What is the Secret Ingredient to Owning Your Own Business?

Posted on 07 February 2011

Mark Kennedy

The best recipe must have the right ingredients. There are literally tens of thousands of books on the market today, just a guess, that tell you what you need to succeed in business. Should you buy them? Maybe, but not all of them and certainly not today.

How about getting that business degree that improves your chances for instant success?  Well, if I looked at most of the business entrepreneurs I know…definitely not! A degree will most likely get you a well paying job, increase your chance for advancement, but it won’t guarantee you a business of your own.

So what is the secret ingredient you have to have in your business recipe? The willingness to take a risk. What about all those other factors like money, a great idea and/or specific skills? Aren’t they the real key to owning a successful small business? Well let’s try an experiment and examine the following groups:

1. Family members

Are you out there on the wire? Do you have a plan to ensure you make it to the other side?

2. Your friends

3. Your high school buddies -  been to a class reunion yet?

4. Your college buddies – does higher education make for a good entrepreneur?

Of all the people in the combined lists above, how many of them have money, great ideas and/or specific skills? All of them. Yet only 1 in 10 has their own business.

Now for some of you this experiment is not fair because you have chosen people just like you as friends. Wise choice, but chances are there probably aren’t many entrepreneurs in your neighbourhood. In the United States there are only 20.4 million small businesses (2005 US Census), which is about 13.0% of the available labor force. In Canada approximately 12.4% of the population owns a business.

So my fellow risk taker, if you are going to take a risk, you had best calculate that risk carefully. How best to calculate your risk…PLAN.

On your team,

Mark Kennedy


Category: Small Business advice

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