Success or Failure Depends on You

When you decide to become an entrepreneur you start to wonder about all the things that need to be learned. This is particularly true when your business starts to scale and you need to prepare for the stage changes that lie around the corner as you pass from one stage of growth to the next.  

People often ask me what exactly it takes to be a founder. Of course, there are many ways to answer this question, but I will share my favourite one.

Being a founder is about taking on the task of making something new come into the world.

What you need to understand is that being a founder is very different from having a  job because you need to set your own criteria for success and pursue them. Maybe it sounds easy to you, but quite the contrary. What makes it so difficult is the fact that very often there is a lack of feedback and when this happens you don't know if you are doing things right or wrong. So don't get confused that the lifestyle of a founder is always as glamorous as you have seen on TV.

Most of the time it is actually brutish and full of uncertainty and worries-- but there are also wonderful things about being an entrepreneur. For example, it's great to have control over your time. Your success or failure correlates with the amount of effort you put in, instead of the actions of someone else. So, you are dependent only on your own work without having a boss giving you orders all the time.

In general, the lifestyle of an entrepreneur can vary a lot but what separates it from a life with a regular job is that one thinks about the business all the time, even when relaxing. The passion about your own business keeps your mind busy no matter what you are doing and this condition is found in every entrepreneur who strongly believes in their idea and knows that there is a place for it in the world.

As an entrepreneur, your success or failure depends on you. Learn to assess the missing elements that are stopping you from scaling. Surround yourself with peers who understand your challenges and share your passion. Connect with experts and investors who can offer you the right advice at the right time in your scaling journey. If you do these things diligently and keep learning you'll improve your chances of success and ability to enjoy more fully the benefits of being an entrepreneur.