Do you think you’re an entrepreneur? Have you thought about starting your own business? There’s benefits and challenges to get you excited about the self-employment space.
Let’s take a look at them more closely …
Freedom
Financial independence is often a motivator for a young entrepreneur. Working hard in your early years to eventually earn ‘passive’ income and travel the world would be a dream come true for a many of us. However, unfortunately it is not common to achieve the glorious utopia of financial and time freedom. Running your own business can be hard work and few entrepreneurs achieve their initial vision. It takes dedication to bring a small business to fruition from scratch, but people have done it before, why not you too?
Be your own Boss
Being your own boss definitely comes with its perks! You’ll be the only person you have to answer to, and every decision can be yours. This means doing things your way, working the hours that suit you, implementing your own plans or creative freedoms, and living the life you prefer. At the end of the day the adage ‘you get back what you put in’ tends to prevail – you’ll likely still have to put in the hard yards if you want to achieve success. As the head honcho, the buck stops with you.
Positioning yourself as an Expert
As you build your business, you will likely start to become an expert in your field. People will come to you for advice if you are consistently proving you’ve got the know-how within the industry, and this is definitely something to be proud of. The joys of learning the ins and outs of business ownership will come to you over time as you take risks within your field and gain knowledge from others.
Time
You’ll have more spare time! Or so you might think… Having more spare time to do what you like or spend time with family is an opportunity many think they will have when starting a business and setting their own hours.
Having more time doesn’t usually end up being the case. But as an entrepreneur, you can end up having a bit more choice about how you spend your time.
Managing a team that can take on responsibilities for the business will create time and freedom in your calendar. Going to sporting events mid-week, staying out late at events, and making plans with friends are all opportunities that can open up to you if you become your own boss.
Challenges
If you’re someone that enjoys a good challenge to keep the cogs turning, becoming an entrepreneur and starting a business is the perfect opportunity. Starting a successful business is no small feat. There will inevitably be people who don’t think you’ll be successful, so you have the opportunity to prove these people wrong. Prove you have the potential and willpower to be the best in your field of work. There will be challenges to prevent you reaching your goals, pushing past these will prove you have what it takes.
The COVID-19 pandemic has presented a major challenge to entrepreneurs on the path to business success. Bankrupting so many small Australian businesses, COVID-19 was relentlessly destructive and unbiased. The COVID-infected economy has a bottomless bag of challenges for you and your small business – but with these challenges, many opportunities have risen. As a business owner it’s critical to use your intuition to overcome challenges and persist. View challenges as opportunities and you’ll be surprised with the solutions you come up with.
Growing a network or community
“It’s not what you know; it’s who you know”. This quote gets thrown around all the time, but it couldn’t be truer. Networking becomes a natural occurrence in business operations as you meet other business owners – in fact it will be key to your business success.
A key tip is to be authentic. People will know if you’re putting on an act to look more professional than you are. If you are genuine, those who have been in your situation will be more than happy to give you tips and tricks to help you improve. Creating genuine relationships with people can help your business in the future, so attending networking events and being your genuine self to everyone you meet is non-negotiable.
To sum it up….
There are up-sides and down-sides to business ownership. At the end of the day there are plenty of reasons to get excited about jumping into the entrepreneurship space. And as they say, there’s no time like the present.
