spend an hour a week investing in yourself. If you can't speak coherently, you are just a hack. My soft skills have improved tremendously as well as my confidence. If you aren't comfortable speaking in public then you are not doing yourself justice. Toastmasters is the best bang for the buck, dues are cheap and I have earned 2 speaking gigs from the club. Another speaker in my club has made 1000 this year so far in giving 2 seminars on public speaking. astro
Lots of good ones in this thread. Here are a couple of that come to mind: Do a lot of reading/research Be persistent in reaching your goals Respect others
Here's some tips: - read good books and use what you learned - learn from other people's mistakes and your own - make low cost mistakes - spend your time on difficult things that prevent your business to success - don't spend your time on routine tasks that others can do for you - admit that you're not the best person for every task - no partners (except in some special cases) - be persistent but not stupid - try many things and invest on those that succeed - take responsibility of your business - be prepared for adversity - learn marketing. I graduated from marketing and stils read marketing books all the time. - understand that nobody loves your business like you do - make decisions. It's better to re-evaluate once made decision (and fix mistakes) than make no decision.
Vision, knowledge, courage, I think these three things are important for a business man. Josephine Time Attendance, Payroll, HR Software
One should never forget the past! Your prior experience helps you not to repeat the mistakes and to make right decisions at right time.
Great list and I'd like to believe all of them. Unfortunately I've known one or two successful business people who; Were not honest Were aggressive Did not value their staff Did not understanding accounting Did not believe in writing business plans.
Yes of cos lone internet marketer is also a business man. The future will comprise bigger % of such lone ranger business man.
Nonsense. That is Bad advice. Having a degree is great cos it helps get a job and stable income but does not make you a businessman. Degree/ University education is not directly related to being good business man/ entrepreneur. Sure there are business men who have degrees but not all degree holders are businessmen. Degree holders are booksmart while business man are streetsmart so they have different skill sets. Bill Gates, Steve Job, Richard Branson and tonnes of entrepreneurs do not have degrees
Again this is poor advice. You don't need to the level of public speaking that toastmaster seminar teaches you to to be successful businessman. Heck actually unless you are some hardselling salesmen/ marketeer trying to hard sell yr own bad products you may need to master the art of speaking and even then you don't public speaking- You do need basic presentation and communication skills but you do not need super duper master debater skills. Many successful businessmen are reclusive and are not front end people or salesmen. More important skill is operational management skill.
Again not really true. Yes, it is damn important to enjoy business that you do but you need to step up and make a difference to make big money. Cos for every 1 who enjoys his business and makes money, there are probably another 19 who enjoys his business but does not make money.