WHY DO YOU THINK OF DITCH YOUR BILLION-NAIRA BUSINESS AMBITIONS
Ideas on how build a new company should look likes this; We all want to build the next Apple, Google or Facebook - companies worth billions and billions of Naira. But you might want to think smaller, at least initially rather than ponder the question, "How can I launch the next billion-Naira company,
Entrepreneurial Design has a sur
prising syllabus for a business class: Don't write up a business plan or create a pitch deck for an imaginary billion-Naira business. create a project that will produce N10,000 in monthly profit in a way that's repeatable and sustainable. The resulting projects include profitable, ongoing businesses and funded Kick-starter projects - for if you take on the challenge of building a N10,000 startup, you'll learn three invaluable lessons:
1.1 Self-sufficiency
Individuals and startups need to be self-sufficient and that's why getting your project to ramen profitability is such a vital and game-changing milestone. But when you have to rely on a salary to make a living, or your company needs to rely on investor money to continue to exist, your autonomy and creativity become limited. When you are making N10,000 per month, you begin to be able to cover your rent and that self-sufficiency slowly transforms into a dawning sense of limitless possibilities. Blogger Ailian Gan calls it, "creating a sense of self-propulsion" -- that feeling that you can take charge of your own destiny.
1.2 Related: What makes some people Valley Successful? Not What You Think
Actually building a business treading the common path of idea to accelerator to funding to operating often results in a rude awakening. I've talked to a number of founders who have attended top accelerator programs, raised glitzy million-Naira seed rounds, and then fell flat when it came time to actually build the business. In short, building a business is a lot different from fundraising. By the time my company 4D Logo Concept have hit N10,000 in recurring revenue, I had learned how to set up the groundwork and grow from there -- from how to build a product, to how bring it to market, to how to get people to pay for it. Most importantly, if you focus on building a N10,000 startup rather than a billion-Naira one, you'll get the order of operations right: validate and learn first, then scale. If you focus on building a N10,000 startup instead of trying your hand at building a business for the first time as a funded company, you'll learn how to actually build a business first without millions of Naira of investor cash at stake. You'll save yourself a lot of pain and time that way.
2.3 Related: How Entrepreneurs Think Differently and You Should Too
Finding success anyway in the biggest twist of all, it turns out that one of the best ways to build something big is to build something small. The paradox is that limiting yourself to "big" ideas tends to produce bad ones, according to famed investor and founder of Y Combinator Paul Graham. The best ideas are often what Graham calls "toys" or ideas you wouldn't recognize as touching on a billion-Naira opportunity. ZeroCater, a Y Combinator-funded company started by founder Arram Sabbeti, was born from the humble ambition Sabbeti had when he wanted to quit his job and needed enough income to pay for his rent and ramen. He started by helping his own employer cater their company lunches and began to expand to other startups in the area. What started as a N1,000 startup soon became a much bigger opportunity and then a full-fledged startup as Sabetti added more and more paying clients. Within a year, Sabetti had turned his rent and ramen side project into a startup backed by the best investors in Silicon Valley.
2.4 Related: How to Successfully Turn (Almost) Anyone into Your Mentor
Often the narratives and myths that swirl around in the startup world make it seem as if successful businesses spring out of people's minds, like Zeus' offspring. It so often doesn't work that way. The N1,000 startup is a powerful frame to put on your ideas, because it strips the distorting force of market opportunity out of the idea equation. Rather, it properly focuses you on the question of whether you're building something that other people want enough that they're willing to pay you for it. Meanwhile, if you do the work and grow from it, that seed of an idea can sprout into a thriving startup that brings in real money.
2.5 How to Become the Best in Your Field. The notion of a miraculous genius being born smarter and more capable than the rest of us mere mortals charms our curiosity. Robert Greene, author of the popular The 48 Laws of Power (Penguin, 2000), would disagree. The fascination we have in prodigies, he says, is "bogus. It's completely bogus." Exceptional talent is about hard work, he says. Greene studied the lives of exceptionally successful people for his latest book, Mastery (Viking/Penguin, 2012). He says that there is no such thing as being born into superior success. Rather, those politicians, entrepreneurs, scientists, athletes and artists who rise above the rest in their field, achieving what he calls a "high-level intuitive feel" for their specialty, have an unyielding focus and work ethic. "It's not a question of some natural talent or brilliance that you have, it's that you have reached that level of experience or practice," Greene told Entrepreneur.com. "We have to get rid of that old-fashioned notion of genius and creativity." He holds himself to the standard he preaches, having put in more 20,000 hours researching and writing his last five books. In Mastery, Greene examines the cultural poster-children for natural-born genius: Mozart and Einstein. For example, by the time he was 9 years old, Mozart had already put in 10,000 to 20,000 hours of work, equaling the efforts of an average person in his or her 20s, says Greene. Einstein attributed his own success to persistence, he says. Greene developed a near cult-following for his methodical and -- some say -- Machiavellian breakdown of power and the people who wield it in The 48 Laws of Power. Part of what makes Greene popular is that he studies powerful people and then breaks down their process such that others can emulate it. Here are recommendations from Greene for entrepreneurs eager to be the next Steve Jobs.
2.1 Related: Glimpse the Future: Inspirational Inventors in the Spotlight
i. Chose a topic to focus on that you are deeply in love with. "Masters and highly successful people are emotionally and personally engaged in their work" on a level beyond intellectual curiosity, Greene says. It's the personal commitment to a topic, problem or skill that is ultimately necessary for motivating and maintaining the long hours and fervent curiosity required to rise to the level of "mastery" in a field. "Otherwise you are never going to have the energy, the patience, the persistence, the ability to put up with the criticism, you will give up too easily, you won't push through all the crap the world is going to throw at you." Related: Inspiration for the Downtimes (Infographic)
2. Skip all the extra school. Learn by doing. According to Greene, learning entrepreneurship in school is inane. "Being an entrepreneur is making something, it's like Legos," Greene says and the best way to become an entrepreneur is to try building businesses. Henry Ford's first two automobile companies failed miserably, notes Greene. "You want to actually psychologically desire failure because it is how you are going to learn." If you aren't going to start your own business, at least work in as small a company as possible to learn as many skills as possible. Avoid large corporations and business school, Greene says. As an entrepreneur, "you are going to hire the people that have the MBAs. They are going to bring in that nuts-and-bolts knowledge." Related: What Entrepreneurs Need to Know About Their Brains
3. Don't focus on making money in your 20s. "Tune out the idea of making your first million. It's about learning. You are there to accumulate as much experience building a business and you want to build several, if possible," says Greene. In the first five to 10 years after college, pursue experience over money. You will learn more than you could earn in those years.
4. When you have some experience, select a mentor. When selecting a mentor, look for somebody who is already doing what you see yourself doing in five to 10 years, says Greene. If you are going to try to approach a master to be your mentor, wait to do so until you have already started amassing a body of work. A healthy mentorship relationship is like that between a parent and a child, says Greene. A good mentor should be older than you and at a point in his or her career that he or she is wants to give back. Personality is important, too. "You want somebody who matches your spirit. If you are a very rebellious type, you don't want a stuffy conservative type mentor," says Greene. Related: Startup Must-Haves: Perseverance and Optimism (Infographic)
5. be flexible and creative. For the book, Greene interviewed Paul Graham, the computer programmer entrepreneur who started Via web, a company acquired by Yahoo in 1998 to become the Yahoo Store, and a partner of Y Combinator, an accelerator for startup entrepreneurs. In the highly competitive interview process for Y Combinator, Graham "can tell after one minute if he has the next Zuckerberg or this guy is useless, and it is because they are open-minded, they're flexible and they love, they are excited, they have a childlike interest," says Greene. Building a company will inevitably confront you with unexpected challenges, and your ability to adjust your path to deal with those surprises is critical. Now let’s look at the Nigeria aspect where there no creative ideas rather than youths going about complaining of no job in the country. In the developed nation like western world youths go for research and they always come with new ideas .
