8. Be Humble
A quote I reference often: You don’t know what you don’t know. This rings so true to me, so simple, and yet so deep. I understand this and try to always stay humble, no matter how confident I feel about myself or my knowledge on any subject matter. This keeps me open to learning from others, keeps me coachable, and keeps me growing and learning. I love talking to other business owners for this reason. When you think you know it all, you stay the same. There is always room for improvement.
For a new entrepreneur, this should come pretty easy because you are entering a brand new venture and are forced to learn as you go. You will never know all the challenges or struggles you may encounter before they come. The possibilities are endless. It is important to have a plan and you can try to be as prepared as possible, but knowing comes from experience, as hindsight is 20/20 as they say. If you have been there you know and you can feel more comfortable approaching new challenges with efficiency and calm confidence. But this comes with time.
Luckily with the internet today, answers and solutions to problems you may encounter may possibly be available at the click of a mouse. Search engines like Google and YouTube, or industry forums and websites provide tons of free resources from people who want to help and have encountered similar situations. You can even post your problem on a website or forum and complete strangers will chime in to provide their guidance and what worked for them.
You don’t need to figure everything out yourself. It is ok to ask for assistance. Be open to receiving help. Learn from someone who has done it before and had success. Learn from those who have done it before and failed. Be open. Be Humble.
Seek out expertise where you lack the experience. If you have all the time in the world to spend learning new skills and trying to learn through trial and error, then by all means, sometimes that is the best way to learn. But as busy entrepreneurs, we know this is never the case. We don’t have time to try to figure everything out on our own and as much as we want to believe we are good at everything, we also recognize that to be the most efficient, we need to delegate and put trust in others to get the job done right.
The school of hard knocks can carry a hefty tuition if you make big mistakes. Although you may learn big, this can set you back quite a bit, not only financially, but in time, which is really your greatest asset. Cut your learning curve and increase your efficiency by leveraging the experience and knowledge of experts, preferably proven experts who can show you solid results and performance. Seek out experts who continue to invest in themselves and their companies to stay in the know and keep up with the latest trends, innovations and technological advancements in your industry. There have been plenty of times where I tried to resolve an issue using my own ideas based on my experiences which I thought at the time was good enough. But, upon consulting an expert, I soon realized there were better options available, which I never even knew existed, but so appreciated.
