Startup Sunday
Now that I've started my business, I can't help but notice the similarities between being a good parent and being a successful entrepreneur. Both ventures began with planning, some money, a lot of courage and even more perseverance. Not to mention, a really good name! (Is it cool, but not too trendy? Will the other businesses make fun of it behind my back?) Then came the daydreaming, the bragging ("Check out my website - it really rocks!") and the sleepless nights. Still, you feel energized, fulfilled - and exhausted.
Voila! You're a new mother, er, entrepreneur.
Here are a few other things I've learned in my role as the former and applied to the latter:
1) Do your homework: Remember your dog-eared copy of "What to Expect When You're Expecting"? Obviously, you were driven by the need to know everything. When it came to starting a business, I was much the same. I perused countless blogs and websites, and picked the brains of as many folks as I could, especially former colleagues who had already branched out on their own. I asked tons of questions - and got some pretty good advice. Such as: Never stop asking questions. The most successful entrepreneurs always keep learning.
2) Strive to remain flexible: Of course, with all those questions will occasionally come the answers you don't want. The deadline has been moved up. Great. The meeting has been canceled. Wonderful. But ... not the end of the world. After all, wasn't having the ability to be flexible one of the main reasons many of us left the corporate 9-to-5 to begin with? Move stuff around to catch up. Or, if it's extra time you've now got, use it to pitch new clients. Or just take the afternoon off. Remember, you're the CEO now - and you won't mind.
3) Remember the essentials: Snack time (to reinvigorate), downtime (ditto), and baby wipes. I'm serious about the wipes. Many a time, I've used one to remove a stain from my blouse before a meeting, to clean a table at Starbucks before I set a laptop down, or to take off telltale signs of lunch from the back of a document. Magic!
4) Don't sweat the small stuff: In a great stroke of business foresight, this was actually the last thing my maternity-ward nurse said to me - right after she handed me a small, swaddled bundle and right before I could run. At that point, like a lot of new mothers, I became slightly - OK, incredibly - agitated: My baby - she's being exposed to the elements for the first time! The sun!! The wind!! With a sigh, the nurse pulled the blanket around my daughter a little closer and said kindly, but firmly: "Really Jeannie - if you fixate on all the silly little things, you will never get anything done."
And you know what? In business, as in parenting, she's absolutely right.
Image by Wondermonkey2k via Flickr
Great post and I agree - I don't always do it but I agree!
Posted by: Nancy | Sunday, July 11, 2010 at 09:29 AM