pay. He almost did my garden for free.
He then used my garden as a show sample of his work to other houses in the complex. Within 2 years he was managing 20 house gardens. By then he had bought a motorbike. He also employed 3-4 helpers who used to visit our houses for daily maintenance. His wife was one of them.
A year later, he informed me that he had started a tempo delivery service with his son. He also won a contract to build a garden for the bungalow that the builder was building for himself in the complex. It was over 1/2 acre land. He took me there and showed me the work he was doing. I was happy.
Soon, the builder of the complex offered him the contract to maintain the trees and gardens in the entire complex. I was told that he now has 2-3 delivery vehicles and over 15 people under him.
Today he came to remodel some trees in my garden. He came in a Luxury car, got down and got to work with the workers. He was digging the soil, uprooting trees and planting new ones. He was standing there and getting things done.
At home, Maya and I were discussing his journey from a small gardener to an established small entrepreneur in 4 years. She said why can’t others do this and I said it’s there in the genes. It cannot be taught. If that was the case, entrepreneurship courses would have been in hot demand across the world.
Rambhau drives a car which even his owners don’t (like me, for example). But he works in our gardens. He takes our instructions and delivers value to us. He has the humility to serve his customers when in reality he could be making more money than them.
Rambhau must be in his early 50s. He was a contract worker until late 40s. Obviously, entrepreneurship existed within him, but he was locked in an ecosystem that did not give him opportunities of high returns for his hard work. When he got the right platform to deliver, he seized the opportunity. He did this without any support from traditional banks. (Who would fund a gardening business?)
These are the millions of small entrepreneurs like him in India that drive the Indian economy. They get no bank or VC funding. They borrow money at high-interest rates, do not understand financial ratios and repay all their debt consistently on time, while building a profitable business.
Nobel laureate, and Grameen Bank founder Muhammad Yunus said,
‘To me, the poor are like Bonsai trees. When you plant the best seed of the tallest tree in a six-inch deep flower pot, you get a perfect replica of the tallest tree, but it is only inches tall. There is nothing wrong with the seed you planted; only the soil-base you provided was inadequate.
Poor people are bonsai people. There is nothing wrong with their seeds. Only thing is society never gave them a base to grow on.’
Rambhau is a perfect example of this dogma of poverty that faces 80% of Indian population. Fortunately, he refused to become a bonsai. He literally expanded his “flower pot” to a 200-acre campus and made enough money to afford a Luxury car for himself. He proves that if you have the talent, the will, and the willingness, hundreds of ways magically appear around you – capital or no capital, education or no education.
“He is not my Gardener, he is my Entrepreneur of the Year for 2016.” – Ninad Vengurlekar
A lot of entrepreneurs make the crucial mistake of going all in without having the do’s and don’ts of their business figured out.
An entrepreneur isn’t aware of everything about the business he is going to start and isn’t expected to. However, there are some basics he needs to figure out before starting his own business. The business model, target audience, market and long term goals are some things that should be very clear from the start.
A lot of entrepreneurs make the crucial mistake of going all in without having the do’s and don’ts of their business figured out. Not only does this lead to chaos on the business front but also causes hindrances in the whole process leading to a failed venture.
Here’s a list of 5 questions every entrepreneur must ask before venturing into any market:
What problem am I catering to?
Starting a venture and offering a product or a service to the public is worthless if it doesn’t serve a purpose. An aspiring entrepreneur should be able to pin point exactly what he is willing to offer and how it will help his target audience. The value of your product or service is determined by the problem you are solving in the long term.
All entrepreneurs have found a loophole or a need in the society and thus come up with a particular product. For instance, Ola was successful because it solved the problem of availability of public transport.
Many entrepreneurs forget to test their business requisites which is why it goes haywire. One needs to be able to predict how much investment is required to start a business. Also, a lot of people think they require massive amount of funds but later when they actually chart out a plan, the amount is not exactly what they had expected it to be.
For instance, if you want to open a pet accessories store, you need to identify a location which is apt and how much the rent of the store would cost. Also, you need to estimate the cost of inventory and salaries of the helpers in the store. If you prefer opening a store online, you need to estimate website making charges and cost of inventory.
Who and how fierce is my competition?
To do well in business, you need to be absolutely aware of your competitors and what their strategies are. You also need to research about how successful they are in their field. If this initial step isn’t implemented properly, you could take miscalculated steps which could prove to be very harmful for your business.
For instance, if you’re opening a pet accessories shop, you need to find out who your competitors are in the same location and how well they are doing. Also, try and find out their marketing strategies and pricing schemes to avoid duplication.
It is very essential to offer an extra added value on your service or product without which you cannot sustain. If there is nothing special that you offer, customers will prefer sticking to their brands and not buying yours. As an entrepreneur, you need to figure out what your special sauce is and work relentlessly on your USP.
For instance, L’Oreal came out with a professional range that women at home can use with minimal efforts. Earlier, they had to go to a parlour to get a hair spa done but with L’Oreal hair masks available at reasonable prices, they can sit at home and do the hair spa themselves. This saves time and effort which is why it was so successful.
What resources do I need immediately to get started?
The first step of starting a venture is survival by gathering all the resources one needs to actually get the company going. Immediate resources mean the resources you absolutely cannot start your business without.
For instance, if you want to start a cake shop, your immediate capital requirements would be a shop and ingredients to make the cake batter. Once you start selling cakes, you need to invest in boxes, paper plates, a display case and some tables and chairs if it is going to be an eating joint.
Hence, making a list of immediate requirements and fulfilling them is absolutely crucial because without this step, your business will never take off.
When entrepreneurs are hurled at with difficulties, they simply duck or give up which is a very wrong attitude to move forward with. Instead, we should attack the problem from the front and try solving it for the essential lessons it’ll impart.
In today’s life, we have surrounded ourselves with technology and everything can happen with the click of a button; this has lead to people becoming lazier and more laid-back than ever. When entrepreneurs are hurled at with difficulties, they simply duck or give up which is a very wrong attitude to move forward with. Instead, we should attack the problem from the front and try solving it for the essential lessons it’ll impart.
Here are a few ways on how to never give up:
1. Let the past experiences be history
It is a common practice of the generation today to let a part of themselves get stuck in the past and let the negative events or failures affect them. For instance, a failed business venture is capable of hampering an entrepreneur decision making capabilities today. So, it is very important to let go of the past and walk into the future with a fresh mind and new hopes. If you as an individual find the past experiences difficult to get over, try and embrace and hobby or a new venture and it’ll help you divert attention.
No matter how bad things might be going; you cannot afford to doubt yourself for even a moment because as soon as you do so, your whole venture is shadowed by doubts. You should be willing to face every difficulty hurled at you and always remember that you aren’t lesser than the other person. This virtue will stand by you every time you want to quit or give up, so, you need to build up on it in abundance.
3. Look for guidance
If you are demotivated in life for some reason, the best option that you have is to seek help from a person you really look up to. For instance, if your inspiration to join an industry is Mr X, try and get in touch with him for further guidance.
If you are distressed, there’s nothing wrong with seeking counselling or help from psychiatrists. They’ll help you identify your problem and provide solutions which will make you a more positive person.
4. Maintain the delicate balance between personal and professional life
For an individual it is important to strike the perfect balance between his personal and profession life because the two are interdependent. A glitch in your personal life can show signs of unprofessionalism while working, where as workplace stress and issues can hamper your personal life. Along with working hard, spending time with your loved ones is something you should do often.
5. Have a confidante
A person’s life might be under a lot of stress and no matter how self confident one may seem in office, s/he might need to go home and remove the outer cloak and break down in front of someone. For such instances, it is very necessary to have a confidante with whom you can share all your problems, sadness and happiness. After sharing your feelings, you will feel lighter and you might be likely to gain some insights and counselling from their side as well. A confidante can be a spouse, parent or anybody you trust with your life.
The worst thing you can do is let failure affect you adversely. Failures are stepping stones to success and each failure should be like a lesson to you to do better in future. Learn to stare at failure in the face and derive the best teachings out of your mistakes. Also, as an entrepreneur, don’t let the fear of failure keep you from taking a certain risk.
7. Focus on an end goal
You should be very clear from the very beginning about what you want to derive out of doing a certain task. The end goal is what’s important and should remain your point of focus always. If you think you team needs motivation to stay focused, inspire them as well because when everyone focuses and works together towards one destination, they are bound to succeed.
For instance, to boost employees’ performance in the office, Google allows them to bring pets to the office.
When you should be an intrapreneur instead of an entrepreneur?
Entrepreneurs are people who come up with an innovative idea which they are willing to work upon and expand. One of the major qualities of an entrepreneur is risk-taking. However, there are certain people with a similar skill set who can manage and build a business but don’t want to undertake the financial risk. However, the people who are willing to become entrepreneurs minus the risk can become intrapreneurs; a concept which has been gaining popularity over the years.
Over the years, intrapreneurs have been put down by the general public because it is a commonly held belief that entrepreneurs are people who embrace their freedom and like to be the boss. However, with changing times, this theory is slowly fading away. While starting your own business might seem challenging and exciting, working for other people holds great value too. It is just outdated and short sighted to not consider people with entrepreneurial skills working under an entrepreneur as futile.
If you are still confused whether you want to become an entrepreneur or an intrapreneur, you could ask yourself the following questions and decide based on these answers:
1. Are you ready to take financial risk?
The biggest risk about starting your venture is probably the financial risk you as an entrepreneur have to bear. All ventures need to have start-up costs settled and later seek out for venture capitalists to invest in the business.
Even if your revenue is negative, you need to keep bearing fixed costs.
Losses and absence of liquidation are two major reasons businesses shut down. Many a times, venture capitalists pull out because they stop believing in your idea and believe they have found a better idea to invest in. After a great sale period, your profits can start dwindling because of competition. These are a few financial risks every entrepreneur needs to bear at some point or other.
If these risks seem appealing to you, go ahead and own your business like a boss. If not, you still have the option of embracing entrepreneurship by becoming an intrapreneur.
A lot of entrepreneurs do not just seek just money. Some want recognition, some want success and some want to genuinely help the society through their innovations. Some entrepreneurs also seek freedom. You need to figure out what you really want and work towards achieving it. In a regular 9-5 job you might not really have the option of getting what you want.
Once you have your motivation sorted, you are now ready to approach the employer or an existing entrepreneur who can actually help you get what you want. Without any financial burden, you can utilise your skills by becoming a great intrapreneur.
3. Do you want to work on an already developed project?
Working for a new start-up means starting from scratch. You need to do everything from developing a product to the marketing to the launch of the final product. However, if you believe that you do not want all that additional burden of working on a newbie, you could always look for a start-up which is a little more established.
With existing businesses being relatively sorted, all you need to do is keep steering forward and continue with their plans. You could devise some new strategies as well.
If this seems appealing to you, you need to find a corporate partner who allows you to work for “square two”. It isn’t a very difficult task to find one in India considering the number of start-ups which are established and require intrapreneurs to handle logistics and marketing.
There are certain things that an entrepreneur knows are short-lived which is why they don’t give much importance to those.
There are certain things that an entrepreneur knows are short-lived which is why they don’t give much importance to those. They believe stressing about certain things is pointless and only a waste of time. Instead, a successful entrepreneur prefers giving time to better things like innovating further for the business or expanding it further.
Here are 12 things successful entrepreneurs do not care about:
Failure
Successful entrepreneurs are often not affected by failures as they know failures are stepping stones to success. They are also aware that failures are short-lived and should be treated as a lesson and not as something deterring.
Success
Well-seasoned and experienced entrepreneurs are also aware of the fact that success just like failure is short-lived as well. If they achieve success early on in their life, they revel in it and strive to do better in future. To keep the success streak alive, they work harder and come up with more ideas to keep their business going.
Stress
An entrepreneur is aware of the fact that s/he needs to deal with major stress as one is solely responsible for the company but a true and successful entrepreneur doesn’t let the stresses of running a company and making profits affect him/her majorly.
Great entrepreneurs aren’t threatened by the IQ levels of very great employees who might actually be smarter than the entrepreneur.
They are aware of the fact that smart employees have a lot to contribute in terms of strategy to the company and help it grow which is why they prefer hiring smart and creative employees.
Risks that are proved wrong
Risk taking is a major part of the entrepreneur’s job and to survive in the dynamic market, one needs to take certain risks. An entrepreneur isn’t afraid to take risks and if the risk results in failure, s/he just puts it behind and moves on further.
Making money
An entrepreneur gives more preference to achievements over money. S/he is aware of the fact that money isn’t an issue as long as one is doing well in the market. Also, an entrepreneur gives more preference to achievements and establishments which allow his company success in the long term.
The professional-personal life balance
This might sound very harsh but entrepreneurs in their initial days need to give the company their complete attention and focus. Their personal life might suffer. But a committed and dedicated entrepreneur prefers giving his company utmost importance in the initial years.
Competitors’ success
Keeping a close watch over competitors is important to chart their strategies and marketing tactics. However, the competitors’ success is not something that affects the entrepreneur to such an extent that he’ll let it affect his business. An entrepreneur just strives to do better and be the best in the market.
An entrepreneur cannot afford to be pessimistic. One has to take calculated risks and hope for the best.
Creative boundaries
Successful entrepreneurs are aware of the fact that the creative limit doesn’t exist and while one is innovating, there aren’t any boundaries. Hence, they motivate their creative people to think out of the box.
Following rules
An entrepreneur is aware of the fact that rules were established long back and they are meant to be revised time to time which is why they set their own rules.
An entrepreneur needs to be constantly working upon methods to make the limited time that he devotes to his venture.
The life of an entrepreneur is dynamic and there are moments when he needs to keep pushing with no strategic focus in mind. Amidst marketing strategies, emails, conferences, meetings, a lot is lost. However productivity cannot be one of the factors that an entrepreneur compromises upon. An entrepreneur needs to be constantly working upon methods to make the limited time that he devotes to his venture, productive.
Here are certain things that an entrepreneur must to do to boost his productivity:
1. Customise a task list and learn to prioritize
It is very important for an entrepreneur to set a goal at the beginning of the day. Along with that, he must add the things he needs to do in a day ranked according to their importance. An entrepreneur must be very clear and focused about the things he needs to do in a day which will ensure the productivity for the day. Prioritizing also comes with certain benefits as an entrepreneur through his priority list knows all the tasks he has accomplished and gets a fair idea of the remaining tasks as well.
To prioritize the list, an entrepreneur should always give highest weightage to the task that will impact him and his business the most. The less important tasks on the list can be delegated to the other employees. In this way, maximum productivity is ensured and an entrepreneur can proceed to enjoy his life to the fullest.
A key quality shared by the world’s top entrepreneurs is focus. At all times, an entrepreneur needs to focus on things are absolutely essential and that cannot be compromised on. Focus can only be achieved when one’s mind is clear and working free of any kind of distractions. As soon as one starts to procrastinate, the productivity for the day is hampered severely.
Most entrepreneurs do not address personal issues at work which is why they’re able to be more productive and effective in the office. Trying to concentrate on too many things at once hampers productivity in a massive way. Hence, entrepreneurs must try and focus only on business during work hours.
Entrepreneurs need to decipher business like a strategic game of chess and execute the plan one step further in their head. He must also be capable of weighing the outcome or the risk of a decision and have a backup plan.
If one fails to devise a plan in his head or worse, execute it, it can lead to a lot of shortcomings and the failure of a whole business plan. Maximise productivity through result-driven actions and this can be achieved through the first point: prioritize. Also, preparation boosts confidence which is a very good boost for the company.
For instance, when people were busy making profiles on Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg was devising ways to make Facebook a model to earn revenue through ads.
Here are 10 of those lessons from personal experience.
When I started my company eight years ago, back when I was a student, I had no idea of the learning curve I would face before I might actually make it. Today, as I continue to run my firm as well as speak to and advise other startups, I continually go back to some of the lessons I learned through direct experience (many times, the hard way) and through helping other companies avoid the same mistakes.
From all the years I’ve been an entrepreneur, a few of those lessons stand out as defining moments in my career. They also represent moments in the trenches when I had to make a significant change, to either my business infrastructure or my personal mindset, in order to advance to the next stage in my company’s growth. Here are 10 of those lessons from my personal experience:
1. If you don’t start delegating as soon as your budget allows it, you will burn out fast.
One of the most important lessons for me as a founder was that you need to spend as much time as possible, as soon as possible, in building teams. You may be able to last a year or so as a one-man show. But if you’re seriously growing your business, you will not be able to wear all of those hats on your own. You can only hoard your cash and keep your overhead low for so long. Start reinvesting into team building and the dividends will multiply.
2. Shoot for goals that are 10 times bigger, and actually believe in them.
A lot of times, it takes just as much effort to close a small deal as a big one. The only barrier is your own thinking. Further, if you build your business plan around a goal that’s ten times larger, and take that much more action, it’s a lot more likely that you will hit and surpass your original goal anyway.
3. Do the stuff you don’t want to do.
In almost every case, the stuff that you least want to do is the stuff that is most important to do. I learned very early on that I needed to suck it up and do those boring/hard/not-fun tasks if I was ever going to move the needle. Even when you delegate what you’re weak at, you still end up with something on your to-do list you don’t want to do. This is what separates the best from the rest.
4. There are some things you shouldn’t do.
I spent a lot of time in the beginning doing tasks that I shouldn’t have been doing simply because I tend to be a taskmaster and perfectionist. Now, each morning, I review my to-do list; and if there is something there that ultimately isn’t necessary and consequential, I either delegate it or eliminate it altogether. Focus on the top two-to-three areas where you can make the most impact on your business.
5. Watch out for information overload.
I love to read, and I read a book per week. But I’ve also learned to be careful about overloading myself with too much information. There are a thousand books about everything out there. Find a few really high-quality sources of information that serve you and drill down on them. Read them over and over and immerse yourself in them. Implement what you learn and then move on to your next source. Don’t get lost in the bog of information out there to the point that it keeps you from taking action.
6. Know your ‘why.’
You’ve got to know why you’re doing this, and it can’t just be money. There needs to be a reason beyond financial goals that pushes you to get up and do this every day. Building a company is hard, and lots of obstacles will make you want to give up. You need to have a reason for hanging in there that is much bigger than the problems you are going to face every day.
7. Recognize that many wins were originally far-fetched ideas.
Oftentimes, the idea that you think is least likely to work or is too far-fetched is the idea that becomes your next home run. Whether it’s that potential client that you are unsure about contacting because he or she is out of your league, or that marketing campaign you never thought could work, just do it (while managing your downside) and let results dictate what’s a good idea or not.
8. Measure everything.
The only way to improve anything is to measure it every single day. Why? Measurement brings clarity and awareness.
9. You need only one service/product.
When you are a fledgling company (and especially if you’re an agency), don’t waste time, money and effort trying to offer 20 different services. Sell one service and become the best at it. Down the road, an expansion will be much easier when you have the cash.
10. Keep in touch with everybody.
Always look at every contact as a relationship, and not just a transaction. Keep in touch with as many contacts as possible on a regular basis. Send personal notes, articles you think they’ll enjoy (such as this one!) and holiday greetings. Relationships are critical to long-term success.
Author: Richard Lorenzen
Richard Lorenzen is CEO of Fifth Avenue Brands, a public-relations firm in New York. He speaks nationally on entrepreneurship and has been featured on Fox News, Entrepreneur, Huffington Post and more.
The basic idea behind equity is the splitting of a pie. When you start something, your pie is really small. You have a 100% of a really small, bite-size pie. When you take outside investment and your company grows, your pie becomes bigger.
A hypothetical startup will get about $15,000 from family and friends, about $200,000 from an angel investor three months later, and about $2 Million from a VC another six months later. If all goes well. See how funding works in this infographic:
First, let’s figure out why we are talking about funding as something you need to do. This is not a given. The opposite of funding is “bootstrapping,” the process of funding a startup through your own savings. There are a few companies that bootstrapped for a while until taking investment, like MailChimp and AirBnB.
If you know the basics of how funding works, skim to the end. In this article I am giving the easiest to understand explanation of the process. Let’s start with the basics.
Every time you get funding, you give up a piece of your company. The more funding you get, the more company you give up. That ‘piece of company’ is ‘equity.’ Everyone you give it to becomes a co-owner of your company.
Splitting The Pie
The basic idea behind equity is the splitting of a pie. When you start something, your pie is really small. You have a 100% of a really small, bite-size pie. When you take outside investment and your company grows, your pie becomes bigger. Your slice of the bigger pie will be bigger than your initial bite-size pie.
When Google went public, Larry and Sergey had about 15% of the pie, each. But that 15% was a small slice of a really big pie.
Funding Stages
Let’s look at how a hypothetical startup would get funding.
Idea stage
At first it is just you. You are pretty brilliant, and out of the many ideas you have had, you finally decide that this is the one. You start working on it. The moment you started working, you started creating value. That value will translate into equity later, but since you own 100% of it now, and you are the only person in your still unregistered company, you are not even thinking about equity yet.
Co-Founder Stage
As you start to transform your idea into a physical prototype you realize that it is taking you longer (it almost always does.) You know you could really use another person’s skills. So you look for a co-founder. You find someone who is both enthusiastic and smart. You work together for a couple of days on your idea, and you see that she is adding a lot of value. So you offer them to become a co-founder. But you can’t pay her any money (and if you could, she would become an employee, not a co-founder), so you offer equity in exchange for work (sweat equity.) But how much should you give? 20% – too little? 40%? After all it is YOUR idea that even made this startup happen. But then you realize that your startup is worth practically nothing at this point, and your co-founder is taking a huge risk on it. You also realize that since she will do half of the work, she should get the same as you – 50%. Otherwise, she might be less motivated than you. A true partnership is based on respect. Respect is based on fairness. Anything less than fairness will fall apart eventually. And you want this thing to last. So you give your co-founder 50%.
Soon you realize that the two of you have been eating Ramen noodles three times a day. You need funding. You would prefer to go straight to a VC, but so far you don’t think you have enough of a working product to show, so you start looking at other options.
The Family and Friends Round: You think of putting an ad in the newspaper saying, “Startup investment opportunity.” But your lawyer friend tells you that would violate securities laws. Now you are a “private company,” and asking for money from “the public,” that is people you don’t know would be a “public solicitation,” which is illegal for private companies. So who can you take money from?
Accredited investors – People who either have $1 Million in the bank or make $200,000 annually. They are the “sophisticated investors” – that is people who the government thinks are smart enough to decide whether to invest in an ultra-risky company, like yours. What if you don’t know anyone with $1 Million? You are in luck, because there is an exception – friends and family.
Family and Friends – Even if your family and friends are not as rich as an investor, you can still accept their cash. That is what you decide to do, since your co-founder has a rich uncle. You give him 5% of the company in exchange for $15,000 cash. Now you can afford room and ramen for another 6 months while building your prototype.
Registering the Company
To give uncle the 5%, you registered the company, either though an online service like LegalZoom ($400), or through a lawyer friend (0$-$2,000). You issued some common stock, gave 5% to uncle and set aside 20% for your future employees – that is the ‘option pool.’ (You did this because 1. Future investors will want an option pool;, 2. That stock is safe from you and your co-founders doing anything with it.)
The Angel Round
With uncle’s cash in pocket and 6 months before it runs out, you realize that you need to start looking for your next funding source right now. If you run out of money, your startup dies. So you look at the options:
Incubators, accelerators, and “excubators” – these places often provide cash, working space, and advisors. The cash is tight – about $25,000 (for 5 to 10% of the company.) Some advisors are better than cash, like Paul Graham at Y Combinator.
Angels – in 2013 (Q1) the average angel round was $600,000 (from the HALO report). That’s the good news. The bad news is that angels were giving that money to companies that they valued at $2.5 million. So, now you have to ask if you are worth $2.5 million. How do you know? Make your best case. Let’s say it is still early days for you, and your working prototype is not that far along. You find an angel who looks at what you have and thinks that it is worth $1 million. He agrees to invest $200,000.
Now let’s count what percentage of the company you will give to the angel. Not 20%. We have to add the ‘pre-money valuation’ (how much the company is worth before new money comes in) and the investment
(Think of it like this, first you take the money, then you give the shares. If you gave the shares before you added the angel’s investment, you would be dividing what was there before the angel joined. )
Now divide the investment by the post-money valuation $200,000/$1,200,000=1/6= 16.7%
The angel gets 16.7% of the company, or 1/6.
How Funding Works – Cutting the Pie
What about you, your co-founder and uncle? How much do you have left? All of your stakes will be diluted by 1/6. (See the infographic.)
Is dilution bad? No, because your pie is getting bigger with each investment. But, yes, dilution is bad, because you are losing control of your company. So what should you do? Take investment only when it is necessary. Only take money from people you respect. (There are other ways, like buying shares back from employees or the public, but that is further down the road.)
Venture Capital Round
Finally, you have built your first version and you have traction with users. You approach VCs. How much can VCs give you? They invest north of $500,000. Let’s say the VC values what you have now at $4 million. Again, that is your pre-money valuation. He says he wants to invest $2 Million. The math is the same as in the angel round. The VC gets 33.3% of your company. Now it’s his company, too, though.
Your first VC round is your series A. Now you can go on to have series B,C – at some point either of the three things will happen to you. Either you will run out of funding and no one will want to invest, so you die. Or, you get enough funding to build something a bigger company wants to buy, and they acquire you. Or, you do so well that, after many rounds of funding, you decide to go public.
Why Companies Go Public?
There are two basic reasons. Technically an IPO is just another way to raise money, but this time from millions of regular people. Through an IPO a company can sell stocks on the stock market and anyone can buy them. Since anyone can buy you can likely sell a lot of stock right away rather than go to individual investors and ask them to invest. So it sounds like an easier way to get money.
There is another reason to IPO. All those people who have invested in your company so far, including you, are holding the so-called ‘restricted stock’ – basically this is stock that you can’t simply go and sell for cash. Why? Because this is stock of a company that has not been so-to-say “verified by the government,” which is what the IPO process does. Unless the government sees your IPO paperwork, you might as well be selling snake oil, for all people know. So, the government thinks it is not safe to let regular people to invest in such companies. (Of course, that automatically precludes the poor from making high-return investments. But that is another story.) The people who have invested so far want to finally convert or sell their restricted stock and get cash or unrestricted stock, which is almost as good as cash. This is a liquidity event – when what you have becomes easily convertible into cash.
There is another group of people that really want you to IPO. The investment bankers, like Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, to name the most famous ones. They will give you a call and ask to be your lead underwriter – the bank that prepares your IPO paperwork and calls up wealthy clients to sell them your stock. Why are the bankers so eager? Because they get 7% of all the money you raise in the IPO. In this infographic your startup raised $235,000,000 in the IPO – 7% of that is about $16.5 million (for two or three weeks of work for a team of 12 bankers). As you see, it is a win-win for all.
Being an Early Employee at a Startup
Last but not least, some of your “sweat equity” investors were the early employees who took stock in exchange for working at low salaries and living with the risk that your startup might fold. At the IPO it is their cash-out day.
To help you go easily through rough times, here you can find 10 awesome inspirational quotes that will help you to handle even the toughest critiques.
Getting criticism is difficult – it is unpleasant and can be very discouraging, especially for entrepreneurs, who work under a lot of pressure on daily basis. It is important that you embrace the critique only if it is constructive and can help you to improve your business. Otherwise, you risk to get even more stressed without to have real reason for it.
To help you go easily through rough times, here you can find 10 awesome inspirational quotes that will help you to handle even the toughest critiques.
“Don’t be distracted by criticism. Remember, the only taste of success some people have is when they take a bite out of you.” Zig Ziglar
“The trouble with most of us is that we would rather be ruined by praise than saved by criticism.” Norman Vincent Peale
“The final proof of greatness lies in being able to endure criticism without resentment.” Elbert Hubbard
“You’re never as good as everyone tells you when you win, and you’re never as bad as they say when you lose.” Lou Holtz
“Every human being is entitled to courtesy and consideration. Constructive criticism is not only to be expected but sought.” Margaret Chase Smith
“One of the criteria for national leadership should therefore be a talent for understanding, encouraging, and making constructive use of vigorous criticism.” Carl Sagan
“Criticism is something we can avoid easily by saying nothing, doing nothing, and being nothing.” Aristotle
“You are a glorious, shining sword and criticism is the whetstone. Do not run from the whetstone or you will become dull and useless. Stay sharp.” Duane Alan Hahn
“I like criticism. It makes you strong.” LeBron James
“Criticism may not be agreeable, but it is necessary. It fulfills the same function as pain in the human body. It calls attention to an unhealthy state of things.” Winston Churchill
Here are some of the things to consider when it comes to choosing the right startup team for your business.
Starting up a business on your own at times tends to be a recipe for disaster. It gets worse if you are on board with the wrong team and even worst when they do not share the same business goals as you. Having the right team is key for anyone venturing into the business world as a first timer.
But what constitutes to the right startup team?
Well, here are some of the things to consider when it comes to choosing the right startup team for your business.
Things to consider:
1. Hire people you know
Familiarity can both be a good and a bad thing when it comes to starting up a business. However if used the right way, it can help you achieve the goals of your company.
What better way than choosing people who you are familiar with?
From your own circle of friends, you know each and every person’s weakness and strength. This attribute will enable you to select people who you think meet your company’s vision. This is based on the fact that you have interacted at some point in your life with each one of them.
2. Partner with resourceful and connected people
Without resources and connections, it is difficult to start a business. Having people on your team who have access to certain resources can make you achieve your business dreams. In the world of today, connections are the determining factor of where your business stands. Having on board people who have access to big shots or people who get things done is an added advantage to you as a business owner. Being able to reach folks who pull the strings in the corporate world will make you move mountains. With these two allies, your company stands unbeaten.
3. Choose Passionate and Visionary People
Everyone has a vision for his or her own business. Getting individuals who share the same vision and are passionate as you are is crucial to every business. Visionary people help you reach your business target. In every business, there are ups and downs. You are going to need people who will stand by you in the stormy weather; these are individuals who are passionate and share the same vision.
4. Search for marketing experience
Experience, what every business owners asks before employing you. As a first timer, it is important to walk with people who have tasted the waters. They will be your guide in knowing the dos and don’ts in this business jungle. They will teach you the steps it takes to starting up your own business company, who exactly is your target market and strategies on how to achieve your goals.
No man is an Island. Get yourself the right startup team for your company today.
