I am a new entrepreneur (for about a week now), and oddly enough I have been asked by many why I started my own business. I thought this story would be a fantastic first post!
I have had more than a few jobs in my career and each one gifted me with knowledge that I didn’t have before taking it. I learned over the years that a job is worth having if it is teaching you something, and if you get up each morning with purpose and the drive to keep bettering yourself because of it. Each job I had made me feel that way, until one day it didn’t. That’s when I knew it was time to move on. That feeling comes for many reasons, in my case it was financial means, higher education, greater challenge, making a difference, purpose, life…. The point is, in each role I came to an impasse, at which I had to make a decision.
In the last year, life made the decision for me to leave a job that I really loved. I wasn’t ready to move on because my challenge hadn’t been conquered and the tasks weren’t complete. Even though I wasn’t ready to leave, in hindsight I could see the difference I made in that organization. That got my mental wheels turning. What can I do, if I can’t have the job I really love? Easy, start my own company! Well, it wasn’t that easy, and was actually scary as hell, but I took the steps and made it happen. The hard part wasn’t deciding to start a business, the hard part was understanding why I should start the business.
In my soul, it means sometimes to me to make a difference, to impact others, and until I left that job that I loved, I didn’t realize how much impact I could make. So, as I began thinking about the mystical business I wanted to start, I spent a lot of time with myself, pondering. Where I landed was that I was great at a handful of things and those things could drive change in organizations. I realized that my superpower of business development (by the way, I self-taught these skills throughout my career), was an amazing asset to many companies. I realized that the challenges that I love and seek are really the development of success in a company, and once that is achieved, I am ready to move on. So my thought was, if I were to start my own business, that challenge would always be there because each new business partner would need my superpower to help them with change in their own organization. I would get a new challenge with each company! This was the moment I figured out why being a lifelong employee was never for me (why I got bored in my previous jobs).
Coming back to where we started in this post, I decided to start my own company because I know what I can offer a company that will allow for gain on both sides. I can have a future full of challenges (exciting ones) that will push me to continue learning new innovative ways to build business. I have finally found what my true purpose in life is and I had a burning passion to bring it to fruition, so I did! I wish I could say it was simple and that the road ahead is smooth, but I am not that naïve! I know there is a great deal of uncertainty, undesirable challenge, adversity, and overwhelming fear on the horizon; but I am ready to face it because anything worth having doesn’t come easy. I am ready to embrace myself and my skills to show my daughter that anything is possible if you really want it. I am ready to make an impact on the community I live in, to be a part of change on a greater level.
I want to say my business will be a great success, but the truth is, time will tell. Until then, I will make great strides to forge ahead a path that I haven't traveled before. I have faith and hope that the destination will be vast and grand. Even if I never arrive where I want to go, I can hold my head high and say I DID IT; because I have achieved something that some people can only dream of! If you are a business owner and looking for help developing your company, please schedule some time to talk with me!