10 characteristics of a successful entrepreneur

For many people, entrepreneurship has become the job choice of the 21st century. That’s understandable given the challenges and rewards of building a successful business. If you are considering entrepreneurship, you should begin the process by understanding the mental, psychological, and behavioral characteristics necessary for success.

1. Positive mental attitude. This is possibly the most important of all features. You will never be a successful entrepreneur without a positive attitude. The only thing you can be sure of is that you will experience difficult times. Your success or failure will be determined right now. If you maintain your confidence, persevere, and remain positive, you will succeed. Conversely, if you allow doubt and uncertainty to prevail, you will probably fail.

2. Enjoy being around people. Being a successful entrepreneur means that you will continually interact with a wide variety of people, such as customers, potential clients, colleagues, competitors, vendors, attorneys, accountants, and coaches. It really helps if you enjoy being around these people.

3. Excellent communication skills. Communication can be defined as the precise exchange of information between two or more parties. This is important because you will have many conversations. Must be able to accurately exchange information in a rapidly changing world using a variety of communication methods (eg, interpersonal, electronic). Of particular importance is the ability to really listen and understand where another person is coming from.

4. Have the need to achieve. Successful entrepreneurs are achievement oriented. They value achievement and the intrinsic rewards that accompany reaching difficult goals. It is a strong motivator for most business owners.

5. Witty. Most new businesses have limited resources, such as money, information, and time. Successful entrepreneurs discover how to make the most of these resources. They are masters at stretching a dollar and making a few resources go a long way.

6. Aim. It is not easy to be objective about your business because you are passionate about making it successful. However, you must be impartial and dispassionate when it comes to making business decisions because emotion, bias, and sentiment can lead to bad decisions.

7. Engaged. Building a successful business requires absolute commitment. It takes a lot of work and there will be times when you get discouraged. It is during these times that you must be firm, faithful and committed to your vision.

8. Dependent. This should go without saying, but I’ll say it anyway. There is a strong positive relationship between your perceived level of trustworthiness and the success of your business. No matter what type of business you have, your customers expect you to be dependent.

9. Proactive and not reactive. Successful entrepreneurs anticipate problems early and deal with them before they occur. If you simply react to problems and issues as they arise, you may feel overwhelmed.

10 Possess technical skills and knowledge.. Every business requires unique skills and technical knowledge on the part of the owner. You have to be good at what you do for your business to be successful. This often means obtaining additional education and training on an ongoing basis, sometimes in order to obtain specific credentials (eg, certifications, licenses).