10 Signs You’re Not Cut Out To Be An Entrepreneur
By: Louise Morris
Tags: Innovation, Startup, Entrepreneurship, Business, Leadership

1. You thought this article applies to you

If you read the headline of this article and thought, ‘That’s me’, chances are you’d be right.

Going into anything with a mindset of self-doubt is going to affect your success. Yes, there is such thing as overconfidence and a little bit of self-doubt can actually help your performance. But too much of it can lead to you unconsciously sabotaging yourself — psychologist Louisa Jewell states that self-doubt causes us to engage in behaviours such as procrastination, hesitation and self-handicapping.

Thinking that you’re not cut out to be an entrepreneur will eventually become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

2. You get along with everyone

There’s nothing wrong with being popular but if you’re not a fan of confrontation and make decisions based on pleasing people rather than your own beliefs then you won’t make it as an entrepreneur.

Part of being an entrepreneur involves building your team — you’re going to have to be able to hire and fire people. You’re also the leader of your business, you need to be able to act like it. How can people be expected to follow someone who doesn’t even lead by their own beliefs?

Analysis of the traits of serial entrepreneurs identified persuasive ability as their number one characteristic. In business, persuasion is the process of making people believe you’re right even when they think you’re wrong.

If you’re too focused on trying to get along with everyone and please people, you’re not going to be able to ruffle the feathers necessary to be an entrepreneur.

3. You can’t explain rock, paper, scissors

Rock, paper, scissors seems like a simple concept — until you have to explain it. You need to be able to break it down into the correct processes and be able to apply rules and steps to those processes. A game that appears extremely straightforward is actually quite complex when you break it down.

Your business is the same. Being able to communicate your ideas and breaking down their implementation is a key skill for any entrepreneur. Even if an idea seems simple in concept, in reality, it may be far more complex — but you need to be able to explain it, regardless.

4. You need money quickly

Being an entrepreneur is one of the slowest ways of making money. Think about it; making an idea become a reality can take years with prototypes, market research and sourcing capital. Then after that, there’s the business journey itself — which, based on failure rates, there’s no guarantee you’ll be making money at any stage.

If you’re looking for money now, don’t go down the entrepreneur route. Even if you do find that your business is experiencing fast growth, those profits will likely need to be reinvested in the business to further that growth.

If you really want to make some money just for yourself — be an employee, not an entrepreneur.

5. You accept reality

When you think about your day-to-day life, do you accept it for what it is? Or do you think about the countless problems that need to be solved?

If you can’t think of even one thing in your own life that needs improvement, how are you going to improve other people’s lives? Accepting reality kills innovation and creativity.

Entrepreneurship and complacency don’t mix well. If you’re willing to accept the world as it is, then I hope you can also accept that you’re not an entrepreneur.

6. You aren’t an endurance athlete

Running a business is a lot like running a marathon — exhausting. You may be tempted to sprint it at the start but soon run out of gas as the adrenaline starts to fade. Even if you do everything right you’ll still find yourself struggling for air by the end of it.

Being an entrepreneur is a test of endurance just as much as it is a test of your skills. You can have someone with all the knowledge and talent necessary to succeed in the world of business but if they haven’t the stamina to keep going then entrepreneurship might not be for them. You need to have a high workload threshold and build resistance to burnout in order to make it.

7. You don’t use a map

According to Dun & Bradstreet, the main reason businesses fail is because of a lack of business planning. Without a structured roadmap to guide your business venture, you’ll end up wandering aimlessly and be entirely lost by the time you reach your first crossroads.

There’s a reason people say; ‘fail to plan, plan to fail’. If you aren’t the type of person to sit down and take the time to figure out where you want to go and how you’re going to get there then you’re going to predisposed to failure. And not only do you need to be able to plan at the start of your business journey — you need to be able to adapt that plan to continually grow given the unpredictability of business environments.

So before you think that your risk-taking, spontaneous nature will aid you in being a successful entrepreneur — remember it is the calculated risk-takers who are actually successful.

8. You don’t like labels

You are a brand and you have to be able to market it. Even if you know nothing about marketing and don’t know what image you want to present your business under — you have to figure it out.

Don’t want to tie your business down to a label? Then make ‘no label’ your label or rethink your decision to start a business. With no brand, you have no business.

9. You can’t make the leap

Everyone has a comfort zone. Biologically, we are creatures of habit which makes it so easy to find yourself staying in that comfort zone.

When you choose to be an entrepreneur, you’re inherently giving up your comfort zone. You’re going to face new challenges all the time and experience a lot of change as you deal with them.

But taking the leap into the unknown should be thrilling and exciting — even somewhat addictive. If you don’t like that feeling, if you’re not familiar with that rush, you won’t be happy as an entrepreneur.

10. You follow the recipe

You’ve read every book there is about running a business. You know the stories of the most successful entrepreneurs by heart. You know all the rules and guidelines and you follow them to a tee — apart from one. There’s always a fine print at the end of every startup guide which states; the above rules are subject to be broken.

Remember, entrepreneurship is linked with innovation and following someone else’s path isn’t exactly innovative. Anyways, the majority of the time success is random — you can’t replicate that. There may be best practices when it comes to running a business but sticking rigidly to them can hold you back.

In order to be cut out for entrepreneurship, you need to be willing to bend and break the rules. You have to make your own success.