Are you cut out to be an entrepreneur?
So you set out, and you’re on fire, your dream and vision basically consume your every waking and sleeping moment, you’re running on nervous energy most of time. On reflection it must have been quite exhausting for my friends and loved ones because I’d worked on, lost sleep and obsessed about at least two different business ideas before having my ‘lightbulb moment’, turns out it was staring me right in the face. It always makes sense to “stick with what you know”. I realise now that my other ideas were more like hobbies within industries I knew nothing about. Looking back had I invested in those businesses I would have struggled to make a profit.
“It isn’t a business, it’s a hobby” Peter Jones, British Entrepreneur
Working from home on http://www.worksmarthub.co.uk/ was hard. I knew I had to stay motivated so every day I got up and got ready as if I was going to the office (dressed down), popped on Radio 2 for a bit of company, fired up my laptop and sat at my kitchen table working through a to-do list. If anybody says that the process is a breeze, it really isn’t. There were days when I felt completely lost, lacked confidence, didn’t know how to make this dream a reality and became increasingly frustrated. My savings were depleting and nothing was happening. I knew I couldn’t carry on like that so I reached out to friends and managed to get a temporary role to get me through the big lull period. Necessity as they say is the mother of invention. During my final week on the assignment I got a call offering me the space I’d been after for almost a year! It was meant to be.
‘Feeling puzzled back in 2018’
How to decide if you’re ready to make the leap?
Ask yourself these questions: do you have the right personality traits, such as perseverance, resilience, self-confidence and a strong desire to succeed? You also need good levels of steel and empathy, otherwise you’re never going to cope with the stress and demands of being an entrepreneur. Will your business idea make money? It’s great if you’re thinking about opening a lovely little Tea Room, but can you really devote every weekend to working in it? If you have kids that’s probably a NO.
Are you prepared to do the repetitive and quite often dirty jobs to keep costs down?
Employing a daily cleaner in a start-up serviced office business I realised was a luxury. I had to lose the ego and literally grab a toilet brush! Emptying bins and cleaning loos really wasn’t how I pictured myself when I was sat in my kitchen creating a cool website but fast forward 16 months and I’m writing this blog from a desk at http://www.worksmarthub.co.uk/surrounded by a community of fantastic professionals who are my lovely clients.
‘Henry and I are well acquainted’
What I’ve learned on this journey so far
I will always be last in the queue to get paid as landlords, suppliers and staff are always going to be ahead of me. I’m not going to be able to take a real switch off type of ‘holiday’ for a long time, yes my body may be lying on a sunlounger in a warm country but my head is still in Altrincham back at http://www.worksmarthub.co.uk/ and I’m still dealing with enquiries and issues.
‘I was lucky to get away to Tenerife this month’
So why do we do it?
Start-ups are a risky business and they definitely don’t make us rich over-night. We’ll encounter more plate spinning then we ever thought possible, especially when you throw the school run into that mix and looking after children but I knew I had to be my own boss. I needed to make my own decisions and have complete control over my earnings. I also wanted to reduce my own commuting time by working locally in Altrincham whilst creating something that could inspire other hard working women and busy mums to follow their passion by believing in themselves.
What do most self-made millionaire entrepreneurs have in common? They have the courage to take risks. A family member tried to point out the financial risks to me just before I signed the lease and took on a significant financial burden in completely renovating two very run down floors, but my passion and drive were stronger than any fear. I’m so thankful that was the case.
That’s entrepreneurship.
