Good morning colleagues , I hope we all enjoyed the Sallah. Barka de Sallah once again. I will like to implore us not to use this period for festivities alone but also to sit and strategize on how start a business so that we can all become independent from the so called paid employment. I could recollect I was training some young fellows on starting a business and one of them said starting a business of your own is like a trap. I now defined the trap as Taking Risks Accurately & Prosper. I want us all to CLAIM our businesses today. CLAIM as defined by me is Create Locate Attract Inspire Market (CLAIM) your business.
Most of us have desires to start our own businesses, but often don’t know how to turn that dream into realities. The best way to start a business is to break the project down into small steps and complete those steps one by one.
The first is to know whether you are cut out to run your business and that brings me to Step 1 which is SELF-EVALUATION: Dreaming about starting your own business is easy, setting up a small business and working at it until it becomes profitable is always the issue.
It is going to require time, money, focus, persistence and a whole lot of things. While all these things I listed are important your personality, attitude and soft skills are equally as important so before you venture into that Business make sure you ask yourself and honestly answer all of these questions:
- What skills, interest, experience and industry knowledge do I have?
- Am I a self-starter or do need to have other people to tell me what to do?
- Am I good at planning, making decisions and carrying them out?
- Am I open to suggestions, criticism and change?
- Am I able to set goals and deadlines and the deadlines?
- Will I be able to stay focused even when things are difficult?
- Am I both optimistic and realistic?
- Am I honest in all my dealings with other people?
- Do I learn from my mistakes and make changes based on what I have learned?
- Am I self-confident?
- How much time will I be able to devote to starting and running the business?
- How much money can I afford to put into the business?
- Am I willing and able to take debt to start a business?
- How soon do I need to make money from the Business?
- How supportive will my family members be?
- How much money will I need to get out of the business to keep a roof over my head and food on the table?
- What kind of business would best match my interests and skills?
I want us to sincerely ask ourselves these questions even if you feel you are not going into business now, I want us to remember it’s the last port of call for everybody even after retirement from your paid establishment.
Next week we will be taking the next step which is “Choose the right business to start”. Here I will showing us some of the things we should consider in deciding what would be the best business for you, personally to start.
Thank you.
Word of Wisdom:
Don’t ever steal anybody’s vision (Business idea), remember Moses is different from Samuel. The rod of Moses may not work in the hand of Samuel.
