Bonnie Harvey, co-author of NY Times Bestseller “The Barefoot Spirit: How Hardship, Hustle, and Heart Built America’s #1 Wine Brand
Start on Your Road to Success
A lot of young people look forward to the time when they start a business of their own and make millions of dollars. Incessant reporting of young millionaires who made large sums of money developing social networks have motivated our youth to find that one-hit, one-time formula that can surely make them millions as well.
Is this dream real?
It is nice to dream that you will be a successful businessperson at a young age, but believe it or not, you do need to prepare for success. It is easy to say that you will find a miracle drug, an infallible software program, or make a video blog that will have all sorts of sponsorship coming your way. It would be difficult to swallow that out of a hundred or so ideas, only a handful would take flight, and only a couple would achieve cruising altitude.
Before you even think of making your first million, you must first accept that to make money at a young age, you should also master business skills at a young age.
How do you start becoming an entrepreneur?
No matter how lucky and able you feel, you need proper education. This is not only found in schools, you can also acquire this by apprenticing with the right businessperson/s. The right training will be your foundation in building your dreams. So, as early as now, be ready to commit to your goals.
Value training that will help you in your quest to become a successful businessperson. Financial savvy does not come instantaneously; you need to learn the theory and practice it even with the meager money you have now.
Where do you find training?
There are a lot of ways to learn, one is in an educational institution. Do not knock down theories; these ideas may seem “old” to you, but they have been proven time and again to work. Keep these in mind and understand the reasons behind them. You will never know when they will come in handy.
Another is through seminars and workshops. Entrepreneurship is a combination of different skills such as financial management, people management, germinating ideas, becoming a great leader, etc. There are a lot of institutions that offer seminars and training workshops on these.
Also, you can try researching on contemporary leaders and read their stories. (Some of them you will find here on ManagerMojo.com.) Most of these successful entrepreneurs are either published writers or have had their stories translated into a book. Reading about their experiences, struggles, and way of overcoming obstacles may help you avoid some mistakes on your way to becoming a success.
Finally, you can try and find yourself a role model, someone whose story strongly captivates you. There are hundreds of successful people willing to share their knowledge and experiences with younger generations. You may share the same set of values with this role model, or his/her story may be an inspiration for you to achieve higher goals; either way, having a hero of sorts can help you find your own spot.
Steve Caldwell
As a self-professed “manager from hell,” Steve Caldwell learned through the hard knocks of making mistakes while building a career. Today he serves as a leadership coach, mentor and role model guiding high achieving managers to become the strong leaders their companies, employees and the world needs. He is also author of the book Manager Mojo – Be the Leader that Others Want to Follow (available on Amazon).
“In all arenas, we suffer from a lack of leadership talent,” Steve observes. “Every day employees are promoted into management with no training or support to guide their development into leadership positions. You don’t have to be born to lead. You can learn to lead.” He can be reached by email at [email protected] or by phone at (415) 670*9543.
