7 Things Every New Entrepreneur Should Master

Whether entrepreneurs are born or made, there's a mindset required to getting started well. Here are some takeaways I've gathered for you from speaking to many successful business owners on the ReinventingPerspectives podcast:

Learn how to release the need to control outcomes.

This is huge! The single most challenging aspect of going from being an employee to a business owner is embracing the relationship between success and failure. It's impossible to reach success without failing over and over and YES over again. We are taught from school to hate failure, to avoid it at all costs, but life demands the opposite. It demands a spirit of adventure, trying things you've never done, being bad (like totally sucking) at something but doing it anyway. Not being afraid to look like a fool because you're on a quest to discover NEW things. To break new ground in your life and business, you must do things you've never done.Discoveries aren't made without a LOT of failures. REMEMBER that with each failure, you've just made a discovery, albeit not the one you intended, but you now know what doesn't work and if you're a real genius you'll seek to understand why it didn't work. Do the work and track the outcome. Feedback is your dear friend on this entrepreneurial journey.

That's just the way it is!

Momentum will keep you in the game.

Stay in the game. It's going to be tough, but you need to keep at it for long enough to begin to see results. Study what's giving the most results, and then do more of that and nothing else.

Persistence is everything. We have a natural ability to push through to meet a desire, until we're educated out of it. Think of how a baby will set their mind on walking. They can feel it's time to get to that next level of life and keep at it until they make it. They wobble. They fall. We gasp at their attempts, fearing they'll get hurt, and yet they continue undeterred. Quitting is not an option. Then somewhere along the journey of life, we are taught about instant success (which is a lie by the way). Study the lives of people you consider great and draw a timeline from the moment they set out to do something and the moment they "Arrive!" It's no walk in the park.

What keeps them going? The little signs that confirm, they're in the right direction. The presents or gifts of hope that momentum shares. When we stop taking action, momentum is lost. We have to start all over again, making it even more painful. Reduce the pain by never stopping.

Learn how to communicate purposefully.

Share what you're doing with the intention of sparking interest and challenging people to join in on your action. Get people excited about your work in this world (note I didn't say your offer - not everyone is your customer, but everyone can help spread the word about a noble cause). Marketing your business is the skill set that will make a way for everything else you're good at. If your target customers don't know who you are and what you offer, how can they possibly buy? For those of us with no marketing IQ (raised hand here!), we have to sit down and commit to doing only this: LEARN & APPLY.

There are no excuses in today's world. Everything you need to know in order to market your business is just a click away. Find the avenue that amplifies the way your genius works. Check out our Social Media Marketing Cheat Sheet here:

Set up systems for everything.

Yes EVERYTHING! It's all in the details. The busier you get, the more your sanity and smile will depend on your systems. What is the standard of doing every task? How should it be done, in what sequence, by what time, with what result, tracked in what manner? It's work that some may love, other's may fall asleep just thinking about it, but it's VERY important.

Begin to lead yourself.

Transformation is at first an inside job. Always begin with yourself. How else can you hope to bring about transformation for others when you can't even get yourself to do what you need to do?

Ask yourself: What's the vision here? What are my values? What does the best version of me look like? How will I get to that point? Then BEGIN your personal journey.

As your business grows, I always say this, you can literally make yourself redundant. The person that started the business is not the person that's capable of leading its success if they haven't developed themselves. A growth mindset is essential. We can become bottlenecks to progress because we are not the leadership that is needed at that level of success. Don't do all the dirty work just to be left outside of the house you built.

Elevate yourself to being humble.

Pride will lead to a destructive fall. I love the way Pastor Lisa Harper defined humility, she said it's not about shrinking yourself to appear small but it's about focusing on God and not ourselves. If you focus on yourself, all you will see is inadequacy and this leads to many other problems. YES, we are inadequate. YES, we don't meet the criteria. YES, this is more that we can handle. BUT IN CHRIST, ALL things we can handle. When we bring the best of our ability and a passion for serving, He fills in the rest. Release it all to God. Cast all your burdens to Him. God cares for you and I. Don't allow the weight of things to crush you. They're not your things. Give them to God and simply be open as a vessel to do His will.

Protect your peace.

Do whatever it takes to have a sound mind. When we are clouded in our minds, we can't create. Entrepreneurs are creators. We need to dream, to think, to innovate, and to execute. It's not possible to carry out our duties with no peace. Look at the life of Jesus, the demands of the ministry on his physical body were more than we can even imagine. The constant crowds looking to be fed spiritually, physically, and emotionally just sounds plain exhausting. To do that work, he often retreated to quiet places to pray. To recalibrate. To connect with God. The temptation in hustle culture is to never rest and this is contrary to God's word. We have the greatest of examples in that when God created the world, on the 7th day He rested. Why would the God who never slumbers nor sleeps take the day off? Clearly, he wasn't tired, but He set an example for how to work. Work and rest. Connect with the Prince of Peace, Jesus Christ. He holds all the answers to everything that we are facing. Remember He is the beginning and the end.

BONUS: Manage your time, don't be managed by your circumstances.

I hope you find something to take away from this article. Thank you for your time and support. Be blessed, it's always worth it when we're in alignment with our Kingdom purpose.

P.S Grab a copy of the Christian Entrepreneur's Toolkit: Are you ready for the power of a Kingdom perspective NOW AVAILABLE on amazon.com