To Start, You Have to Start

I've often told the story about the kid who told me they wanted to be an entrepreneur. I responded with "Tell me about your business." What I should have said was "What have you sold?" because I wouldn't have wasted his next few minutes with the story about his idea. He hadn't sold anything.

Once that story was told, I responded with "To start a business, you have to start."

The problem with that story that I tell is that it models what I hear from many adults. They have ideas. They might even have a prototype that they use themselves. They haven't sold anything though. I question sometimes if they really want to do the hard work, but what I think it usually is revolves around is the ability to understand professional sales.

Here, I could go on about the difference between inventors and entrepreneurs, but I typically skip this rabbit trail. It's a real issue, though!

But I really tell that story often to get to this question: if you haven't sold your product, have you started a business?

I use the illustration above when I am coaching established founders and family enterprise owners. We are typically talking about some new initiative. The memory of founding may be far behind or may be wanted to be forgotten. I don't blame them.

So when it's hard to start anything, I typically talk about this: Is your "why" strong enough? Using the starting a business illustration again: If you don't want to work for someone else, is that enough to motivate you every day to start a business? Hint: your "why" typically involves more people than just you to strengthen it.

We are all pretty good at explaining what we do. And we may be pretty good at explaining how we do it. But do we spend enough time explaining why we do what we do? Probably not.

ryan

Ryan Kauth

Ryan Kauth is a coach for established founders and family business owners with growth initiatives that can't seem to get off the ground. He is also a university lecturer, fractional Chief of Staff , football fan, and early morning pet feeder/walker.