Starting a business is NOT Easy

Starting a business is not easy. There are tons of things to consider. Here are some of the things to take note before you decide to start your own business.

1. Structure:

Just like a building without a proper structure, a business with no clear direction and structure will fall easily. There are hundreds of different options out there. As a good businessman, you must be able to decide the correct structure which fit your financial capacity and at the same time allows the company to grow. Some people establish a business that more or less stay in the same position for decades. You definitely don't want to happen to your business. Another thing to consider is what is your positioning in the market, whether you want to target the upper class, or middle. What kind of branding strategywould you want to push for. Should you decide to pay fixed salary or provide commission based structure. What is the proportion that the company need to take. What is your pricing strategy. And the list goes on and on..

2. Employing the right people:

Finding the right people for the job is often not easy.
The most important trait that you should look for is loyalty and honesty. Meaning that the person would not stab your back. The second trait is ambition. Ambition is a double edged sword. Meaning that employing ambitious people must be done in a careful manner. You must be able to align his goal with company's direction. Ambitious people are very self driven. Meaning that they can run automatically as long as they can see the finish line. Our job as a leader is to keep reminding and motivating them about their personal goal.

Training is also crucial. Untapped potential does not worth anything. In order to bring out the best in everyone, training needs to be done. A good leader leads by example. Meaning that if you expect the employee to be able to perform up to 9 out of 10, you yourself must be able to perform a 10 out of 10 consistently.

3. Marketing

The most important thing in business is marketing and sales. You will still make money as long as you can sell your products and services. Doesn't matter if you have the most advanced technology in the world if you can't even sell it. Deciding on your marketing and branding strategy is extremely hard. The reason why most businesses fail is because they can't seem to find the correct way to attract customers to use their products or services.

4. Strategic Maneuver:

Strong companies are flexible. They are not tied down by routine tasks. They are able to adapt themselves to the ever changing environment. What happens to a lot of big companies is that once they grow big, they become too large in terms of their structure which prevents them from responding to external changes. Resulting in their growth to stop.

A good businessman must be able to detect changes before it happen. They must also be able to spot any opportunities available in the market and flexibly maneuver the company direction accordingly.

When starting a business, we must be able to consistently analyze the performance and spot the bottlenecks of the whole process. Once you have grown to a certain level, sometimes the company's strategic direction would also need to be changed.

Starting a business is not easy.. But that does not mean you should not do it.