ET OnlineBy Krishnakumar Natarajan
Over the years, I have often seen many people take the entrepreneurial plunge as soon as the killer idea or innovative concept pops into their mind. At the same time, I have also seen people sitting on the fence and forever deliberating about taking the decision. To say the least, entrepreneurship is not a cakewalk.
The budding business creators of tomorrow who take the entrepreneurial plunge in a hurry to convert their killer idea to a scalable business face a higher probability to fail with their startup venture if they do not think of other aspects of building a business. Meanwhile, the fence sitters repent seeing their unique business idea taken by their competitors.
Whether to take the plunge early or deliberate forever is not the only challenge that entrepreneurship throws at up. Although, there is nothing more tempting than the idea of calling the shots and making things happen on your own terms, it is also difficult to leave behind the security of a stable job to make a mark for yourself the entrepreneurial way.
Find your true calling Therefore, it is important to understand that being unhappy in the current job or peer pressure of friends starting their businesses should not be the influencing factor for one to get into entrepreneurship. It should in fact be the true calling of doing something unique. It should be the lure of creating something new and the satisfaction of winning customers, which should propel you into this journey.
Once you have made up your mind about taking a shot at your entrepreneurial dream, it is advisable that the budding entrepreneurs are better prepared for their journey by considering the following factors:
Possess the domain understanding of the business It is important to have a deep understanding of the business and the industry vertical you plan to enter. You might have a unique business idea where you see no competition. However, it is important to validate the real needs of the customers by interacting with other players in the market. Also present challenges and needs are not a proxy for needs of the future. Doing proper market validation and understanding the things that have worked or not worked for your competitors will help in better planning and execution of your unique business idea.
Build a diverse team that complements strengths There are many up-and-coming entrepreneurs with ideas, but not having a diverse group of people to help in expanding and making it more powerful. When one has identified the problem in the domain, then focus on building a complementary team that will help in strengthening the idea and developing it into a business proposition. For instance, in an ecommerce venture, one may have the best understanding of technology for the platform, but it is also essential to have the guidance and support from someone who understands merchandising and retail, or channel marketing. Diversity of key competencies needs to be there amongst the start-up team.
Have the roadmap of how your business will shape up in the future For startups there are a lot of uncertainties, and thus having a view of the market for the next five years may be difficult. Nevertheless, startups should have a view of what their organization should be doing and achieving in two or three years' span, which is more of an aspiration. At end of the day it is the aspiration that drives the success of a business.
Identify key execution challenges that you might face It is important to identify well in advance the challenges which can hamper execution of the business idea, and plan how it can be de-risked. When you enter a market, the realities can be totally different from the ones that you had envisaged. Being flexible to change the go-to market strategy is imperative. Listening to the customer and changing as per the customer's need, and not being dogmatic about the idea is important for a business to succeed.
How are you sourcing the funds? Before starting a business, it is important to take stock of your financial position. Most businesses require some kind of initial seed or startup funding. As the business is in initial stage, there is no point to pitch the "killer-idea" to venture capitalists to raise a large amount of money. By getting the money from friends and family and risking your own savings you will be able to kick-start your dream venture. But as the business will not reach scale until a critical mass of customer-base has been built, it is a struggle to invest capital for growth. Therefore, it is important to get investors who will help in supporting the business as well as in expanding it. Be careful in choosing seed fund investors who are from the domain where you are launching the business as they will not only help in the set-up but will also share their expertise and guidance to make the venture successful.
Also keep in mind that being passionate about entrepreneurship alone will not suffice in converting your dream idea into a scalable business. Starting a new venture needs much more than passion. Once the entrepreneurial plunge has been taken, it is perseverance and the risk taking abilities that sets apart the successful entrepreneurs from their peers, as they scale up their idea into a sustainable business.
The author is executive chairman, Mindtree.
Over the years, I have often seen many people take the entrepreneurial plunge as soon as the killer idea or innovative concept pops into their mind. At the same time, I have also seen people sitting on the fence and forever deliberating about taking the decision. To say the least, entrepreneurship is not a cakewalk.
The budding business creators of tomorrow who take the entrepreneurial plunge in a hurry to convert their killer idea to a scalable business face a higher probability to fail with their startup venture if they do not think of other aspects of building a business. Meanwhile, the fence sitters repent seeing their unique business idea taken by their competitors.
Whether to take the plunge early or deliberate forever is not the only challenge that entrepreneurship throws at up. Although, there is nothing more tempting than the idea of calling the shots and making things happen on your own terms, it is also difficult to leave behind the security of a stable job to make a mark for yourself the entrepreneurial way.
Find your true calling Therefore, it is important to understand that being unhappy in the current job or peer pressure of friends starting their businesses should not be the influencing factor for one to get into entrepreneurship. It should in fact be the true calling of doing something unique. It should be the lure of creating something new and the satisfaction of winning customers, which should propel you into this journey.
Once you have made up your mind about taking a shot at your entrepreneurial dream, it is advisable that the budding entrepreneurs are better prepared for their journey by considering the following factors:
Possess the domain understanding of the business It is important to have a deep understanding of the business and the industry vertical you plan to enter. You might have a unique business idea where you see no competition. However, it is important to validate the real needs of the customers by interacting with other players in the market. Also present challenges and needs are not a proxy for needs of the future. Doing proper market validation and understanding the things that have worked or not worked for your competitors will help in better planning and execution of your unique business idea.
Build a diverse team that complements strengths There are many up-and-coming entrepreneurs with ideas, but not having a diverse group of people to help in expanding and making it more powerful. When one has identified the problem in the domain, then focus on building a complementary team that will help in strengthening the idea and developing it into a business proposition. For instance, in an ecommerce venture, one may have the best understanding of technology for the platform, but it is also essential to have the guidance and support from someone who understands merchandising and retail, or channel marketing. Diversity of key competencies needs to be there amongst the start-up team.
Have the roadmap of how your business will shape up in the future For startups there are a lot of uncertainties, and thus having a view of the market for the next five years may be difficult. Nevertheless, startups should have a view of what their organization should be doing and achieving in two or three years' span, which is more of an aspiration. At end of the day it is the aspiration that drives the success of a business.
Identify key execution challenges that you might face It is important to identify well in advance the challenges which can hamper execution of the business idea, and plan how it can be de-risked. When you enter a market, the realities can be totally different from the ones that you had envisaged. Being flexible to change the go-to market strategy is imperative. Listening to the customer and changing as per the customer's need, and not being dogmatic about the idea is important for a business to succeed.
How are you sourcing the funds? Before starting a business, it is important to take stock of your financial position. Most businesses require some kind of initial seed or startup funding. As the business is in initial stage, there is no point to pitch the "killer-idea" to venture capitalists to raise a large amount of money. By getting the money from friends and family and risking your own savings you will be able to kick-start your dream venture. But as the business will not reach scale until a critical mass of customer-base has been built, it is a struggle to invest capital for growth. Therefore, it is important to get investors who will help in supporting the business as well as in expanding it. Be careful in choosing seed fund investors who are from the domain where you are launching the business as they will not only help in the set-up but will also share their expertise and guidance to make the venture successful.
Also keep in mind that being passionate about entrepreneurship alone will not suffice in converting your dream idea into a scalable business. Starting a new venture needs much more than passion. Once the entrepreneurial plunge has been taken, it is perseverance and the risk taking abilities that sets apart the successful entrepreneurs from their peers, as they scale up their idea into a sustainable business.
The author is executive chairman, Mindtree.
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