4 Things To Figure Out When Starting Your Own Business
Run your business with your whole chest...
Hi, I’m Career Coach Mandy, and I write about how to bring more creativity and joy into your life — and how to find more purpose with your career. Thank you for subscribing to my newsletter, which I send out about twice a month.
In today’s article, we’re going to talk about the four things that I think you should figure out if you’re in the process of starting or running your own business:
Figure out your relationship with time
Identify the skillset you want to build
Figure out your relationship with other people
What are you teaching?
So, let’s get started.
First, figure out your relationship with time.
When it comes to business, we are usually in the business of selling our time. I don’t actually believe that there’s such a thing as passive income, rather it’s more like, linear income versus non-linear income. Linear income is a basic time to money ratio. You get paid $22 an hour. You get paid $450 per assignment, or $1,000 for every class that you teach. It’s linear. There’s a basic math equation. Non-linear income is you spend significant time and energy creating something (a piece of content, a digital product, a physical product) and then it is sold immediately, or whenever there is a buyer.
So, what is your relationship with time? Some coaches and consultants, for example, get energy from having private, one-on-one time with clients (there is joy in the microcosm) — while others, after a few years, may yearn for environments that are more varied and less repetitive. Do you enjoy having a strict schedule when you are working, and then the freedom of being “off the clock?” Basically, you have to figure out where you are in life, and what kind of business is going to support your relationship with time.
If you’re looking for maximum flexibility, going the content creation model, where you are doing things on your own time, may be for you. Or, if you have teenagers and they’re fairly independent now and you know you have three hours every morning to devote to clients, then awesome.
Second, identify the kind of skillset that you want to build.
No matter what business you’re in, it’s going to be a vehicle of personal growth for you. So, what do you want to get better at? This is, of course, taking into account the things that you are already naturally gifted at. Maybe you’re a natural storyteller, but now you want to work on getting better at applying that to social media and doing short form content. Or, maybe you’re a gifted connecter, and now you want to practice getting better at hosting events to connect more like-minded people.
Building a business is never about just selling something; there has to be an element of personal transformation for you, too. It’s going to teach you something. So what do you want to learn?
Third, figure out your relationship with other people.
When you imagine what your business looks like, are you doing it alone or are you with other people? Do you imagine a boutique agency, with 15-20 smart, creative people working alongside you, or is it only 5 people, with you at the center, or perhaps with a co-founder? Business is always about your relationship with other people. Not just who surrounds you, but also who sits at the top alongside you.
What do you envision for yourself? Do you want to go at it by yourself, and do you have what it takes to create your own empire (you probably do), or would you feel better with a small cohort of a co-founding team? Do you imagine yourself going to conferences to meet other business owners, or are you more of a hermit and just want to work intensely during the day, but then have a nice separation between work and life and at night just chill out with a glass of wine and relax?
And finally, fourth, what are you teaching?
Every business, no matter if it’s a product or service, is about teaching something. There’s always something aspirational. If you are running a coaching business, you are teaching people how to think differently and more positively about their life. If you’re running NIKE, you’re teaching people to believe in themselves and see themselves as an athlete. So what are the lessons that you want to impart, and what are the vibes that you want to create with your business?
In conclusion, running a business requires your whole heart. There will be moments when you’re feeling lazy, tired, unmotivated, want to burn the whole thing down. That’s very normal. I hope that asking yourself these questions will help you in your journey.
Sending so much love!
xo
Mandy aka Career Coach Mandy
PS. Here are my latest videos on YouTube, we’re now at 44K subscribers, if you can believe it! Thank you so much everyone for your support, I feel super motivated to keep going. :)
I thought this was a fascinating take on the usual 'starting your own business' article.
A fresh perspective and 4 fundamental questions to help shape a new (or existing) venture. Have printed it out so I can refer to it often. Thanks Mandy.