They say the first few years determine whether a small business will last or not. Quite a few don't make it past year 3 and for those that do it seems year 5 is the definite make or break moment.
That was pretty true for me as well.
After I started my small business in August of 2012 I made a LOT of mistakes. I was passionate about my new "baby" but didn't know exactly how to take care of it once I'd given "birth" to it.
I just tried things. For 4 years I experimented with everything from producing shows to participating in craft events to selling within other businesses to framing for my artist clients. I used what I knew from the events I'd visited in the past along with the skills and experience I'd gained from managing teams and spaces for corporations when I was employed by them.
And even with all that knowledge and experience I still f*cked up. A lot. And in numerous ways.
The thing that most people won't tell a new business owner is that this is normal! That's why so many of us fail at the start. We're supposed to mess up, fall down, flounder...but THEN once we do we're also supposed to get back up and try again. It's how we learn to even be successful to begin with. Through failure.
I could write a book on what not to do in business now. I won't, but I could.
And I learned just as much through all those mistakes I made as I did from past work experiences.
In year 5 though I got tired of messing up. I was sick and tired of being sick and tired within my small business and there wasn't a week that went by during those first 5 years that I didn't think about giving up. Some years I thought about it daily.
But then something happened in the 5th year that caused me to "woman up" and manage to begin to turn my sinking ship around and start to steer it towards my definition of success.
I finally sat down with a pen and paper and asked myself some deep questions about what I was doing. Then I answered in complete honesty with no emotion allowed. I tuned out all the noise of what others had told me and tuned into what I truly needed to do to make things work.
That's when I began to stop making mistake after mistake and my small business started to grow.
And after 11 1/2 years now I'm so glad I did that in year 5 AND I'm also grateful for those first 4 years of screw ups a.k.a. lessons.
That was pretty true for me as well.
After I started my small business in August of 2012 I made a LOT of mistakes. I was passionate about my new "baby" but didn't know exactly how to take care of it once I'd given "birth" to it.
I just tried things. For 4 years I experimented with everything from producing shows to participating in craft events to selling within other businesses to framing for my artist clients. I used what I knew from the events I'd visited in the past along with the skills and experience I'd gained from managing teams and spaces for corporations when I was employed by them.
And even with all that knowledge and experience I still f*cked up. A lot. And in numerous ways.
The thing that most people won't tell a new business owner is that this is normal! That's why so many of us fail at the start. We're supposed to mess up, fall down, flounder...but THEN once we do we're also supposed to get back up and try again. It's how we learn to even be successful to begin with. Through failure.
I could write a book on what not to do in business now. I won't, but I could.
And I learned just as much through all those mistakes I made as I did from past work experiences.
In year 5 though I got tired of messing up. I was sick and tired of being sick and tired within my small business and there wasn't a week that went by during those first 5 years that I didn't think about giving up. Some years I thought about it daily.
But then something happened in the 5th year that caused me to "woman up" and manage to begin to turn my sinking ship around and start to steer it towards my definition of success.
I finally sat down with a pen and paper and asked myself some deep questions about what I was doing. Then I answered in complete honesty with no emotion allowed. I tuned out all the noise of what others had told me and tuned into what I truly needed to do to make things work.
That's when I began to stop making mistake after mistake and my small business started to grow.
And after 11 1/2 years now I'm so glad I did that in year 5 AND I'm also grateful for those first 4 years of screw ups a.k.a. lessons.