It is far easier to go to work for a well established company, receive a paycheck every two weeks and have magical matching 401k contributions into your retirement account than it is to be an entrepreneur.
You’re waiting for the BUT, aren’t you?
There is none. It absolutely, unequivocally, 100% is easier.
Is entrepreneurship more rewarding? For many, I’m sure it is. More flexible? Quite likely. Greater earning potential? Certainly a possibility. More difficult? For damned sure.
Over 50% of small businesses fail within five years—not because they lack talent, but because they lack strategy. Let’s make sure you don’t become part of that statistic.
Don’t worry, this is meant as a word (or about 1,500 words) of ENCOURAGEMENT to the small business owner, entrepreneur, or solopreneur – whatever you may call yourself with some next steps to help you get to where you want to grow.
Let’s talk about the stages of your business and how you can continue to level up, despite the difficulties because as you already know, it’s hard to see yourself returning to traditional employment regardless of the benefit package.
The 5 Stages of Business
- Hobby
- Starting
- Side Hustle
- Job Replacement
- Expansion
Part 1 - Hobby
Here are the two primary ingredients needed to have a hobby. We will add to this list as we go – get your notepad ready and call out where you’re at, and where you may need to add something to your packing list.
1. Skill
You have to have enough skill/will to want to keep doing the thing. Whether it’s making jewelry, coaching others, or mowing lawns, you have to be moderately good at it, and your results are successful! Maybe you gift what you’ve created or share your experiences with others.
2. Passion
You must enjoy it enough to pick it up day after day, and be willing to keep creating or sharing.
I once had a client share that she was told the difference between a hobby and a business is that you may pay for your hobby, but you get paid for your business. This is an important distinction as we head into part two.
Part 2 - Starting A Business
Side story, reflecting on my own limiting beliefs about starting a business.
I used to think that entrepreneurship was exclusively for the creatives, the artists, or the uber-smart with big ideas. In our household, we also held the limiting belief that if one spouse was an entrepreneur, the other would be the responsible health-insurance-carrying, 401k-matching, stable income earner.
Growing up in a small rural community my Dad followed his dream of starting a ranch and raising cattle when I was about 14. That translated to my Mom working one of those stable ‘city’ jobs, and a lot of farm chores for me as a teenager.
When I busted out of that small town after high school, off to college to take a city job right from the start I was well established in my career when I married my entrepreneurial husband and was content to carry the health insurance. Until I wasn’t. And we really had to work through the logistics and challenges of both of us being entrepreneurs. Now on the other side of that challenge – it wasn’t nearly as big of a deal as we had thought. And the benefits of taking my kids to school, playing pickleball on a lunch break, calling coffee dates real work, and taking Wednesdays off – those are the REAL benefits.
What I wished I realized earlier is that entrepreneurship can be for ANYONE and the challenges that you believe will make it difficult or impossible CAN be overcome…and that’s true of any stage of growth.
So now you have a dream or desire to turn that hobby into a business.
Starting a small business successfully requires key steps to transition from a hobby to a full-time business on top of the aforementioned skill and passion, we’re adding:
1. Naivety
Going in with a bit of naivety is likely what was necessary for many of us to actually cross the finish line of creating a successful business. The work is HARD at this juncture, and if you knew all of that in advance, you may not attempt to enter in…kind of like parenthood.
2. Time
Sacrifice could also be used here. You’ll give us leisure time, sleep, and other commitments in order to get your hobby transitioned into a business. Not only do you need to figure out how to take payments, consider a website, figure out how you’d like to market, but where and how you’ll get clients or customers. There are several reps in the business building phase that get created and re-created over time.
3. Success
You must have something that people want, and prove that you can get others that success or desired result, or same quality with a product on repeat.
4. Determination
Grit is essential to get your business off the ground. You’ll need to try harder than you likely ever have before to launch. You’ll get frustrated. There will be tears. And still, you must continue on determined to get your craft into the world.
This part of my journey took a long six months, and that I wanted to take six weeks. I wrote about some of that experience here if you need some encouragement in the ‘getting off the ground’ phase
Part 3 - Side Hustler
We’re stacking up our list of ingredients with skill, passion, naivety, time, success, and determination. Now to officially have a side hustle we need one thing.
- Revenue – It’s essential that your small business make money, and not just any money – you need more revenue than you do expenses. But also, you need to be able to set some aside for taxes and you need to pay yourself.
Let me write this a little louder for those in the back. You NEED to pay yourself. I get a lot of early entrepreneurs who are investing in their businesses with tools, courses, coaches, and more but have not yet paid themselves for the time and energy they have invested in their work. You must build a business that can pay you appropriately.
This doesn’t mean that it has to happen immediately, or even be a comparable dollar-per-hour wage from the 9-5 that you left a year in – but you absolutely should be working toward that. If you aren’t making money, you’re stuck with a hobby that you’re trying to make into a business.
I’ve helped several entrepreneurs get through this stage, and frankly – get over themselves…so that they can ‘sell’ their products and services. Selling without being “salesy”; offering up their offer without feeling silly. But without the determination and time from part two, you’ll simply give up and go back to this being a hobby.
Do not move forward until you have fixed this part of the equation. You absolutely can do it with that time and determination mentioned above.
Kelly did! Here’s what she had to say about our time coaching together.
Part 4 - Job Replacement
You know that game, ‘the VanHoose family went on a family vacation and they brought an a – apple, b – bear, c – can opener.’ Well here on our business-building adventure, we’re not going in alpha order, but we have skill, passion, naivety, time, success, determination, and revenue in our suitcase.
Stay with me! We’re switching metaphors from ingredients and cooking to packing for travel.
Now, it’s time to perhaps leave your ‘regular’ job, or perhaps you simply want to put more financial resources toward your family goals while growing your side hustle into a job replacement for yourself. This can be true of part-time or full-time hours.
Here’s what we need to add to the mix.
1. Consistency
Pay close attention here. You need the consistency and discipline for yourself that rivals your most demanding ‘traditional employment’ role. You need to become the boss for yourself that has a reputation for being a hard ass. You must be consistent with your approach to work. That means that you have to work sometimes when you don’t feel like it…and frankly, nobody is going to make you, but you. Be consistent. Show up.
2. Confidence
You’ll need to face your fears with courage, an extra swipe of antiperspirant and build your confidence to do the damned thing. This level of growth will require you to do things differently than you have to date. New relationships are formed, new stretching of your own abilities and ways of thinking. You are changing in this season and you need to have the confidence that you belong and you offer value.
3. Systems
Winging it will no longer serve you here. You need solid systems and processes in place that are repeatable and streamlined to save you time and energy and continue to get excellent results for your clients and customers. Batching, time blocking, energy flow creation; all of it needs to be considered as systems to create. Your goals should be written, your data should be tracked to help you make the best decisions for your next level of growth.
Most of my small business clients are transitioning from part 3 side hustle to part 4 job replacement. These are my sweet spots of coaching – I love supporting clients with this level of growth.
Part 5 - Expansion
The VanHoose family went on a work-related travel trip and they packed; skill, passion, naivety, time, success, determination, revenue, consistency, confidence, and systems in their suitcase with the wheels that roll 360’ – that’s my favorite. We have two more items to toss in our carry-on.
- Scale – The ability to create or offer outside of yourself. This could mean having offers that are more passive or require less time, or it could mean that you have sales that are generated without your need to be present. You must have the ability to scale beyond yourself to grow into this expansion level.
- Leadership – With expansion, you’ll very likely become a leader in your organization. You may have hired support before, but you’ll truly need to lead at this level. You must dedicate time to your leadership skill development, support of your team, and leading the organization at an ownership level versus a contributor level
Where are you on this journey to growing your business? All are valid, and there is no defined timeline to be in each one – this is the beauty of entrepreneurship being a very personal journey
If you’re ready to level up, let’s chat. I help entrepreneurs transition through these stages, build sustainable businesses, and get paid what they’re worth.
Book a free strategy call here:
https://calendly.com/journeytoinfluence/strategy
Thank you for joining me on my journey to influence.
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