8 Entrepreneur Mistakes to Avoid

Who doesn’t want to be an entrepreneur and run their own company? Nothing beats being your own boss and making the decisions that you think are best for your company to grow. However, there are a lot of entrepreneur mistakes that can’t devastate everything you’ve worked towards.

When you run your own company, every decision you make is crucial. That’s why you want to avoid these 8 entrepreneur mistakes to ensure the longevity of your company.

1. Do Everything Yourself

Many entrepreneurs think that just because they own their own business, they need to do everything themselvesf. That just isn’t the case – doing everything on your own will only cause problems. You’ll be spreading yourself too thin and not devoting enough attention to everything.

Working with trusted individuals (employees or freelancers) will allow you to give everything the attention it needs. You can also find people who specialize in areas you’re not as confident in. For instance, if you need graphics for your advertisements but aren’t confident in your ability, you can hire a graphic designer.

As the owner of your own company, you need to be able to delegate work just as well as you can do it yourself. Working with others is the key to taking your business to the next level.

2. Going into a Field You Don’t Know

The key to being a successful entrepreneur is going into a field and industry that you’re passionate about. Chasing money into an industry that doesn’t interest is setting yourself up to fail.

Not only do you need to be passionate about your industry, but you need to know everything there is to know about it. Studying and research is just as important as implementing actions and delegating work. Be the expert that the clients are looking for – leave no doubt in their mind that you’re the best.

If you don’t know your field, it will show. There are many options out there in almost any industry and clients will choose something else. Also, as a small company, you’ll be crushed if you don’t differentiate yourself from the rest of the competition. The best way to do that is to be better than the rest – be an expert.

3. Not Establishing a Working Relationship with Other Link Minded Individuals

As we mentioned above, working with others is the key to getting your business off the ground – you can’t do everything yourself. Establishing working relationships with other entrepreneurs and freelancers will help strengthen your company.

These connections won’t just help your company grow now thanks to their expertise, but it will also help build your network. Being an entrepreneur is much easier when you have working relationships with other professionals in the same field – you can work together to create something great.

4. Poor Communication

When working with others, the worst thing you can do is have poor communication. You need to be able to explain exactly what you need or what’s going to be done. Your employees, freelancers and clients won’t be able to work with you if they don’t know what’s happening. It’s the same with any job on Earth, communicate properly and politely what’s going on, what needs to be done and what you need.

5. Fear of Failure

Success isn’t guaranteed as an entrepreneur, but that doesn’t mean you should get down and give up on your company. Failure is part of being your own boss and starting a company for yourself. Knowing how to handle failure is what separates struggling business owners and successful entrepreneurs.

Rather than looking at a failure as a setback or a negative, look at it as a learning opportunity. You will never make the same mistake again and the company is stronger because you made it so early on. Grow from it and move forward.

6. Growing at an Inappropriate Pace

When your company does start to see success, don’t start expanding immediately. Don’t go on a hiring spree after 6 months of continued growth. Let the company mature a little bit before you start adding on too many employees. Continue to use freelancers and see where that takes you.

If the company does continue to see growth after a couple years, don’t be afraid to expand a little more then. That doesn’t mean hire on 10 more employees – try one or two at a time. Each new employee comes with more costs and you need to make sure the company can take on that many new faces.

7. Taking Too Much Money From the Company

Let’s face it, the only reason anyone works it to make money. That means you don’t want to start a company and not get paid – that’s completely understandable. However, just because you’re the boss doesn’t mean you need to take a sizable paycheck. Most of the money you make needs to go back into the company so it can continue to grow.

8. Poor Organization Is One of the Most Common Entrepreneur Mistakes

When you’re running your own company, the last entrepreneur mistake you want to make is to have poor organization. Much like anything you do in your life, you won’t see success if you aren’t organized.

There are many tools you can use to keep a company organized. Assigning tasks in boards such as Trello or Monday will help keep everyone on the same page. In addition, using messaging tools like Slack, Skype or Google Hangouts will make it easy to communicate with your employees. Keep everyone on the same page and you shouldn’t have an organization problem.

Don’t Make These Simple Entrepreneur Mistakes

When running your own business, you don’t want to make these 8 entrepreneur mistakes. At a young state, they can have devastating effects on your company. However, if you stay diligent and avoid these problems, you could see great results.

If you’re looking to meet other like minded entrepreneurs and build strong professional connections, EO Chicago is here to help. Learn more about us and how we can help you out.