Published:
08/10/2014 01:21am
With Entrepreneurship, Losing is Winning
Statistics on startups and entrepreneurship does not look very favourable. A lot of startups fail in their first year of operation, many more are forced to close down by their second and third year. By the fifth year 95% or 8 out of 10 businesses have failed. That is the major reason why a lot more people will stick to the traditional corporate sector and have a regular income. But for the few who go into entrepreneurship it is one heck of a journey. For all the time i have been reading and studying entrepreneurship i have come to realise that failure is some how good for the entrepreneur. It always clear that those who didn't give up on their dreams after they failed but somehow found a way to get back to their business are the extremely successful ones.
When you start a business, it's about you, your ideas, your desire to make a change in your society, community or country in the hopes that someone will be willing to pay you for the change or product you have created. In every startup, entrepreneurs represent their own brand and therefore have to play many roles. From marketing, operations to sales and accounting.When an entrepreneur decides to do it all, clearly the skill set that she's strong in comes to bear. The other skills that she does not possess or comes naturally to her, she fumbles with them (that is why i encourage partnership). Whiles trying to do hold a startup together out of stress, fear or whatever the problem is she crashes and burns. But the good thing is when you fail as as an entrepreneur you learn how not to do things like you did before. This is the entrepreneurs advantage. Being an entrepreneur makes you a strong analyst. You get to bounce ideas off your head as many times as possible always reviewing and making judgement of these ideas, your mind now is a repository of ideas. Every great product or service you see around began as an idea. From a personal experience you know what works and what doesn't. Which on hindsight is not a bad thing because its like paying for school just that this one is more hands on and your failure makes you learn a lot about yourself.
Entrepreneurship is fundamentally about taking risk, and i guess you have read how life is not "fun" for those who do not take risk and what not. But no matter how cliche these quotes are, they are true. Successful entrepreneurs are happy because they now have a leg up on something we are all breaking our backs to have that is time, money and freedom to do whatever they want to do be it travel, charity etc. So if you're considering entrepreneurship, go for it. Take that risk today. Your first startup will fail, the second too might fail, the third one might not really fail but you will sell it before it goes out of control, your final startup will be google.
PS: I leave you with another cliche quote "I have not failed. I've found 10,000 ways that won't work."-Thomas A. Edison
