adminStudies have tried to answer the question time and time again: “what are the characteristics of a successful entrepreneur?” This article is going to cover a few characteristics considered to be high on the list for those who succeed in home based businesses.
1. Self-confidence
This is the power of having confidence in yourself and believing in your strengths and abilities. Self-confidence is one of the characteristics of successful entrepreneurs because it implies an unshakeable belief in yourself. Most of us come across issues of self-confidence at some point in our lives and at the best of times, we can get around them. One of the strategies we have learnt to use over the years is avoidance – finding a way to get around the issue at hand. However, there are times when we can’t get out of it, or we really don’t want to. If a lack of self-confidence is preventing you from doing or trying something new, starting your home business or from succeeding in all parts of your life, it’s time to do something about it.
An understanding of where the low self-confidence is stemming from is a great place to start. The low self- confidence you see is only the fruit, but find out the root of this problem. Is it something that happened in your childhood? Were you teased or bullied in your youth? Was a careless word thrown at you and it stuck with you all these years? All these experiences might have stripped you of your self-esteem and your belief in yourself. If you grew up feeling inadequate or you had such a horrid boss who kept comparing you to your colleagues and found you lacking, all these are enemies of your success. Don’t ignore these feeling of low self-confidence, in fact try something today – affirm yourself, tell yourself the opposite of what you were told or what you believed about yourself.
You owe it to yourself and to your business to kill those thoughts of inadequacy creeping in your mind each time you have a task set before you. Boost your self-confidence by listening to motivational speakers who incite you into taking back control of your self-confidence.
2. Achievement Oriented
On our continued quest to find the characteristics of a successful entrepreneur, we come across an achievement orientation. This is a desire or drive to excel, advance and grow. We can agree that when starting or launching a home business, we need to have this characteristic at its optimum within us in order to succeed. Being achievement oriented helps you to gain amazing results through being focused and having a sustained effort within your business. Having a home business is different because you don’t really have anyone pushing you to achieve your goals, it has to be a deep desire within you to achieve a specific goal – start listing what you want to achieve and you will find that you can work your way down the list in no time. Starting small is always the recommended way- don’t overwhelm yourself – you will get spooked into inaction!
Similar to self-confidence, start small. Part of being achievement oriented is self-management and having a positive outlook on life.
3. Risk-Taker
There is a chance of loss inherent in reaching for any goal, yet you have the confidence necessary to take calculated risks to achieve your goals as a risk taker – this makes it one of the characteristics of a successful entrepreneur. We won’t skirt around the fact that there will always be the risk that a business start-up will fail, but the risk an entrepreneur puts forth may also result in a profitable business. The entrepreneur understands the risks and determines to move forward in spite of those risks.
Many new home business owners have dipped their toes in the lake of risks and have yielded such positive results, they want to go for a long swim in it. This article is to encourage you to be one of these successful entrepreneurs, but we have to warn you that taking risks should not be done blindly and without knowledge or forethought – do a risk assessment to gauge whether you can emerge unscathed or whether your business is not stable enough to take a hit from the risk. Plan carefully and work hard, don’t gamble unnecessarily with your children’s legacy (your business).
4. Positive Thinking
Wow, we are on a roll with these characteristics of a successful entrepreneur. The next one is one we mentioned before – having a positive attitude or outlook.
Negative thinking is just not allowed – so kick it to the kerb right now! You must truly believe that there is nothing hard enough to stop or distract you from reaching your goals. Positivity is contagious and when it spreads, it can open doors to new ideas, customers, friends and many other opportunities.
The more positivity you bring out, the greater the chances for you to succeed in your home business leading to longer lasting happiness. It’s not as easy as it sounds, but takes at times every ounce of determination from within you to squeeze out some positivity. Our negative experiences mess up our positive outlook, but as a budding home business owner, train yourself to reprogramme your mind toward being positive.
5. Persistent Action
An important fact to note at this point is that all these characteristics of a successful entrepreneur have to be put together for success to materialise. If you have positive thinking but no clear goal or no element of risk taking, you may struggle to excel in your business venture. You have to take action, no excuses allowed. This action must also be persistent – the last of the characteristics of a successful entrepreneur we will talk about today. If at first you don’t succeed, try, try, try again – remember that song we used to sing as children? Unknowingly, even at a young age, the games we played were teaching us persistence.
As an entrepreneur, learn to make a decision, act on it and use persistence to make it materialise into what you envisage it to be. We’ll leave you with a quote from Sir Winston Churchill: “Success is the ability to go from one failure to another with no loss of enthusiasm.”
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