How to become an Entrepreneur

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Think you could be the next Branson? Ready to let your ideas do the talking? You should be an Entrepreneur… Entrepreneurs pursue professional opportunities, with little regards to the risks or resources required to succeed. This could be coming up with their own ideas for products to fill gaps in the market, or buying and selling the latest start-ups and spurring them on to success. There is no set career path. There is no field. There is just an idea, the drive and determination to succeed, and a very particular set of skills… (although these are not necessarily acquired over a long career). Typical duties for an Entrepreneur could include:

Developing new products and services
Writing business plans and developing business models
Raising the capital required to get their company off the ground
Selling, distributing and marketing their product
Buying and selling different businesses and developing them for maximum returns

Contrary to popular belief, here’s more to being a successful entrepreneur than a hoodie and a good idea (sorry Mark). You must be a creative (and competitive) person, with the confidence and conviction to make your ideas a reality. However, the very best entrepreneurs don’t just come up with great concepts. They also see opportunities others don’t recognise, and use their business acumen to succeed where others may have failed. Other key skills include:

Highly developed organisational and interpersonal skills
Unshakeable self-belief and confidence in ideas
Adaptability, objectivity and honesty (especially if/when things don’t quite go to plan)
Innovation and originality
Thinking ‘outside the box’, the ability to ‘push the envelope’ (and other things that sound incredibly cliché, but in fact aren’t)

"Someone once said being an entrepreneur is like jumping off a cliff, and assembling an aeroplane on the way down. I find it pretty hard to disagree with that. In a nutshell, I would say it’s hard work. You need to be prepared to trade eight hour days in for 18 hour days, and have such complete confidence in yourself that even on the worst day you can come out with something positive. However, although it can be tough at times, the thrill of taking big risks and being your own boss never wears off. When you pull off a big deal, it doesn't even feel like a business. It just feels like winning."

Get qualified

There are no formal qualifications needed to become an entrepreneur. However, having the right set of attributes may not be enough to get you ahead. There are range of different courses aimed at developing your business skills, and anything from learning how to write good business proposals through to improving public speaking skills could really make a difference when it comes to getting your ideas off the ground.

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