I want to be an entrepreneur. What to do?

@abrakadabra • Oct 23, 2024

Oct 23, 2024

1.1K

So, today some random guy wrote me an email this morning that has the above sentence only.
And like always, I pointed to this forum and asked him to put his question here. Looks like, like most newbie CEans, he must have felt awkward to start a thread with such a topic.

Hence, I thought why don't I do it. There are hundreds of people around us who want to start something of their own. All that they know is "I want to be an entrepreneur." So, what to do?

Let us keep this question open for all CEans to answer. If someone asks you such a question, what would you say to him/her?

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Kaustubh Katdare

@thebigk • Mar 23, 2012
I had answered similar question at one of the panel discussions I was a part of. My answer was something like this :-

If you want to be an entrepreneur, here's your checklist :-
- First have a *solid* reason why you want to be an entrepreneur & not do something else. If your reasons are "because I want to be rich"; then I'd advise think of something else.
- Second - test your inner fire. The thought of 'starting-up' should make you restless and sleepless. If the thought just pops up in your mind once in a while; then you better deal with it through Yoga and meditation. When the thought of starting your venture or seeing your ideas come to reality becomes unbearable; that you just keep thinking about it day and night, when you are in bathroom or in toilet; then you are ready.
- Third; figure out what kind of entrepreneur you want to be. The answer to this question will come from knowing your own interests. This is the hardest step! It's difficult to find out what your interests are and is often a long process. The only way to find out what you really love doing is to keep trying several things that you think are of your interest. I like the quote from Jeremy Shoemaker of ShoeMoney ( a highly popular blog on making money online ). He said I'm successful because I was blogging when there was no one to visit my site and see what I was writing about, I am blogging when there are so many people reading my stuff and tomorrow I'll continue to blog even if everyone just went away. I do it for 'myself', not for 'others'.
- Third - just start doing it!
- Fourth - read a *lot*. If you don't have ideas or are stuck with problems, then read a *lot* about what other entrepreneurs have done. How they solved problems and how they dealt with tough problems they faced. Reading opens up your mind. By reading a lot, I'm not saying picking up a book, flipping few pages and then going back to Facebook to see what your friends are doing. Go find out all the books which you think will help you. Do it unless you're in the step #2 above.
- Keep thinking about whether what you're doing can be turned into business. Trust me, if you think hard enough; you will find several ways. If Coca Cola can sell sugar water for several decades; you can surely figure out how to make money through your ideas.
- Develop a fearless attitude. Today or tomorrow; you'll have to deal with people and business is all about people. Stick these words right on your pupils: "Screw It! Let's Do It!". That attitude helps almost everywhere.
- There's a LOT of fun in proving people wrong and watching their mouths shut. But it will take time.Last: Enjoy the game. No one dies of entrepreneurship. Our time is running out fast and if we don't do what we want to do; we won't be proud of ourselves when we are 80 year old.
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avii

@avii-TGGs8o • Mar 23, 2012
In beginning CE I had mentioned that I will be an entrepreneur in coming few days & actually I am 😉
- Actually I was not interested in monies, but got a good opportunity & made use of it 😀
- I did not read any books related to entrepreneurship. Now I have started reading them & getting some really good ideas / suggestions.
- I started with as less money as possible, so I that won't be in loss if things didn't go as planned. But things turned great 😁
- There are 4 types of entrepreneurs [according my engg. syllabus 😁]
1. 1. Innovative Ent. : These people invent & bring something new product / market.
  2. Imitative Ent. : These people copy / adopt from already successful business
  3. Fabian : Changes the model only when they have no option other than closing the business
  4. Drone : Rather chose to sink than bring change 😛
- Risk factor plays a vital role if you gonna be an Innovative Ent. for obvious reasons
- I belong to type of Imitative. I took an already successful business.
- Only question I asked myself was "What I am providing something different than others are not so that customers will be interested in me / my business ?"
I really cannot reveal what I am doing, but it's nothing illegal 😁 Thing is, currently my business is in just Alpha mode [not even Beta] & already I have got good clients. Currently I don't have any website for my business & it's only a private / limited service. But things started turning so well I got good clients very soon cos I explained each of them why should they do business with me. Actually I was planning for MS & as things didn't go well as planned, I will prepare for GATE 2013. Since I suck totally at my basics, I have taken GATE seriously & will enroll in some coaching classes. I will be selling my company [ofcourse with a good profit 😁 ]. Seeing heavy amount of transactions in my bank account my dad thinks I am doing some illegal things like hacking etc 😨

Things I learned :
- Believe in yourself & your ideas.
- Think always about it. Always think how you can bring something new, how you can satisfy* your customers.
- In beginning, you will get both, potential customers & trolls, explain them patiently why should they do business with you even though you are beginner & there are already big players
- You need to spend lots of time & less sleep. I used to sleep only 4-5 hours a day & worked hard.
- Make sure you have good future plans & strategies. [otherwise you will screw up like me 😒]
- Don't care about friends / relatives who discourage you "Tumh kya kar sakte ho" types. And always respect constructive criticism.
- Do extensive research on it before starting up, observe what your would be competitors offering. See if you can offer same at less price. [but not so less that you'd be in loss]
- Don't care much about money / profit etc in beginning. Build a good reputation first.
- So am I sad for selling my infant little Beta company ? Hell no. I have understood insides of it & I am pretty much confident I can start over again ! All the best 😁
*don't get naughty on this 😁
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Kaustubh Katdare

@thebigk • Mar 23, 2012

#-Link-Snipped-# : Good to hear that! I'm sure you'll inspire a lot of our fellow CEans. When you are comfortable, do share the details so that you can inspire people! I liked :

Only question I asked myself was "What I am providing something different than others are not so that customers will be interested in me / my business ?"
Those who're stuck with the problem of "Which business should I get into?", I think the following could be very useful:-

Entrepreneurship revolves around solving problems! You need not be very innovative to come up with a ground breaking business idea or be a rocket scientists to 'invent something' and then sell it. Think about existing businesses and figure out how many of them are innovative. You'll realize that 99% of the businesses aren't innovative at all. They just solve some problem for the people who become their customers. Think of a regular grocery shop near your house? What problem does it solve? It makes it convenient to the things you need by bringing them close to your home. What problem does Google solve? It helps you find great content you're looking for on the Internet. What problem does Toyota solve? It gives solves the problem of personal transportation and so on.

Now think what problem can you solve? Think of the problems associated with the fields of your interest! For example; when I started CE, I was looking for a place where all the engineers working on mega & extreme engineering projects come together to solve problems. But I didn't find any; so I thought of starting CE. We may not have many engineers who work on mega-projects; but we did gather a great bunch of super amazing engineers who're going to rule tomorrow's world.

The point I want to make is that you should find the problems associated with the domain you are interested in. If you can solve that problem for yourself; be assured that there will be several problem who'll be benefited by your solution. You just need to figure out how to offer your solution to others and then build a business around it. It's not 'that' difficult; and you'll learn everything in the process. There's no institution in this world that can tell you how to do business. The MBA institutes will tell you how to run someone else's business; but not how to do business.

Remember: Screw It! Just Do It! 😀

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avii

@avii-TGGs8o • Mar 23, 2012

^exactly !

and also for "Which business should I get into?", one should always try to do something what they love.

and yes, I will be sharing about my ventures once everything gets sorted out 😀
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avii

@avii-TGGs8o • Mar 23, 2012

Anyone read Business Line here ? Yesterday they gave a supplement related to Entrepreneur Awards & it has full of inspiring stories. Do read it guys 😀
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surajssd009005

@surajssd009005-6T8n02 • Mar 24, 2012

avii
Anyone read Business Line here ? Yesterday they gave a supplement related to Entrepreneur Awards & it has full of inspiring stories. Do read it guys 😀
please can you give the link for it....,?
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Manish Goyal

@manish-r2Hoep • Apr 1, 2012

One of the point that i had realized in past few days is that you have to be a good decision maker

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Anoop Kumar

@anoop-kumar-GDGRCn • Apr 1, 2012

I like this

The_Big_K
"Screw It! Let's Do It!"

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ISHAN TOPRE

@ishan-nohePN • Apr 2, 2012

goyal420
One of the point that i had realized in past few days is that you have to be a good decision maker
Yeah, you cannot afford to confuse in minor things.
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Kaustubh Katdare

@thebigk • Apr 2, 2012

Decision making is actually over-rated. It's very easy; in my opinion. We spend a lot of time thinking whether the decision we're taking is going to be right or wrong. The fact is, no one knows! So the best way to take a decision is to figure out all the facts to the best of your capabilities and base your decision on information or data you have. That's the only thing we can do. Everything else is out of our control at the time of taking decisions.

...and if you have an entrepreneurial attitude; you'll any way figure out how to take decisions to grow your venture.
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Vignesh Raghav

@vignesh-raghav-zyV2ib • Apr 26, 2012

Entrepreneurship is seen by different people at different perspectives . Some prefer by reading biographies of honchos and business tycoons .Some have innate talent to pursue . Some prefer to have some motivation from their business heirs . Some management or technical capabilities and at last some crazy ideas works out !

So ones own way of reaching a goal differs from others . But ultimately boils down to '3 spell' 1) Passion towards ur target and ur long term goals 2) Peoples management 3) Monetary fund (You can arrange these bullets at any order) but without these three your thoughts become futile . This is also one among many perspectives 😘

But always action speaks better (absolutely no idea about reaction) !!! 😉
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Vivien.hugo

@vivienhugo-DUw6tZ • Apr 26, 2012

Starting my own business? Maybe in future. I'm going to think carefully before I do.
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Ankita Katdare

@abrakadabra • Apr 28, 2012

Vignesh Raghav
Entrepreneurship is seen by different people at different perspectives . Some prefer by reading biographies of honchos and business tycoons .Some have innate talent to pursue . Some prefer to have some motivation from their business heirs . Some management or technical capabilities and at last some crazy ideas works out !

So ones own way of reaching a goal differs from others . But ultimately boils down to '3 spell' 1) Passion towards ur target and ur long term goals 2) Peoples management 3) Monetary fund (You can arrange these bullets at any order) but without these three your thoughts become futile . This is also one among many perspectives 😘

But always action speaks better (absolutely no idea about reaction) !!! 😉
Good points. Could you describe what do you mean by people management?
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Vignesh Raghav

@vignesh-raghav-zyV2ib • Apr 28, 2012

#-Link-Snipped-# ... As a Software Engineer my quote : " Easiest way to enter into software company bcos an IT company's objective 'Bystanders will be recruited(though they dont have a written policy)'.But its the most toughest job to survive . The reason being dissatisfaction in the nature of work . People's strengths and weakness are not identified . People still work in an IT only bcos of lucrative salary (but still qualification discrimination exists- lesser the qualification ,more the humiliation) . When a people's potential is identified then the management knows where to place them . Ok now the point , as an entrepreneur most important precept is (not the management capability,innovative ideas or creativity) but controlling one's emotions with the people . When there is a disagreement among the people,its the entrepreneur's skill not to lose control and burst out but understand the situation and handle the people without anger bcos entrepreneurship is a collective success not single man's victory . Whoever he/she recruits for their ideas to work should work with equanimity but not with partiality(respects people's thoughts ) . So people's management come into big picture .Then we can identify where to place the people .

BTW , sorry for the lengthy post... 😘 I can still go lengthy .... 😏

AbraKaDabra... Disclaimer : The afore mentioned thoughts and insights are from my point of view and are subjected to market risk . Please read the policy document . 😎

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Kaustubh Katdare

@thebigk • Apr 28, 2012

On a counter note: Lengthy posts are welcome that add value to the discussion.
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Vignesh Raghav

@vignesh-raghav-zyV2ib • Apr 28, 2012

The_Big_K ... thanks 😁
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Ankita Katdare

@abrakadabra • Apr 28, 2012

#-Link-Snipped-# Right, now I get the point.

1. Controlling one's emotions with the people.
2. Working with equanimity but not with partiality (respects people's thoughts)

These are what we call leadership skills. An entrepreneur has to lead by setting example. ☕

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Vignesh Raghav

@vignesh-raghav-zyV2ib • Apr 29, 2012

#-Link-Snipped-# , yep you got the point 👍

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