Category: Entrepreneur

Characteristics of an Entrepreneur

What is an entrepreneur? According to Wikipedia, an entrepreneur is a person who has possession of an enterprise, or venture, and assumes significant accountability for the inherent risks and the outcome. To translate it into simple terms, an entrepreneur owns a business of which the entrepreneur is responsible for the risks and outcomes. To be an entrepreneur, one has to possess defined characteristics of an entrepreneur.

What are the characteristics of an entrepreneur? Are these characteristics vital? It’s a no-brainer actually, of course it’s important! Your chances of business success is significantly lower if you do not possess these characteristics. The characteristics of an entrepreneur consists of:

1. Good leadership

Leadership is a rare characteristic. It is very hard to find individuals with good leadership qualities. This is because not many people dare to take responsibility, or take the lead. Alan Keith of Genetech once said, “Leadership is ultimately about creating a way for people to contribute to making something extraordinary happen.” Precise and right to the point.

To be a good entrepreneur, you must be a leader. You must be able to guide, direct, influence and affect people. This way, all your business problems can be overcomed with ease.

2. Risk taker

All businesses involve risks. There is not a single business in the known world right now that is 100% risk-free. You can’t make money if you are not willing to take risks. If you are not willing to take risks, then you are bound to fail in the business world.

But, a successful entrepreneur does not take all the risks he faces. All risks must be evaluated first, before taking the dive. You wouldn’t want to dive into some unknown waters, would you?

3. Honest and Trustworthy

This is an undeniable characteristic that all entrepreneurs MUST have. Let’s face it, would you give your money to some stranger that guarantees you to make 1000% profit on the street? No you would not. Maybe if that stranger asked for $10 dollars or he convinced you with hard facts, you would, but that’s out of the case. As the saying goes,”Honesty is the best policy.” Every one likes honest and trustworthy people.

Being honest and trustworthy is considered one of your most important characteristics. It would take years to build your credibility and honesty, but it would take just a few seconds to totally destroy your image should you do something dishonest.

4. Your Passion

Your passion fuels your actions. And your actions make money. Any entrepreneur should be passionate about their business to be able to perform well. You must maintain your enthusiasm and interest in your field. For example, when making money online is your passion, you wouldn’t feel working even if you stick yourself to the monitor 24hours a day.

Your passion makes it easy for you to act. Working no longer means working when you work with your passion. It just means doing something you like. If you like to play games and playing games is your 12-hour job, it certainly wouldn’t feel like working 12 hours a day.

5. Intelligence

No, I don’t mean you need to have exceptionally high IQ to success. But what I mean is that an entrepreneur should be clever and witty in all your business dealings. You have to show that you are concentrated and 100% focused on your job to be able to gain your clients’ respect and trust.

The world is a mean one. Scammers are out there somewhere, preying for a weak target everyday. To resist being scammed or being duped, an entrepreneur should be smart and be alert of who you are dealing with. If not, you would eventually suffer some uncalculated losses.

These are one of the few characteristics of a successful business entrepreneur. These characteristics will, no doubt, help you overcome obstacles you may have to face when you are operating a business. And without these characteristics, your business may eventually fail and you will have to bear the losses.

What if you have the main characteristics of an entrepreneur already? Then study the market, find a solution or make a product, get some capital and you’re ready to make a killing in the ever-changing world of business.

You just signed up your first “platinum” client and you’re both excited to get to work. The first month is a breeze and you’re thinking, “Why don’t I have more woman entrepreneur clients just like this one?” when your assistant notifies you that your super-star client’s credit card just bounced.

“Uh-oh,” you think. “Was it just me who thought we were doing so well?” You’re uncomfortable, you begin to doubt yourself or your abilities and on top of all the emotional upheaval, you’re now wondering how you’re going to handle this sticky money situation.

Sticky money situations in business include bounced payments, late payments, requests for refunds, program cancellations and postponements, changes in a client’s circumstances and even disappearing clients.

How you handle these situations impacts more than your cash flow. Depending on the choices you make, you can strengthen your connection to your soul’s values, increase your integrity, raise your confidence as a woman entrepreneur and yes, even salvage your client relationship plus get you paid.

Here are six quick tips that I’ve learned as a business coach to gracefully and authentically handle sticky money situations in business:

Business Coaching Tip #1: Understand
Understand that your feelings of anger, betrayal, resentment or self-doubt are simply a smoke-screen for what’s really going on below the surface. Your client’s actions aren’t personal and have nothing to do with you. Once you stop taking it personally you’ll see you have several options for handling the situation.

Business Coaching Tip #2: Compassion
Put yourself in the other person’s shoes just for a moment. If you were her, how would you be feeling? You don’t have to condone her behavior but if you can momentarily see the situation from her eyes, you’ll gain the upper hand and can negotiate a solution like a successful entrepreneur.

Business Coaching Tip #3: Perspective
Ask yourself, “What is the worst that can happen?” Often, just asking yourself this question helps put the situation into perspective. Sure, not being paid is a drag, but in the grand scheme of things, will it make a difference for you long term?

Business Coaching Tip #4: Truth
When you speak to your client about the situation don’t mince words, don’t try to make it better for them or defend yourself. Simply state the facts, then pause and let them respond.

For example, earlier this year a business coaching client’s credit card bounced two months in a row. I simply said to her, “This is the second month your payment has bounced, what’s going on?” That opening gave her the opportunity to explain the problems she was having in her personal life and the chance for her and me to make alternate arrangements.

Tip #5: Boundaries
When it comes to sticky money situations the woman entrepreneur often sidesteps making direct requests. You have every right to straight-forwardly request: “I need you to honor our agreement and make sure I receive payment in full by Friday. How do you plan to make that happen? And for goodness sakes, no successful entrepreneur continues to deliver services on a promise when what she is owed is a payment!

Tip #6: Forgive
Forgive yourself! Successful entrepreneurs consider encounters with sticky money situations as opportunities to clean up money values and boundaries. Learning isn’t always free and my experience as a business coach has been that the expensive lessons are the ones that stick!

While no one relishes sticky money situations, you now have a simple system for addressing them quickly and confidently. A “money and soul” based business means you respond first to the integrity of your own soul, and then respond with integrity to the situation at hand. Remember this and you can’t go wrong, no matter how sticky the situation!

Tommy Belesis is the initiator and the CEO of the company, John Thomas Financial which is a financial service providing company, based on New York City. This company was founded in the year of 2007 and often regarded as the biggest milestone of the career of Belesis, who was mainly a broker and banker of Wall Street.

He has also appeared on a regular basis on broadcast media, which includes CNBC and FOX Business News. He also has a fair bit of interest in the politics and right now actively serving national politics. He has appeared both on and off screen roles on the movie Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps. In this piece of movie he has appeared as a trader next to Jacob, aka Jake Moore. In the movie he is also the advisor of Oliver Stone! The movie has been able to portray a true view of Wall Street and a huge amount of credit goes to John Thomas, aka Tommy Belesis.

John Thomas Financial is a private firm, providing financial services and the firm is dedicated to the discrete brokerage and investment banking requirements of its clients. The company research on the dynamics, which affect the worlds markets and they understand the aspects that further development and achievement in the industries that stimulate the global economic engines.
John Thomas financial was founded in order to maintain its strict principles of honesty, admirable services, consistency and a devotion to customer success. Thomas Belesis believes that companies create wealth for the clients and value for its owner. The proper market research and dedication lead the company to achieve the customers trust. The employees put their entire energy and effort in order to bring success to the customers and so to the company.

He is a proven leader and besides his work background, his status as a leader extends beyond the financial and brokerage world. He has been honored with many laurels, awards and titles. He received the Bronx GOP Man of the Year Award, in the year 2009 and in 2011 he received the award for the Business of the Year which was given by the New York Republican County Committee.

After reading a story about Cameron’s companies, a Japanese company contacted him and invited him to Japan and to be an Advisory Board Member to FutureKids in Tokyo. He was invited to Japan by the CEO of the company.
Continuing Cameron’s story, although he didn’t win the Junior Achievement Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award, he did hire the 16 year old winner to work for him on his next Internet venture where together they created SurfingPrizes.com. Cameron recognized the inefficiencies in a similar business and quickly designed a more effective business concept. The company’s product was online advertising that paid its customers to view ads they wanted to see online. This business became his most successful and from it he learned the power of improving on existing ideas.

Board at Age 15: Certainly Not – Bored at Age 15
Quickly Cameron began to receive international attention. After reading a story about Cameron’s companies, a Japanese company contacted him and invited him to Japan and to be an Advisory Board Member to FutureKids in Tokyo. He was invited to Japan by the CEO of the company. With his experience building businesses on the Internet at such a young age, it was a perfect match. FutureKids taught Japanese kids about computers and the Internet, allowing them exposure and hands-on training that they would not otherwise have access to. Cameron continued this work and also became a consultant to Fortune 500 companies.

The Japanese media blitz thrust his name into every Japanese household. It was not long before he was approached to have his biography written by a Japanese ghostwriter. The book was called, 15 Year Old CEO, and was published in Japan becoming an overnight best seller.

Secret Principles on Entrepreneurship
You Call The Shots is a book Cameron authored on learning how to succeed your way and living the life you want. In his book he divulges the 19 essential principles he lives by when creating his business ventures. It is these same principles that he developed over time that has accelerated his own success at such an early age. These principles are fundamental and apply to anyone starting or growing a business. I’ll share one of them here.

Principle #2: Start Small
If starting a new business, look for success in a business that requires minimal cash investment and has the ability to generate a strong word of mouth marketing. This will help to build your confidence and put you ahead of the game. Cameron repeatedly demonstrated the success of this principle beginning at the young age of 9 years old.

Look for more of Cameron’s principles in my next article!

The holiday season is the time to really escape the pressures of daily work schedules and really treasure time off with family and friends. For many entrepreneurs, its also a time of reflection on the life and business lessons learned over the previous 12 months. The biggest challenge in moving forward and making fresh breakthroughs for the New Year is deciphering it all and getting a fresh Key Perspective – a 360 degree perspective which includes determining what areas are your strengths and what areas you may need to seek advice and/or assistance in. With regards to getting business assistance, it is equally important in determining when, where, and how to receive it.

how to become a successful entrepreneur

A few years ago on a holiday trip back to my home town of Little Rock, Arkansas, I was able to spend a little quality time with family and some old friends. One day I found myself in a room with my rambunctious, 3-year-old nephew while others were in another part of the house. Perhaps happy and overjoyed to see me or on a sugar-induced escapade, he began jumping on the bed and bumping off the walls. Instinctively, I say to him something that my granddad would have said to me at that age. I said, Boy, keep that up and youll fall flat and bust your head right down to the white meat.

He pauses for a moment, stares curiously as if he just heard an odd foreign language, and then quickly returns to his super-hyperactivity running into another part of the house. Less than 10 minutes later, I hear a loud CRASH-Kabooom!! Immediately followed by crying. Within a few minutes, my nephew slowly walks back into the room rubbing both eyes and sits next to me. Softly and slowly he says, Uncle Ricky, I bump my head on da white meat.

Trying to hold in a good chuckle, I replied; Well, maybe not down to the white meat this time, but, what have we learned here?

Meet Our business development consultant Expert online at https://www.linkedin.com/in/dereklharris

As a business adviser, analyst, and mentor, Ive encountered this same scenario many times before. Not with three-year-olds, but mostly with young twenty and thirty-something entrepreneurs and a few middle-aged business owners as well. Usually because of our egos, pride and/or do-it-yourself tendencies, we sometimes ignore the good advice and/or business assistance available to us. And it sometimes takes a few bumps and lumps to get through to us. Believe me, as a young business owner in the 80s and 90s; Ive certainly had my share.

But as you mature into a successful entrepreneur and possibly into a Breakthrough Entrepreneur, you begin to learn from other peoples failures and mistakes and trust the expertise of others. You also begin to see the true value of outside assistance through advice, education and training. Youll even be able to translate those into measurable returns on investment. Of course no one person can know everything, be qualified to do everything, and/or keep up-to-date with all the details of your business. So thats why being able to filter, discern, and utilize the assistance of others is an essential skill you should develop. So, how do you go about getting the right business assistance?

Frame Your Business Problems, Dilemmas, and/or Ideas

Framing the Business Problem, Dilemma and/or Idea should always be your first step in finding the right answers and best solutions. When working with a client or mentee, I usually request that they follow a similar format to the one below to save on time and add clarity to the discussion.
Each question, problem, or dilemma should be written with pencil and paper in 1-2 paragraphs and in 5 sentences or less. They should answer these following questions:

What are the main objectives or ultimate goals for your business?
What are the backgrounds and core competencies of you and your business team?
What is the problem or dilemma and its background or history within your business?
What do YOU think are possible solutions?
What are the effects of each solution implemented 6-12 months down the road?

Its okay if you cant answer them all. It’s just an indication that you need help defining the problem or idea. This is more common than you think. If fact, as an executive business analyst, Ive met with several business owners that would often discuss what they thought were problems of their businesses. However, put under a microscope those problems turned out to be symptoms of a much deeper problem below the surface. In the complexities of business, it can be easy to mistake a symptom for a problem. Framing helps business owners and entrepreneurs think more deeply, focus, and begin to clarify. A wrong question never gets the right answer.

Determine what type of Business Assistance you need.

When framing, it is very important to think long and hard about what your life + business challenges are and how they relate to one another. Once youre clear on what questions you want and need answered, then youll be more apt to determine what type of assistance is actually needed. Usually it boils down to three types:

Business Advice
Business Skill-set Acquisition or Training
Business Education
Ive always said that some people just need advice; others need to acquire & develop skill-sets, while others may need a whole new level of education.

Consider the Source or Pathways to Potential Solutions

Living in the information age, there are a variety of sources from which you can find solutions. The following are the basic pathways:

Inexperienced personal acquaintances & friends people who are often inexperienced in the subject matter but have no shortage of advice. Usually it involves something theyve heard someone else say or claim they have done.
Mass media sourcessuch as the Internet, social media, books, blogs, print, television, and radio. This is often the easiest and cheapest way to get educational assistance, but because there is so much information, it can be overwhelming and sometimes hard to determine what or who to follow.
Experienced personal acquaintances & friends people who are experienced in certain matters, but are not engaged as a professional in your particular business or industry. They might offer some very good pearls of wisdom, but youll have to tailor the assistance they offer to your own situation.
Experienced professionals people who are experienced in the subject matter and can engage with you one-on-one to address the specific needs of your business. You can get advice, skill-set training, and education from this option. Most people consider it the most expensive route, but it really depends on what your intended outcome is. Most times, it offers the greatest ROI.

Evaluate which Resources Works best for Your Situation

You should further consider the following before determining which best serves your needs.

Complexity of the issue Is the issue too far outside your area of expertise? How serious are the consequences of making a wrong move or decision?
Implementation Is the solution difficult or time intensive to implement? If you implement the solution yourself, will there be any further implementations needed that affect your bottom line, customers expectations or other business operations?
Impact What is the potential impact if you do or dont heed the advice, acquire a skill-set, and/or educate yourself on a particular subject matter?
Price How much will the assistance cost versus its return on investment?

Once youve gone over all of the considerations, youre ready to move forward accordingly. But a word of caution: you should never think of getting business assistance as an exact science, no matter where you get it from. Because we live in a world of constant change, we have to manage and think in terms of probabilities. You should constantly and consistently monitor the outcomes and results of the business assistance you receive or act upon. To minimize risk, you should always take your time and review multiple sources and weigh the differences. Eventually, youll find resources that you trust and people with whom you can develop strong, mutually-beneficial business relationships.

Still, for most business owners and young entrepreneurs, reaching out for help for your business is usually a hard thing to do, but take heed to the advice here: If you keep going down the path of entrepreneurship and ignore the plethora of valuable business assistance available to you, you will inevitably bump your head.

And for the really stubborn: Youll see the real value of this only after you fall flat and bust your head right down to the white meat.

Well, maybe not right down to the white meat.

Are you considering (or ignoring) some type of business advice, skill-set training or business education that may resolve a nagging business problem or dilemma? Do you have a particular experience youd like to share? If this article been helpful let me know. Id love to hear your thoughts. Please leave a comment below.

Happy Holidays and Cheers to Your Fresh Breakthroughs!