You want to stand on your feet, kick-start your own business and be that Entrepreneur you’ve always dreamed of. You’ve probably been told several time that the only way you can succeed as an Entrepreneur is to jump into the business world with both feet.
Before you think of quitting that job, consider this: A paper appearing in an issue of the Academy of Management Journal finds that entrepreneurs who start off by working part-time on their new ventures-holding on to their day jobs while they launch their new companies-cut their risk of failure by a full third.
Working part-time at a new company gives you a chance to see if your idea, and chances to execute on it, are any good before you leap in. You also get a learning experience about the enterprise in question and get to know if you’re suitable for it.
As a first time Entrepreneur, you also cannot guarantee if the small business venture will succeed, so the best option is to minimise the financial risk by initially keeping your full-time job and working on you startup during your free time.
Even successful Entrepreneurs had at one time of their Entrepreneurship journey being at this stage where they had to work full-time and work on their startup. Pierre Omidyar launched eBay while at another software development company. Henry Ford founded the Detroit Automobile Company while employed by the Edison Illuminating Company.
Keeping your full-time job while starting your business will almost certainly be the busiest periods in your professional life, but it’s worth it. You maintain a stable income while building a future.
Here are a few strategies to making it work:
Validate Your Business Idea.
The #1 reason why most businesses fail is lack of market need for their product. You should validate your business idea, to avoid creating a product that nobody needs, or one that doesn’t work. Validating your idea involves getting honest feedback from potential customers before you start building, creating, and spending money.
As humans, it’s normal to think that we are right and our ideas are amazing. It’s easy to take off with an exciting new project in mind and work inside of your little bubble without ever involving anyone else for feedback during the process.
Channel your excitement into a positive, calculated direction, and intelligently test your way into assumptions about your potential new business before jumping aboard and setting sail.
Set Goals.
In setting your goals, consider your business plan and make sure your goals are detailed, measurable and realistic. If you want to turn your business into a full-time venture, come up with a rough idea of when you’ll like to begin this transition.
Create a schedule by mapping out yearly, monthly, and weekly goals, and keep track of them along the way. Making and meeting goals will help you stay on your timeline, which will help ensure your business’ success. On the other hand, if you don’t intend to leave your full-time job, determine how much time you’re willing to put into it on a daily and weekly basis, and then create a plan to help you stick with it.
Do a Lot of Outsourcing.
This one is all about focus. Look for opportunities to outsource every possible part of your business creation that you can. Could you hire someone to do it better, faster and, ultimately, break even or make more money during that time? If so, do it.
Entrepreneurs know how to make the most of every situation and resource they have. It’s the best skill you can hone, and you don’t need to make a major change to start. Figure out today what you could do to better to maximize your time, get rid of dead weight and take care of both kinds of business.
See Your Job as an Advantage.
No matter what kind of job you have, make sure you consider it as a blessing, not a curse. It isn’t holding you back, it’s keeping you afloat. You need that paycheck because otherwise you won’t have enough money to live on while you get things going. You’re lucky, because capital from your current job is there every couple of weeks. Most investors want to see that entrepreneurs are investing in themselves first, and you need a paycheck or savings (preferably both) to make that happen.
Plan Your Days Well.
It might sound impressive when someone works 36 hours straight, but you’re definitely not managing your time or your health with that approach. Actually, few businesses are built on that strategy. It’s the little, consistent daily things you do that add up to make or break a startup. Stop the busy work, get rid of distractions and give both your job and your venture the laser focused attention they deserve.
If your job takes up 40 hours of your time each week (give or take), account for it and figure out how to maximize all those other hours. Sleep should still be a priority, as should some daily exercise. Still, there are 72 hours in a week to do with as you wish beyond your 40 hours of work, so spend them well. Successful entrepreneurs manage their time, they don’t wish for more of it.
