Category: Entrepreneurial Inspiration

The challenge for young entrepreneurs: proving yourself

Young Entrepreneurs in Canada

Recently, our GoForth Expert Dawn McCooey was asked the question, “How do I handle clients more concerned with my age than my experience?” It’s a question we get asked often by young entrepreneurs – who we consider to be small business owners under the age of 35.

As we’ve discussed before, young entrepreneurs bring a wealth of positives to the table – endless energy, fresh ideas and adaptability to new technologies. However, there will always be a few people who might cast a wary gaze upon you when you enter the boardroom. But fear not! There are several ways you, as a young entrepreneur, can impress even the most skeptical of prospective clients.

Model behaviours you want to receive

As Dawn says in her answer to the question above, “You’re going to be the one to dictate people’s impression of you.” It’s especially true for young entrepreneurs. Be impressive. Be professional. Be well-spoken. Be honest. Be courteous. Be confident. When your clients leave the meeting room, make sure they remember you as a capable and intelligent person they’d be happy to do business with, and your age won’t cross their minds.

Have confidence in your work

No entrepreneur is infallible or completely confident at all times. We all doubt certain aspects of our careers. But for young entrepreneurs, it can be a little easier to let doubt creep in when the very people you want to work with don’t seem to trust what you are. Here’s the upside: These people are few and far between. Most people care about the end result more than how many grey hairs you have (or don’t). So go forth with confidence and stand behind your business, your pricing, your method and your strategy. After all, it’s the result of hours of planning and research – why undermine it?

Get great experience, and show it off

Say you’re exchanging emails with a prospective client who is focusing less on your long list of completed projects and more on the fact that you graduated university last year. Ease his or her concerns – provide testimonials, give samples and show case studies to increase your credibility. If you’re the right person for the job, prove it – as early and as often as possible.

We should mention that experience doesn’t need to be of the paid variety. Of course, we want you to get paid, but look for other avenues to meet people in your industry, make a difference and also prove your credibility: advisory boards, committees and mentorships are great options.

Know when to back away

This last point might seem counterintuitive for an entrepreneur – I mean, you’re in this to feed yourself, right? But consider a scenario where all above options have failed despite your best efforts, and your prospective client is still not able to get past your age. Ask yourself honestly – is this a person you want to enter into a working relationship with and deal with on a regular basis? A healthy work/life state is a critical function of successful entrepreneurship; one not to be ignored. There is absolutely no shame in knowing when to cut your losses, and moving on to a client who will jump at the chance to work with you and respect you while doing so.

Do you have any other ways young entrepreneurs can prove that success isn’t just about age?

Share this post:

Do one thing every day that stretches you

We’ve all heard the line “Do one thing every day that scares you,” or we’ve read it on a Lululemon product bag. But why would we want to do something every day that scares us? Petting an angry dog scares me, so why would I want to do it? Sounds pretty negative to me and not very motivating.

I believe in the benefits of expanding our worldview and understanding of our selves, so I like to do something every day that stretches me.  I recognize that great success and happiness are only possible when we’re willing to take a little risk. Stretching ourselves outside of our comfort zone is a conscious activity that calls for courage and vigilance. And sometimes the only way we can find that strength is to take it one step at a time.

Try to remember the last time you resisted, avoided or delayed doing an activity that made you feel uneasy or uncomfortable. What made you feel uncomfortable?

Now spend some time visualizing yourself actually doing whatever it was that you resisted, avoided or delayed. Create a vivid picture of yourself being fearless throughout the activity. You’ve done this 100 times before; it’s completely comfortable. Doing one thing every day that stretches us means that we’re going to learn something, and have a deeper appreciation of our true selves and abilities. And for an entrepreneur, this can only mean a more rewarding and enriching small business experience.

Share this post:

Passing the real tests in entrepreneurship

After two years of 20-hour days in start-up, I honestly believe that starting and running a successful company is a linked series of tests – almost daily tests of personal ability, skill, agility, determination, worthiness and limits. Theory is for the classroom. The real tests begin outside of the classroom.

Every day, entrepreneurs are faced with circumstances so unique to them that new or novel strategies, tactics or actions have to be developed to deal with them. Business schools teach theory that mostly apply to big companies – companies with the benefit of resources, people and support. In small business, theory does not help us create unique solutions to problems we hadn’t planned on. Instead, our survival depends on the entrepreneur’s ability to respond to new information and to execute correctly.

For some, facing new challenges every day is the joy of running a business. For others, it is simply too overwhelming and one of the factors associated with the high rate of business closure.

I get up every morning knowing that something somewhere will challenge me, make me stretch, make me work harder that day. I also know that the more tests we pass, the more incremental successes we have, and the more confident we become in our abilities and skills as entrepreneurs. This is the beauty of experience. Relish in your success every day knowing you’ve just passed another real-life test of being an entrepreneur.

Share this post:

Entrepreneurial inspiration – Anita Roddick and The Body Shop

If you’re Canadian, you’ve likely heard of The Body Shop. You probably know it for its line of innovative and forward-thinking beauty products and its socially-conscious campaigns. While The Body Shop of today may not seem an obvious choice for small business inspiration, what if we told you that founder Anita Roddick started with little more than a great idea and a need to support her family?

Roddick was born in Littlehampton, England, as the third of four children. She grew up working in the café her parents owned, developing a strong work ethic and learning about the inner workings of a business at the same time. This set the stage for her entrepreneurial spark. As for her sense of empathy and goodwill towards others, she credited the discovery of a book about the Holocaust, at the age of 10, with this shift in her thinking.

Roddick was trained as a teacher and studied in a kibbutz in Israel. Afterwards, she took to traveling the world and worked in many different countries. When she returned home to England, she met Gordon, her future husband. Together they explored entrepreneurship, returning to Roddick’s roots by opening a restaurant and then a hotel. Soon enough, they began to feel the pressure of small business ownership.

It was during this time that Roddick had her A-ha! Moment – why couldn’t skincare products be packaged in refillable containers and marketed without making women feel horrible about themselves? And, more importantly for Roddick, how could this make money for her family?

Roddick opened the first Body Shop in 1976 in Brighton with just 15 products and using her hotel as collateral. Ten months later, The Body Shop was so successful that a second location had been opened.

The success of The Body Shop was due largely to Roddick’s own principles and experiences. Her travels around the world taught her about the kinds of products women in pre-industrial communities used to clean and care for their bodies. Her childhood, during World War II, taught her the value of reusing and reducing waste. The Body Shop was green before it was popular to be green – and customers responded. In 1984, The Body Shop went public and continued to spread across England and, soon, around the world.

Believing that “businesses have the power to do good,” Roddick lent The Body Shop’s support to a number of social and environmental issues. The Body Shop was one of the first businesses to prohibit animal testing and promote fair trade. When the company became a subsidiary of the L’Oréal Group, Roddick continued to monitor their work closely, making sure that operations were being run in line with her and her company’s core values.

In 2003, Roddick was made Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire. She passed away four years later at the age of 64.

Anita Roddick started The Body Shop with no training or experience, which we obviously don’t recommend. However, her unique vision and passion helped her to create a business that proved commercial success doesn’t have to come at the cost of personal values – something we’re sure many small business owners can aspire and relate to.

 

 

Share this post: