5 insanely cool ways to convince your parents that you want to fulfil your dreams of being an entrepreneur

The life of a successful entrepreneur as you see looks ravishingly fabulous with those big bungalows and cars, many high profile connection along with  big industries operating  in even bigger markets. But even after these when a youngster reveals his or her parents about her dreams of being an Entrepreneur, the very possible reply would be, “Why do you need to be an entrepreneur? You can have a 9 to 5  job with great perks working just five days a week.” And when you do not move on  and put in more emphasis on that point, then in most of the cases chances are the you will get a straight “NO!” for an answer. But it’s not always easy to explain to Mom and Dad why, instead of getting a “real job,” you’re putting everything on the line to create a new technology startup. It can be done, though, and these youthful startup veterans explain how:

Explain your idea on their terms:-       “You have to instill confidence in them, not only that your idea is a good one, but also that you are capable of actually creating it, and convincing people to use it. Selling it to them on their own terms is key.”                   

                                                                              -Tashfeen Ekram, SchedFull.com

Be completely honest:-  “Make sure you have a strong enough relationship that this will not put on undue pressure. You must have ultimate trust between each other and talk through all the risks. Make sure they understand there’s a chance the investment won’t pan out. Lastly, make sure losing the money won’t impact their livelihoods or retirement.”             

                                                                            -Aron Susman, TheSquareFoot

See their perspective:- “Understand and respect where they are coming from. Use their values, and talk from their perspective, without losing your ground on your decision.”

                                                          -Faiyaz Farouk, S2 Leadership Consultants

Convince them of your passion:- “Even though I had spent five years at school to obtain my degrees, and my parents had sacrificed financially to make that happen, they knew that life is about the journey. They saw the passion I had for becoming an entrepreneur and wanted to support me in any way possible.”

                                                                              -Aron Susman, TheSquareFoot

 Don’t Gloss over your potential problems:-“They know you very well, so you have to be honest about your shortcomings, where you might go wrong or potential problems in the business. My dad appreciated that, because someone who doesn’t have a good grasp of his shortcomings can never address them, and thus won’t realize when he is about to fail.”                                                                                                          

                                                                           -Tashfeen Ekram, SchedFull.com

But deep inside if you truly aspire to be an entrepreneur than waiting for permission won’t do, you have to tighten up the belts, lace up your shoes and get ready for the run.

If you have a passion and want to build it into a business, Evita Turquoise Robinson, founder of the Nomadness Travel Tribes has a few tips for you:-

Just Do It:-  Break out of analysis paralysis. Nothing starts in perfection—it does no matter who you are or how much money you have. At some point you have to jump, and build the parachute on your way down.

Learn as much as you can:-  Robins said  when she launched the business she was “a little bit of a lone wolf where I tried to learn everything. I never wanted to create a business where if one person leaves, they can derail the entire system, so I try to learn as much as I can. You should know how to do as much as possible.”

Ask For Help:-   “You feel like you can be on an island, but learn to open up and ask for, once you see as your idea has promise, put the proper people in place. I picked my team from my members, so I did not have to sell people on the idea, they were as passionate about it as I am. I know they will get the job done.”

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The thread line difference between a businessman and an entrepreneur

Are you a businessman or an entrepreneur? Have you ever wondered what’s the difference between the two? In vocabulary, both are synonymously similar.  Both have to form a company, start a business, sell products or solutions to customers and pay their dues. Businessmanship is not a word, but entrepreneurship is. So, what is entrepreneurship? Once, I asked a college mate majoring in management; and he just stared blank at me. Of course, anyone can consult Google and find a bunch of answers, but if I did it that way, then my post would look placidly plain, wouldn’t it?  Back in the day, everyone who owned a venture or inherited one was called a businessman, at least in India. Some of the largest business houses started out as traditional family-owned set ups too, that have been run by next generations over the decades. Business people and entrepreneurs have many similarities. They both provide jobs for the unemployed, give solutions to the consumers, and help in developing the economy of a certain nation. However, they are not the same kind of people. 

The following are 5 differences between a businessman and an entrepreneur:

• On The Originality Of Idea:

A businessman can make a business out of an unoriginal business or product idea. He enters into existing businesses, such as franchising and retailing. He chooses a hot and profitable business idea regardless of whether it is his original idea or borrowed from someone else.

An entrepreneur is an inventor and the first creator of a product. He invests time, energy and money on his own idea. He doesn’t start a business from an unoriginal idea. That is why he starts on a startup while a businessman starts on a business.

• Profit motives:

Businessmen have one primary motive-a healthy bottom line, even in the early days. In short, they want short-term gains. An entrepreneur, however, begins his journey with a people and customer-oriented outlook. Entrepreneurs we know look to solve problems, and therefore give customers what they need as opposed to what they want. Profits, therefore, are a natural progression to this goal and if thought out wisely, come late but in good measure. An entrepreneur thus, works with patience and perseverance, to see his or her idea mature, gain good traction and carves a niche, which in effect, gives rise to competitors or more businessmen!

• On The Degree Of Risks Taken:

Businessmen take calculated and managed risks. They cannot afford to lose money and suffer from bankruptcy. That is why they always do the Math when it comes to business. Entrepreneurs are like sky divers. They take crazy risks. They often don’t care of losing time and money just to pursue their passion. But since they do it with love, joy and passion, they often gain extraordinary rewards. Entrepreneurs, since they do the things they love the most, they do it with the best of themselves, resulting to greater success.

• Businessmen are highly concerned about their positions:

A businessman can become the proprietor in his owned business or say in a corporate structure he can be the Chairman, the Managing Director or the Chief Executive Officer (C.E.O) because he has whole lot of employees to manage the other tasks.

The Entrepreneur can become everything from top level President to a local sales man of his organisation, because he is damn crazy about his work that positions do not matter.

• On How He Defines Success:

A businessman defines success as the success of his business and its stakeholders. Its stakeholders include himself, co-owners, employees, customers, investors, and even his community. An entrepreneur doesn’t define success. He simply do his job and let history defines the success that he accomplished. Remember that this list is only according to my own opinion, and I don’t mean to put one of them on top of the other. Both businessmen and entrepreneurs are supposed to be the kind of people that our world needs. A businessman needs an entrepreneur. An entrepreneur may also need a businessman. There can also be a person who is partly a businessman and partly an entrepreneur.

Developing an entrepreneurial mindset

The idea of setting out on your own and starting your own business can be extremely tempting. Not only does it represent a chance to be your own boss, but it allows you the opportunity to follow your passion. However, to be successful as an entrepreneur, you need to be able to shift from an employee mindset to an entrepreneurial one.

Academic research on the psychology of entrepreneurs has shown that there is no single psychological typology (set of characteristics) that suggests an entrepreneur’s success is guaranteed. But, I would like to highlight the following six characteristics out of the many shared by successful entrepreneurs

•  Perseverance: The ability to withstand repeated rejection and disappointment is an essential part of an entrepreneur’s makeup. Successful entrepreneurs are able to draw lessons from rejection, as well as prevent it from damaging their self-esteem. Essentially, you must be able to deflect the rejection away from yourself and use it as a spur to fix flaws in your business ideas.
•  Flexibility: Entrepreneurship is a tough space to play in. Unexpected challenges and problems appear constantly. You must be flexible enough in your thinking to roll with the punches, solve problems as soon as they crop up, and recover quickly from setbacks.
• High internal locus of control: Successful entrepreneurs have faith in their ability to determine their own success. They see that their own actions, decisions, and responses are what will make or break them – not what the outside world throws at them. This means that you need to take responsibility for doing the things that need to be done.
•  Learning and iteration: When a problem occurs, a successful entrepreneur sees it as a learning opportunity. The lessons an entrepreneur takes from any given situation are then used in successive iterations of the entrepreneur’s ideas to develop and refine them.
• Curiosity: A wide-ranging curiosity about how the world works and where things tie together is extremely common among successful entrepreneurs. Always keep your mind active – this will strengthen your ability to see things from different angles and think laterally.
• Optimism: Despite all the difficulties inherent in the entrepreneurial lifestyle, successful entrepreneurs maintain an optimistic view of life and the world. Being optimistic about a situation could mean the difference between seeing it as an unsolvable problem or an opportunity to be explored.

With this in mind, as a prospective entrepreneur, you need to be able and willing to reach out to those around you for emotional support and financial backing when you need to. An environment that is accepting of failure is a huge support for most entrepreneurs. Being surrounded by people who understand that business failure is not shameful, but rather something to learn from and build on, will help you to persevere and try again.

If this is your need at this period visit Raizcorp.com, which provides the best business incubator model- “Prosperation TM”-its own unique, world-reknowned model of business incubation.

Young Entrepreneur

Oprah Winfrey

Oprah Gail Winfrey is an American media magnate, television and film producer, and talk show host with a net worth of roughly $3 billion.
With magazines, television shows and even a TV network in her portfolio, Oprah is best known for The Oprah Winfrey Show, the highest-rated talk show of all time, which ran nationally for 25 years, until 2011. The success of the show, as well as books, magazines and other ventures earned her the moniker "The Queen of All Media." And the consistent devotion of her global audience has inspired some pundits to call her the most influential woman in the world.
Winfrey was born in Mississippi to a single teenage mother in 1954. She grew up poor, moving from Mississippi to Milwaukee, Wisconsin to Nashville, Tennessee, where she started her television career as a newscaster. She landed in Chicago in the early 1980s and took over a low-rated local Chicago talk show, which she soon made the top show in the Chicago market.
Following on that modest success, Winfrey launched her own media production company, and her own show, called The Oprah Winfrey Show. With the show, Winfrey re-imagined the television talk show as a forum more intimate and confessional than previous shows had been.
Over time, the show evolved, and by the mid-‘90s had moved on to new subjects, such as literature, self-improvement and spirituality. With millions of viewers, Winfrey established herself as one of America’s foremost tastemakers in matters branching from arts to culture to religion to politics.
In 2000, she started her own magazine, called O Magazine. In 2011, after the series finale of her talk show, Winfrey founded the Oprah Winfrey Network, which reaches roughly 80 million homes, or 70.3% of television-viewing households in the United States
With a winning personality and decades of success, Oprah was the richest African-American of the 20th century, and has also been named the greatest black philanthropist in American history. In 2013, President Barack Obama awarded Winfrey the Presidential Medal of Freedom. She also holds, among many other honors, honorary doctorate degrees from Duke and Harvard Universities.

"TRIBUTE" 6 lessons every entrepreneur must learn from the life of Mahatma Gandhi

Bharatmata is writhing in anguish and pain over the loss of the man whose selfless love towards Mother India and her fellow citizens is incomparable. Let the tragedy that enacted in Delhi, give the people of India the tune, reason, rhyme and melody for the history of their future. Today on the 146^th birthday of the father of the nation I would like to share with all the Entrepreneurs out there 10 great lessons you should learn from the life of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi.

·         Conviction: - As an entrepreneur, total confidence in your ideas and abilities as well as knowledge of your shortcomings will help you build a team that compliments your skills. Gandhi believed in his ideas with utmost certitude and primarily succeeded as a consequence.

·        Self Introspection: - Gandhi constantly measured the short term traction of his movement against long term impact. He never lost sight of what kind of a country India would become after achieving independence. He continuously experimented and re-experimented. To a great extent, entrepreneurship is all about experimentation, and no better results can be expected when one experiments with self to improvise.

·       Sacrifice: - In the pursuit of his goal, Gandhi made numerous sacrifices along the way and sometimes it even meant prolonging his struggle. He was never opportunistic and knew very well that the means are as important as the end. As an entrepreneur, you are not only required to make material sacrifices at the personal level but also need to make sacrifices for the business. A business built on delighting customers with experience is far more sustainable than a business built on doling discounts.

·         Inspiring Leadership: - Gandhi always led by example and he practiced what he preached. He was first to implement what he expected his followers to do. As an entrepreneur, your job is to set examples for your team and you can’t expect to drive a team without being driven yourselves. 

·         Always Act: - “Have a bias towards action – let’s see something happen now. You can break that big plan into small steps and take the first step right away.”

·         Truth: -  Gandhi ji idolized King Harish Chandra throughout his life. He was a preacher of truth. He always believed that even if he loses something while practicing truth, in reality, he is not losing anything. This helped him keep his conscience clear in his journey. An entrepreneur, likewise, needs to take care of the truthfulness in his venture. He should not make false claims, spread rumors about his idea and also should not encourage his team members with shallow promises. He must stick to truth and encourage his team to do the same.

Similarly, Bringing it all together  an entrepreneur needs to continuously introspect as whether he is aligning himself to his thoughts or not. If he wants his team and colleagues to follow the suit, he must do it for himself. Be the example, be the leader.  If you lead properly people will follow, and together you will change the world.

Why should we work?

Why should we work?

We humans, when not unconscious, spend more time working or in education than doing anything else. Why? Do we work so that we can buy pleasures when we have time off? Do we work so we can achieve money and consequentially status, which makes us more desirable mates? Do we work because we are brought up with the idea that it is our duty and function as a member of society? Or do we work in the hope of reaching self-actualization?

 

"Work", as we know it today, is essentially there to uphold the concept that "money makes the world go round". It is there to feed the greed of power hungry individuals, from pharaohs to kings to slavers to popes and presidents. The problem is that 'work' is tied to money - a man-made mechanism of exchange that is highly controllable by institutions and those who have a lot of it.

          But that’s not the truth, the truth is however that work can never be measured in the terms of money nor can it be attached to it. “Work”, is something that builds up the character and illuminates the secret chambers of your subconscious mind. “Work” finds the answers to the questions your soul has been searching over long period of time. We are all aware of the fact that we all work to achieve something, may be name, fame, wealth, pleasures, and fulfilling unfulfilled desires. But that’s just a mere illusion…. 

The goal of mankind is knowledge. Pleasure is not the goal of man, but knowledge. Pleasure and happiness come to an end. It is a mistake to suppose that pleasure is the goal. The cause of all the miseries we have in the world is that men blindly think pleasure to be the ideal to strive for. After a time man finds that it is not happiness, but knowledge, towards which he is going, and that both pleasure and pain are great teachers, and that he learns as much from evil as from good. As pleasure and pain pass before his soul they have upon it different pictures, and the result of these combined impressions is what is called man's "character". If you take the character of any man, it really is but the aggregate of tendencies, the sum total of the bent of his mind; you will find that misery and happiness are equal factors in the formation of that character. Good and evil have an equal share in moulding character, and in some instances misery is a greater teacher than happiness.

We say Newton discovered gravitation. Was it sitting anywhere in a corner waiting for him? It was in his own mind; the time came and he found it out. All knowledge that the world has ever received comes from the mind; the infinite library of the universe is in your own mind. The external world is simply the suggestion, the occasion, which sets you to study your own mind, but the object of your study is always your own mind. The falling of an apple gave the suggestion to Newton, and he studied his own mind. He rearranged all the previous links of thought in his mind and discovered a new link among them, which we call the law of gravitation. It was neither in the apple nor in anything in the centre of the earth.

Like fire in a piece of flint, knowledge exists in the mind; suggestion is the friction which brings it out. Suggestion that leads to work which is finally followed by more suggestions and work gradually walking towards the infinite knowledge. Thus the term “work”, when defined in its widest sense means we are working all the time. I wrote this piece; that’s work, you are reading it; that’s work, you are breathing that’s work.

SO, we see that work is everywhere. It is the basic spiritual need that has to be fulfilled.

In the words of Swami Vivekananda, “Neither money pays, nor name, nor fame, it is only your character that can cleave through the adamantine world of difficulties”

10 Character points to determine if you were born to be an entrepreneur

Great entrepreneurs ever born feel that pinch in their bones of building and creating something great. They have always retained the passion to shape the world with their vision and dramatically make it a better place to live in.

Here are 10 essential characteristics possessed by the great entrepreneurial souls. Find out how many you have in common:-

Ø  You like it if you get to do a challenging task: - You find it better do something that seems next to impossible rather than searching for shortcuts and easy paths to achieve something you don’t even want.

Ø  Failure cannot dilute your faith: -  You recognise failure and success to be an everyday factor of life, so neither failure can lessen your confidence and faith in your abilities nor a big success develop over-confidence in you.

Ø  You are a great storyteller: -  You can always find a story in everything, because you discern your own life is a story meant to be lived and shared. Your stories are always able to catch the attention of your audience.

Ø  You find peace at the height of chaos: - Even when thrown into situations where you cannot find ways of your own, seemingly lost in the dark, you still find that peace of mind and the light of hope eventually comes along.

Ø  Everything bothers you: - One way or the other, you try to be a positive impact on everything that surrounds you and always logical while making a decision rather than being emotional.

Ø  You are fond of reading: - Reading always brings new information to you and it feels great re-living the words of those great historical characters. These great characters teach something new to you every time you meet them.

Ø  You always keep your ego aside: - Ego is something that disturbs your thoughts unreasonably putting strains within your urge to learn. You perceive that and kept it away locked up in a box.

Ø  You live in the present: - You are depressed if you live in the past, anxious if you are afraid of the future, but you are at peace if you are in the present.

Ø  Punctuality is a matter of great importance: - Starting and ending your work in time is of great importance for you. No Excuses.

Ø  Your failures are trampolines to bounce back: - You realize the importance of failure and you see it as an opportunity to learn from them to bounce back and stand up rather than being lost in the holdup.

 

Born to be an Entrepreneur? If you have a more than half these qualities in you then it’s a time to pursue you inner voice. Just Get On and Move On.