I am pretty sure you may have heard how exciting the journey of an entrepreneur is. There are thousands of books about firing your boss and beginning your entrepreneurial journey. Almost always, that journey is painted as one where you have unlimited power and control over your time and of course, lots of money in your bank account.Well, it is like that sometimes but Entrepreneurship, like most everything else, has its ups and downs.
So before you hand in your resignation letter, fire your boss or jump off the cliff of paid employment, here are a few things you should know about being an Entrepreneur!
You’re the Boss
Remember how you got those annoying queries from your boss, or how you were ordered to do just about anything which you do not even remember being in your Job description? Well, as an entrepreneur, you can say goodbye to that! You’re the boss here. So, except you love writing queries to yourself, no more queries. You’re in full control. However, if you function best with constant supervision, then entrepreneurship might not be for you. Being an Entrepreneur requires you to constantly be on top of things as you are the head of your organisation.
If you function better with supervision, don’t jump into the entrepreneurship boat just yet.
You Need Good Time Management

As an entrepreneur, you can finally get rid of that annoying alarm that reminds you that a query is waiting for you if you get to work late. You can sleep as long as you want. However, except you have a product that makes money for you while you sleep, sleeping while you should be working is a very terrible idea. You risk losing money and clients and sometimes even your health as you might have to work overtime once in a while to meet up with urgent deadlines.
You Need To Make Decisions
As the BOSS, you make your own decisions and this is an advantage if you are smart, confident and have a great decision-making process. Critical decisions, made in the right time, can make all the difference in any situation. On the other hand, if you are a poor decision-maker, being your own boss is a ticking time-bomb.
You Determine Your Colleagues, Clients and Customers
As an entrepreneur, you determine who you want to work with or do business with. At any point, you may decide to cut off people who rub you the wrong way. That is an advantage. But if you do not learn how to separate personal feelings from business, you may end up cutting off valuable clients or customers of your business as a result of personal differences. This is a disadvantage.
Adaptability is important
As your own boss, one key thing you must learn quickly, is how to adapt to different situations. This affects everything. Yet, how well you adapt, often spells the difference between a healthy entrepreneur and a stressed-out, burned-out one. Dealing with too many variables and changing too many things, too quickly considerably increases the chances for errors. All of these can lead to burn out. Burned out entrepreneurs are of little use to anyone – least of all, themselves.
You can start most businesses without a degree. However, great entrepreneurs are avid learners
You Hold the Keys to Your Success
As an entrepreneur, you really have no glass ceilings. If you are strategic, and you work really hard and leveraging on valuable networks, you can grow as fast and as high as you can. However, entrepreneurship comes with its own risks. Some things are out of your control and in those moments, little mistakes can be costly – very costly.
You Must Have Good Money Management Skills
As your own boss, one exciting fact is that you more or less, have control over cash flow. What’s more, if you work really hard, you can pay yourself as much as you want; But here’s the thing, as an employee, if you have a decent boss, you can look forward to your salary at the end of an agreed period with some level of certainty. As an entrepreneur, you would have to deal with times where your customers don’t pay when they should, or don’t even pay at all. You will have to deal with an uneven flow of orders- while having to deal with overhead costs. You may even sometimes have to turn orders away if your hands are full.
If you can create a structure that adequately handles these uncertainties, all of this is an advantage. If you cannot, being an entrepreneur would be a disadvantage.
So there, you have it, a few of the most important things you must know and consider before you move into the world of entrepreneurship. Most of what looks great on the one side, almost always has their dark sides too. As an entrepreneur, if you understand this and you go into business prepared to handle all sides, you will be very successful!