Entrepreneurship

[norbert]

Part of taking full responsibility for my life was leaving my job and starting to build my own businesses. I always felt I can serve the world better, I can give more. This was the best decision of my life. I thought we could discuss entrepreneurial topics here. Are there any entrepreneurs in these forums?

[Nathan]

Hi Norbert, you've definately hit an area of interest for me. I am currently doing a degree in entrepreneurship (you won't find many of these around) but I am only just turning 20 so I haven't had much experience in the workforce or in my own business ventures. So far I have been involved in 2 different business ventures which I wouldn't say failed, but were both discontinued. One venture was created with a group of us as a class project and the other was of my own.

As I said I don't have a heap of experience to share, but I would love to hear from others. Out of curiosity Norbert, what business did you go into when leaving your job?

[KevinG]

I'm an entrepreneur - yay!

Have my own commercial photography company.

[mark]

me too, me too
running a one-man graphic design studio right now, ran a somewhat bigger company before and - like norbert - never regretted. even the most exhausting clients permit me too work more freely than doing 9 to 5 for the man...

[mindful1]

Greetings everyone!

I too am an entrepreneur and am looking forward to participating in these new forums.

Steve has created quite a community here. Personal development and entrepreneurship feed well off one another, as I'm sure many of you would agree. I believe these forums will create great opportunities for networking within specific personal development interest areas.

[Jill]

Entrepreneur for over 12 years here!

[33Nick]

Me too, I've always been. I tried working in real companies once or twice, it just wasn't for me.

I've been a language teacher, a computer consultant and now a Realtor. Strangely enough, all led to the next.

I build my businesses on helping local businesses. So becoming a Realtor was a strange thing for me. A friend of mine one day told me something magical: "I helped this lady find her home." That was it and it hit home. After that people referred me to a place in town known to define professionalism in that industry. Being highly suspicious and having had businesses myself I build from the ground up, I met people I never thought existed in this crazy industry.

So it's been a year of ups and down, mostly down for the market but I am still putting out there and the tide is turning.

Let's remember that 90% of what has made our country were small businesses.

Looking forward to this forum.

[Henry]

How many times have you guys started your own business and failed before you found one that works?

[mattinglot]

I started my latest business (well really I evolved and combined a couple of my previous ventures) September last year. It's a website development company of all things and the experience has been phenomenal. In just a year I've gone from making my first sale as Tilted Pixel to having a business that supports me entirely and is growing at a rapid pace. This summer I'll be looking into getting some actual office space (so far all home business... what a wonderful thing technology is) and hiring someone on fulltime.

I've started several businesses in the past, a couple of which are now part of Tilted Pixel. My first business I started in high school and sold a single computer hard drive to make $40. Didn't go very far needless to say, but with each venture after I learned quite a bit. I feel with entrepreneurship you really have to be willing to keep trying until you get it right, and to get back up everytime you don't.

Jill: I read your SEO newsletter faithfully and love it! Lots of good information with no strings attached, which is fairly rare in this kind of field.

[Travis_Farnes]

I am an entrepreneur and I love it. Im 22 years old and have had a few businesses. I am currently doing home improvement and handyman work but Im really focusing now on building a business for passive income. Im am still in school so I kinda look at my current business as just paying the bills and getting me through college. However, I'm not sure exactly what I will use my degree for because I don't want to get a job but I think it would be nice to have.

I dont know if I can answer Henry's question because all of my businesses have worked (they pay my bills and teach me many skills) but I am no longer running most of them. I do have a feeling that I will be a part of many business ventures to come.

This is my first post so it is nice to meet everyone!

[Jill]

Originally Posted by mattinglot

Jill: I read your SEO newsletter faithfully and love it! Lots of good information with no strings attached, which is fairly rare in this kind of field.

Thanks, mattinglot!

[darkmoon]

Entrepreneur since 1 month (after 6 years as employee), and very happy with it! I hope to learn a lot from the experienced people here!

[AndyMartin]

Another, "yea" in the room. Entrepreneur for all but 3 very unhappy years of my professional life. Never make that mistake again.

[andrew]

Myself as well at 19. I was 18 when I got released from my first real 9-5(8) job after about 3 months. I had a software idea and started my business off of that. It hasn't taken off yet, but I do freelance on the side until I launch it.

[seoartix]

I tried a cellphone load biz, a money lending biz, a Mary Kaye type of biz until I landed on a nice content writing biz. It took me almost 2 years right after college graduation before I've gotten into my beloved web writing business.

[richie]

hi guys i am 19 curtrently in college and an enterpreneur (well. sort of) launched my site Shaadiya.com Free Matrimonials
and currently have i more site to launch in a week probably
i would love to learn from all the enterpreneurs from here

[TheBull]

Originally Posted by Henry

How many times have you guys started your own business and failed before you found one that works?

For me, I've had one business that didn't so much 'fail' as we (my wife and I) got burned out and sold it. We made our money back and a small profit, but that was about it. It was a LOT of work to say the least.

My other ventures failed due to lack of continued motivation more than anything else. There are two of those. Then there is about 2 or 3 ideas that I had but didn't really follow through with.

Given all of that, I certainly haven't stopped trying or dreaming up new ideas. Things kind of slowed down after we moved to Vegas in April, but we have started up a new web venture at MyDogLovesVegas.com which we started pushing this past weekend. It is a blog community for dog lovers and we plan to expand out to other cities soon as well.

I've been lucky in that I haven't had a business that I invested a lot of financial capital into and have it fail. Most of mine have been time investsments (read: me doing a lot of programming at home...).

In any event I think the most important thing to do is not give up!

[TheBull]

Originally Posted by Travis_Farnes

I am an entrepreneur and I love it. Im 22 years old and have had a few businesses.

Good for you! I read somewhere recently that those in their 20's should be actively encouraged to start their own businesses before they get too tied to some corporate career or other obligations, namely children. The point of the article was that it is far less painful to start one or more businesses early on and have them fail that trying to do so later on. You could have several startups not succeed and still have time to recover or get back into a more traditional career field. Of course no one wants anyone else to fail, but you get the idea :-)

[Steve]

Originally Posted by TheBull

Good for you! I read somewhere recently that those in their 20's should be actively encouraged to start their own businesses before they get too tied to some corporate career or other obligations, namely children. The point of the article was that it is far less painful to start one or more businesses early on and have them fail that trying to do so later on. You could have several startups not succeed and still have time to recover or get back into a more traditional career field. Of course no one wants anyone else to fail, but you get the idea :-)

Yep. I only wish I took more risks in my twenties. Hell, I would have settled for just not having my head up my ass while I was in my twenties. Not that I'm ancient or anything (30), but the older you get the more conservative you have to become with your money-making endeavours.

It's like stocks and bonds. When you're younger you can hold more stocks in your retirement portfolio. As you get older, you're supposed to convert more to bonds to get ready for retirement.

If you're in your twenties, I say go all out. Do your research, but don't be afraid to throw as many things against the wall in the hopes that one of them will stick.

[Leonard]

One here as well. Been a self-employed for the 3rd year now. Things were rather shaky at first, but after some months of pain and sweat, it's great to look back and say you've perservered through it. The important thing I learnt from this is that persistence pays.

Another reason was I told myself that either way, I had to make this work. There were people waiting to see me fall, so it was not going to happen.

[Leonard]

Originally Posted by TheBull

Good for you! I read somewhere recently that those in their 20's should be actively encouraged to start their own businesses before they get too tied to some corporate career or other obligations, namely children. The point of the article was that it is far less painful to start one or more businesses early on and have them fail that trying to do so later on. You could have several startups not succeed and still have time to recover or get back into a more traditional career field. Of course no one wants anyone else to fail, but you get the idea :-)

That's a great point. Many people actually have the intentions of running their own business, but are afraid to take the first step. Some are not young, and have families to support, so the thought of giving up their job and salary turns them away from being self-dependent. It's a harsh reality. If they fail, and look to being an employee again, chances of them getting their last drawn salary is rather low (at least where i am based, that would be the case).

[garg]

Hi,

I believe I'm in the transition from being employed full time and part time entrepreneur to being full time self employed

I can't wait for the day when I finally quit my job and start working on what I love full time.

[norbert]

Originally Posted by garg

to being full time self employed

I can't wait for the day when I finally quit my job and start working on what I love full time.

I made one of my biggest mistakes around 4 years ago: I became self-employed. Please make sure to understand Kiyosaki's cashflow quadrant first (see the illustration on the right). I'd like to spare you 3 years of your life. It's okay if you understand this and consciously decide to be self-employed. I just want to make sure you don't become self-employed because you don't know your options, or don't see the big picture, like I did.

[helgi]

But wouldn't you say becoming self-employed is a good step towards developing a more passive business? Having control over your own schedule and so on, and also just breaking free psychologically from the employee mindset.

[DmitryDavydov]

Originally Posted by norbert

Part of taking full responsibility for my life was leaving my job and starting to build my own businesses. I always felt I can serve the world better, I can give more. This was the best decision of my life. I thought we could discuss entrepreneurial topics here. Are there any entrepreneurs in these forums?

I'm one. 100% of my income comes from my online ventures and I haven't had a job since I was 21 (I'm almost 28 now).

I'm all for business. Business is great. However, drop this dangerous nonsense about serving the world. It's just an illusion people create for themselves. A lot of people believe that they serve the world if they protest abortions or burn abortion clinics or donate to churches or vote for a particular politician.

Stick to business. If you don't lie or cheat or pollute or mistreat your employees, that's good enough.

[norbert]

Not necessarily but I guess that depends on what kind of person you are.

For me, self-employment means the same amount work, done in much more time (it's so easy to procrastinate at home), having more bosses (thought I'll get rid of them but guess what happened: multiple bosses), having no co-workers (being alone s.cks), staying at the same place all day causes stress, anxiety, even depression sometimes (you work at home, then you "go" home, sleep at home, you have no place to go). Then you might get into financial troubles (procrastination -> late delivery -> late payments), starting to prioritize jobs on urgency, not importance (whichever pays earlier gets done first). That's what happened to me.

Then months and years go by and you see that you're still in the same position and there's no way out but building a B quadrant business. Same as if you were an employee. What's the point in getting into self-employment then? To quickly leave the full time job you hate, I know, I had that feeling too.

I fully agree with Kiyosaki who says the S quadrant is the most hardest quadrant to be in and it generates the less income. Better stay an employee and build a B quadrant business. Maybe switch to a part time job instead of a full-time one.

Being self-employed was the hardest 3 years of my life.

[norbert]

Originally Posted by DmitryDavydov

drop this dangerous nonsense about serving the world. It's just an illusion people create for themselves

I believe building businesses that serve hundreds of clients and feed hundreds or thousands of employees is a MUCH bigger contribution to the world than being the programmer I'd be if I had chosen the employee path, creating desktop applications for Microsoft Windows. Does this clarify what I meant by that?

[ahimel]

Originally Posted by norbert

Better stay an employee and build a B quadrant business. Maybe switch to a part time job instead of a full-time one.

Being self-employed was the hardest 3 years of my life.

I think there are advantages and disadvantages both ways. It depends on the kind of business you would employ yourself in, and the kind of business you'd like to build.

On the one hand, Norbert is absolutly right; being self-employed will NOT save you time. Even if you don't procrastinate, you have to run every aspect of this business; you ARE the legal department, the marketing department, the customer service department, the R&D department.... You work way more than 40 hours a week. So if the business you're trying to build will take a lot of time in an absolute sense, then stick to being an E while you build it.

On the other hand, being self-employed does give you enormous flexibility about where you spend that time. My roommate is self-employed and sleeps polyphasically. He does client calls in the 9-1 slot and the 1-5 slot, and paperwork at 2 in the morning. If he doesn't feel like doing paperwork at 2, he does it at 6. If he needs to get his oil changed or help a friend load their moving van, he just takes the day off. If we need to meet with an investor to get funding, and the investor can only meet at 3:35 on Tuesday afternoon, he meets her at 3:35 on Tuesday afternoon. You can't do that kind of thing with an E-type job. So if the business you're trying to build will require you to be in a certain place at a certain time alot, then being an S while you're building it will give you flexibility.

Unfortunately, I can't give you a single answer and tell you it will always be right. It will depend on your personal situation.

[helgi]

I agree that being self employed working entirely on commission based projects, like a freelance contractor or similar, is not such a good plan in the long term. When I consider this I'm imagining a mix between service work and asset development, preferably phasing out the service work over time.

There are so many things I don't like about the idea of a 9-5 job (or rather 9-7 these days), that I would rather opt to pick up trash all day so long as I could set my own schedule.

edit: the part-time job idea is a nicer prospect, especially if it manages to cover basic living expenses. The kind of full time job I dread the most is the energy and attention consuming "career job"

[darkmoon]

I just had a look at the cashflow quadrant. But to me it seems that, if you're self-employed, but spend all or most of your time developing assets, you belong more in the business owner quadrant then the self-employed quadrant. You own systems which generate money, i.e. the assets + a preferably automated way of monetizing the assets (e.g. a blog)! You can see these as mini-businesses