{"id":6731,"date":"2018-01-21T08:10:42","date_gmt":"2018-01-21T12:10:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kerryhannon.com\/?p=6731"},"modified":"2018-01-21T08:10:42","modified_gmt":"2018-01-21T12:10:42","slug":"8-strategies-for-starting-a-successful-business","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kerryhannon.com\/?p=6731","title":{"rendered":"8 Strategies for Starting a Successful Business"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"\"<\/a>Lately, I\u2019ve been devoting most of my Next Avenue posts to advice for women in their 50s and 60s who are small business owners or want to be. So, in the spirit of New Year\u2019s, how\u2019s this for a resolution for women entrepreneurs?: Think Bigger.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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That\u2019s the title of a recent book by Michael W. Sonnenfeldt, an accomplished serial entrepreneur and founder and chairman of\u00a0Tiger 21<\/a>, a community of more than 500 entrepreneurs and investors who collectively manage $50 billion in personal assets. Actually, the full title is\u00a0Think Bigger: And 39 Other Winning Strategies from Successful Entrepreneurs<\/em><\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

I found the book extremely helpful for anyone launching a small business or eager to do so. After reading it, I interviewed Sonnenfeldt to hear more, as well as one of the entrepreneurs featured in the book, Linda Abraham, 55, who co-founded two companies after starting her career at Procter & Gamble. She is now an angel investor and board member at a number of start-ups, including vice chair of Upskill, an augmented reality software company.<\/p>\n

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Michael Sonnenfeldt, author<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

While older female entrepreneurs will gather inspiration and workable ideas from the insights in\u00a0Think Bigger<\/em>, the book could be fodder for anyone gearing up to launch a new venture.<\/p>\n

Read on Forbes.<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

But the book could be especially useful for women because, according to Sonnenfeldt, female entrepreneurs have one obstacle that men don\u2019t. \u201cIt\u2019s tough for anyone to build a company out of nothing more than an idea, but I have found that all too frequently the female entrepreneurs I know have been underestimated in such a pathological way that the only word that can accurately describe it is sexism,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n

Sonnenfeldt also thought women entrepreneurs have an advantage over men, though. \u201cThere is evidence that, on average, the kind of entrepreneurial activities that really require team building and environments that are particularly well-run and sensitive to the dynamics between the members, are where some women have the competitive advantage \u2014 particularly women who are now older and have many years of experience to bring to the table,\u201d he told me. \u201cMany entrepreneurial successes depend on an exquisite form of human understanding and organizational leadership that women have the edge on.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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Here are eight of my favorite \u201cwinning strategies\u201d from\u00a0Think Bigger<\/em>\u00a0and my conversations with Sonnenfeldt and Abraham:<\/p>\n

1. Seek out mentors.<\/strong>\u00a0\u201cWhat saved me, time and time again, wasn\u2019t my education, but the wisdom of other people who had already been through something I was wrestling with for the first time and their perspectives gained over decades of experiences,\u201d Sonnenfeldt wrote.<\/p>\n

2. It\u2019s okay to wear rose-colored glasses at times.<\/strong>\u00a0\u201cThe best entrepreneurs do display certain psychological and character traits that are common to success stories in other fields \u2014 like self-discipline, grit and tolerance for risk \u2014 I would bet that the most successful among us tend to have even higher levels of those trails, supercharged by an optimism that psychologists would label\u00a0delusional<\/em>,\u201d Sonnenfeldt wrote. \u00a0\u201cTo overcome the skeptics and naysayers, nearly all entrepreneurs need grit and a level of optimism that can seem delusional.\u201d<\/p>\n

3. Don\u2019t go it alone.<\/strong>\u00a0Sonnenfeldt is a firm believer that the best entrepreneurs get help from others. \u201cWhat are your blind spots?,\u201d he asks. \u201cIf you don\u2019t have an answer (or believe you have none) you need to assemble your own personal board of directors to help you evaluate how well you\u2019re managing your business, your money and your personal life.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>4. Curiosity is another secret ingredient to a winning strategy.<\/strong>\u00a0\u201cYes, entrepreneurs need an idea, they need passion, and they need self-confidence and grit to keep their business afloat,\u201d Sonnenfeldt wrote. \u201cBut to grow a company and stay out in front of the competition, to catch the eye of a buyer, and certainly to start a second business or more as so many Tiger 21 entrepreneurs have done, you have to show some imagination in figuring out how to better serve your clients and create new customers and new products and even new product categories and business models.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sonnenfeldt recommends you start by \u201casking yourself some tough questions about your business, its future and your customers. What do they need that you\u2019re not offering? How do you boost your business to the next level? Do you need to change your business model?\u00a0 Do you need to bring in someone to help you?\u201d<\/p>\n

Abraham told me that when she\u2019s considering backing a start-up, she looks for a sharp understanding of the market for the person\u2019s product or service. \u201cThere is often a certain naivet\u00e9 about the demand in the marketplace for their idea, Abraham said. \u201cYou have to have a vision about where you are going in a big picture, but you must know how you are going to get there right now.\u201d<\/p>\n

5. Live below your means.<\/strong> \u201cMany entrepreneurs I know would argue that frugality played as large a role in their success as their ideas or business skills, ensuring that they had the critical capital they needed at just the right moments to expand their businesses and fund investment ideas,\u201d Sonnenfeldt wrote. \u201cMost would say during their wealth-building years\u00a0 \u2014 through their twenties and thirties, and often through their forties and fifties \u2014 they consumed less than 50 percent of their income, either saving or reinvesting the balance in their businesses.\u201d<\/p>\n

6. When you need to raise money, turn to pros rather than friends and family.\u00a0<\/strong>When I asked Abraham to name the biggest hurdle for boomer female entrepreneurs, she replied: \u201cRaising capital. I am sorry to say that, but it\u2019s true.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sonnenfeldt\u2019s tip: \u201cOne piece of advice that I would have for people in their 50s to 60s years old is really try to get professional capital, because if you have a good idea that is going to do well in the marketplace, the professionals will validate it and put a proper price on it,\u201d he told me.<\/p>\n

When looking for financing to start a business, he added, \u201cdon\u2019t use the low bar of friends and family, but use the high bar of professional investors. You might not get as high a validation, but you will be getting a piece of market validation about the potential of your new venture that will give you some very early feedback that you would avoid getting until it was too late otherwise.\u201d<\/p>\n

7. Be involved in all segments of your start-up.<\/strong> Pay attention to all aspects of business \u2014 even the ones that don\u2019t interest you, Abraham said. \u201cDon\u2019t delegate until you really know how to do something yourself,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n

8. Don\u2019t ignore skills you\u2019ve developed in other aspects of your life.<\/strong> If you\u2019re a woman starting a business in your fifties or older and have been a parent, many of your parenting skills can translate into managing employees to help them succeed, Abraham said. Each staffer has individual challenges and you need to bring out the best in each one, she noted, so they can \u201cpunch above their weight.\u201d<\/p>\n

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By\u00a0Kerry Hannon\u00a0<\/a><\/span>Entrepreneurship Expert<\/span><\/p>\n

Kerry Hannon has covered personal finance, retirement and careers for The New York Times, Forbes, Money, U.S. News & World Report and USA Today, among other publications. She is the author of a dozen books including\u00a0Money Confidence: Really Smart Financial Moves for Newly Single Women<\/em><\/a>,\u00a0\u00a0Great Jobs for Everyone 50+: Finding Work That Keeps You Happy<\/em>\u00a0and Healthy…and Pays the Bills<\/em><\/a>,\u00a0Getting the Job You Want After 50<\/a>,<\/em>\u00a0Love Your Job: The New Rules for Career Happiness\u00a0<\/a><\/em>and\u00a0What’s Next? Finding Your Passion and Your Dream Job in Your Forties, Fifties and Beyond<\/em><\/a>. Her website is\u00a0kerryhannon.com<\/a>. Follow her on Twitter\u00a0@kerryhannon<\/a>.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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