What leads to entrepreneurial success? Is it luck, education, or talent? Or perhaps it’s because of a wealthy family background. The success of entrepreneurs is often not due to any of the misconceptions mentioned above. Instead, successful entrepreneurs possess the characteristics and qualities that make their success virtually impossible. In this post, we will look at some characteristics of successful entrepreneurs to unlock the secret of entrepreneurial success.
1. Grit
Angela Lee Duckworth, an American academic and psychologist, discovered that IQ was not necessarily the determinator of good grades while she was teaching maths to seventh graders. It motivated her to become a psychologist and started researching the factors contributing to success. She then found a characteristic present in successful individuals, which is grit.
Grit is the combination of passion and perseverance, it’s not something that you are born with, but something that can be nurtured through having a growth mindset. As Angela describes, individuals with grit believe that “failure is not a permanent condition”, and therefore, they can always bounce back stronger to continue pursuing their long-term goals.
Successful entrepreneurs have grit. They embrace failures and view them as lessons they can learn from. Having this grit is what gives them power to run this marathon which is full of challenges and setbacks.
2. Experimental Mindset
Having an experimental mindset is one key factor that constitutes successful entrepreneurs. They are not afraid of failure and are willing to spend time and resources to experiment and find out what works and what doesn’t. They view failures as feedback that takes them one step closer to success.
Willing to experiment despite the risk of failure is also the key to sustained success. Business is everchanging, a successful business today won’t guarantee success 10 years later. Therefore successful entrepreneurs continue to experiment to improve their business despite having success and being in the lead.
3. Innovative Problem-Solving Mindset
An innovative problem-solving mindset isn’t always about creating a novel solution but viewing a problem from a different angle, transferring disciplines from different fields, and combining existing solutions in new ways.
On your entrepreneurial journey, you will face problems and challenges that nobody has encountered before. The same situation may have nuances that demand a slightly different solution, and it requires thinking outside of the box.
Successful entrepreneurs cultivate this mindset by questioning the established assumptions and always exploring better solutions to a problem. It is what enables them to turn crises into opportunities and create great things others have not created before.
4. Risk-Taking
Every business has inherent risks. Successful entrepreneurs understand the upside of every decision, but also the associated risks. Having the courage to take risks is a necessary characteristic of successful entrepreneurs and what got them started in the first place.
To be successful, you have to learn how to accommodate risk and understand that things won’t always go the way you want, there will be gains and losses. However, don’t be afraid to take risks, because if you don’t, you will never be successful, as the proverb states, nothing ventured, nothing gained.
However, being “brave” doesn’t mean saying yes to everything. Successful entrepreneurs carefully analyze the risks while considering the rewards, and they are not afraid to take the risk if the potential is within what they can afford to lose.
5. Strong Vision
What keeps successful entrepreneurs going during their hardest time is not just passion, but the vision they have about their business. Successful entrepreneurs believe in their vision and their future. They have a vivid picture of success in their mind like they have already obtained it, and it motivates them to continue working towards it.
A strong vision also provides them with a clear sense of direction and acts as a roadmap. By breaking the vision down into small and actionable steps, they are able to set both short-term and long-term objectives to realize their vision.
6. Time Management
Entrepreneurs are busy individuals. They have to care for themselves, their friends, and their family while focusing on their business goals. Knowing how to manage time and set priorities is a crucial skill for being successful and also living a fulfilling life.
One essential aspect of time management skills all successful entrepreneurs have is knowing when to say no. Successful entrepreneurs understand how valuable their time is and won’t hesitate to reject anything that wastes their time. If it’s not associated with what they value or doesn’t contribute to their goals, it doesn’t matter.
In addition to that, successful entrepreneurs are obsessed with automating tasks. They believe that repeating the same routine tasks should be avoided at all costs by either using tools and systems to automate them or delegating them to their team so their time can be invested in growing their empire.
7. Leadership and interpersonal skills
Leadership skill is a characteristic that must developed in every entrepreneur’s journey to success. A man can only do so much on their own, leveraging the expertise and knowledge of a team is essential for business growth and success.
Successful entrepreneurs understand their teams, their struggles, weaknesses, and strengths. They know how to motivate them, what they need to thrive, how to manage them, how to build relationships with them, and more importantly how to lead them in the right direction. A true leader is not an emperor, but someone to brings people together to do great things,
8. Decisiveness
Entrepreneurs make decisions every day. In the business world, entrepreneurs often have to make prompt and difficult decisions, such as making a decision during a business crisis, where any decision they make will have a negative impact on their business, or when they find it necessary to make their employees redundant during economic decline.
Successful entrepreneurs have the capability to calmly assess the situation and analyze the consequences of their choice, and the courage to make difficult decisions in the face of uncertainty.
In a situation like this, leveraging the brain power of your team and your mentor is the wisest course of action However, the decision is still yours to make and you need to understand that you hold full responsibility for whatever happens.
9. Desire to learn
Successful entrepreneurs never stop learning. They understand that success is created and maintained through continuous learning and improvement. They know that they don’t have to be the brightest people in the world, as long as they learn, the sky is the limit.
Even after they have achieved what they desire, they understand that the moment they stop learning and improving themselves is the moment they fall. They are dedicated to being a lifelong learner who is never satisfied with the status quo, constantly seeking new knowledge through books, podcasts, courses, and interactions with others.
Bottom Line
Successful entrepreneurs are not fortunate people who happen to stumble across brilliant business ideas and succeed. They are persevering individuals who refuse to give up despite all the hardships and challenges they face. The qualities and characteristics that they develop through this long haul, are what make them worthy of their success.
