Are you currently working at or ever had a job that you didn’t like? When you wake up in the morning, you drag yourself out of bed and force yourself to go to work. When you get to work, sit down in your cubicle and begin crunching numbers your heart really isn’t in it. You’re not giving your best self to your employer. At most, you’re giving about half, and while this might get you a paycheck, it is death to an entrepreneurial venture.
So instead, you want to give yourself – your best self – which is the person that is going to work the hardest, the person that is going to persevere the longest, and the person that is going to ultimately take you to success. You want to be the kind of person that other people will look at and comment on how hard you work and how much you give to your business. Every single day you need to be the best self that you can be. That doesn’t mean that you need to be perfect. No one is perfect. But it does mean that you can look back at the end of the day and say: “I did a good job today.”
Things That You Can Do as an Entrepreneur to Be Your Best Self
- Don’t show up late for work. Show up early instead. Sit down at your computer to do whatever it is that you need to do to make your business work, whether that is marketing, building a website, or simply finding a good opportunity for entrepreneurial success. That is going to be your job. You should be twice as committed as you are to your day job to the time that you spend working on your business and building your success.
- Be willing to help others. If you encounter someone that could use some of the skills that you possess, consider spending some of your free time helping them. For example, if you’re an editor, and a colleague needs someone to look over a rough draft, although you don’t receive money from helping your peer, it could pay back dividends down the road. If there is such a thing as karma, you’ll be building the good kind as well.
- Develop relationships. No one succeeds in a vacuum, and the relationships that you build with other people can help you much later in life as well as build lasting friendships. Some people will only build a relationship with someone who they think is in a position to help them with their business, and this is a huge mistake. Why? You never know when somebody that you have developed a friendship or working relationship with (who may not be able to help you now) may suddenly find themselves in a position to help you achieve success.
- Start to cultivate patience. Many entrepreneurs want success right away. There is nothing wrong with this, but you’re going to want to learn to be patient if you’re in business for yourself because it can take a while to see the fruits of your labor. Rarely is someone an “overnight success.” It is much more likely that they worked hard to get where they are, and you just weren’t aware of it.
- Be flexible when necessary. One of the problems that entrepreneurs run into, particularly if they are the type of personality that likes a very rigid set of rules and working guidelines, is getting stuck at an impasse because something happened that they couldn’t plan for. Things are going to disrupt your plan for success, no matter how much you try to prepare for every eventuality and the only way that you’re going to overcome those challenges is to be flexible.
- Be honest. Use integrity in all of your personal and business dealings. If you think that a product that you are considering is of poor quality, or there’s some reason why it is not a good product to sell, don’t sell it. If someone comes to you and offers to make your website rank a whole lot higher using black hat SEO techniques or asks you to perform work that is shady, tell them no. You want to be the kind of businessperson that customers can depend on and trust, and violating that trust will cost you.
Don’t Multitask
Everyone talks about multitasking like it’s the greatest thing since sliced bread, but the truth is multitasking can actually cost you time spent on your project. In fact, studies show that you not only have a 40% reduction in the amount of work that you get done, but that you actually might be damaging your brain by multitasking. People tend to like multitasking, either because it offers them variety and makes work seem to go by faster or because they’ve been told it increases their productivity. Instead of multitasking, give whatever project that you are currently working on your full focus. In fact, give your current project 110% and watch your productivity rise drastically.
Make Sure Your Heart Is in It
You want to make sure that your heart is in what you’re doing on two different fronts. First, make sure that you are passionate about what you’re doing to achieve success, and you’re completely invested in the project. Second, make sure that you are invested in whatever specific project that you’re currently working on. If your heart isn’t in it, then consider outsourcing it to someone who is more passionate about it than you are. For example, if social media is not your forte, hire a freelancer who can create and post engaging content. If you have been trying to design a company logo, and you find yourself getting frustrated, consider hiring a graphic designer or using one of the premium logo services online.
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