If you start a business, you need to be the one constantly watching for opportunities – and be able to recognize them when you see them. It might be a small opportunity, such as the chance to pick up a new client, or a large one, such as getting your product on the shelves in a large retail chain, but as a small business owner, you have to keep scanning the horizon yourself and positioning yourself to benefit from the opportunities that you find.
As an employee, you may be used to operating in a “head-down” position; if you’re going to start a business and become successfully self-employed, you need to start operating in the “head-up” position.
4) When you’re self-employed, you have to be able to plan ahead.
Your last job may have involved no planning at all, as that was someone else’s job. Or perhaps your job involved planning on a localized level, such as planning a particular project. If you want to start a business, you need to develop expertise in both short-term and long-range planning; it’s about to become a big part of your life.
When you start a business, one of your first tasks will be to work through a business plan. As your business becomes operational, you’ll find that this plan (however detailed) needs to be revised and that other plans need to be created, as you work towards the long-range goals that you’ve set for your business. From following someone else’s plan as an employee, you have to learn how to create the plans yourself – and adapt the plans to changing circumstances.
5) You need to be prepared to put in a constant and consistent effort.
We’ve all seen employees who are just going through the motions, or who were just “putting in the time” until retirement. You don’t need to be a co-worker to know who these people are. As a customer or client you can tell, too.
Bluntly, starting a business takes energy, and you need to be able to give it 100 percent. You can’t afford to just coast along or go through the motions if you’re running a business. Your customer and/or clients need to know that you are devoting 100 percent of your talent or skill or attention to them – and will go elsewhere if they don’t feel this is the case.
Worse, you need to deliver this constant and consistent effort without the employee safety net. Many employees are used to being able to “call in sick” and have someone else cover their job, for instance. As a self-employed business owner, you’ll have to go in and give it your best effort no matter how you feel or close up shop if you don’t have employees who can fill in.