When To Take The Plunge

We got an interesting question from a young potential entrepreneur last week on when to consider starting your own business. This is a subject that’s not often written on, (most of the commentary just focuces on how successful they were), so here are some expanded steps on how we would do a new business.
1. Take our free entrepreneurship questionnaire at www.theasoe.com, under downloads. You should be psychically suited for entrepreneurship, because it’s usually a struggle in the beginning.
2. Our questioner was empployed with a major corporation, so he might have been able to develop an idea within the confines of the corporation he works for. We cover this in one of our specialty courses, S05 on intrapreneuring.
3. Assuming you’re right for entrepreneurship, but you’ve not got an intrapreneuring opportunity, you’ve got to validate your idea through market research. Use our course A02, which should give you a good idea if you’ve got a business, a hobby or something else.
3, Can you find the funding you need? This is not as hard as most periodicals portray it; money is out there for good ideas. We go over all sorts of funding mechanisms in A14, Alternative Finance, far more than I’ve seen written about in the blogosphere.
4. Now, if you’ve got a valid idea and found the funds you need, one way or another, it’s time for a gut check with your friends, family, even partners. Is there anything you’ve missed?
5. If not, and all personal systems are go, it’s time to take the plunge!
If one proceeds in a systematic way, and follows all these steps, changes of failure are cut from about 80% to 20% in the first year. Once you get past the first year, chances get better.
Steve, I hope this helps!