Being an Entrepreneur / Your Business

No technical direction in today’s blog. I feel like harnessing a different side of my brain. I want to discuss you and me. The topic of working on your own, or, even if you don’t the importance of the entrepreneur “in you” wherever you do work. Do you consult, do you have your own clients or are you striving to? There are some principals I think are necessary to make it “on your own” or excel where you are working. While I am a younger CPA and take a lot of pride in what I have accomplished so far, I keep working hard knowing that I have hardly touched the tip of the iceberg of what I can accomplish in my life. Not just from a technical perspective, but from a business aspect and a customer relationship aspect.

The most important part of any business are the customers and your relationships with them. This is a relationship world. If you can’t work with people and improve your relationship skills every day you wake up, your success might be an epic struggle. Have you ever heard the saying “It’s not who you are, it is who you know”? This is not to imply that you must suck-up or be fake so you are everyone’s friend. This saying is meant to emphasize the importance of the people around you. No matter how good you are at what you do, the people around you and the people you connect with will ultimately be a a major part of your success either on your own or within an organization. This applies to all small business owners and entrepreneurs. You never know when taking the time and energy to be genuinely nice to someone and help them out can lead to a new lead or referral that exponentially brings you more clients.

In my opinion, you can’t get around hard work either. While I have talked about becoming wealthy by learning how to make your money work for you so you don’t have to work as hard, you have to start somewhere. Take CafeTax for example. I started this blog about 8 months ago. I did it without goals, like generating revenue or meeting new clients. I just wanted to find an outlet for the creative side of my profession. I was often criticized for this. “Why spend the time doing that”? “It won’t make you money”! “Think about the hours you spend without having any return”! These are valid points and concerns. Fortunately for me I started CafeTax because it was fun to me, and I felt like it was something that could not just educate the reader, but keep me educated. Now a little over a half year later 3 to 5 hundred people a day see my blog and my passion. About 92% of those people are new visitors. Is that a lot? I guess it depends on who you ask. I know some of the bloggers I follow get thousands a day. The point is I worked hard at something, I exceeded expectations, and now I can start making goals with it if I choose to. In addition, some dividends you can’t quantify, like the amount of tax professionals I have met through my website networking and can now reach out to at anytime.

Creating and maintaining relationships and working hard, they will steer you in the right direction. Unfortunately, I still have to include technical competency (I say that with a smile on my face). I must admit, however, relationships carry much more weight than your technical competency when your trying to work on your own. Sure, you need to “know your stuff”, but I have seen more people create success out of their ingenuity with their customer/client relationships while hiring out the technical aspects necessary in the business. Who do you think makes the bulk of the money, the guy who knows everyone and put together a successful business, or the guy who can recite tax code? Maybe you don’t care, but I don’t think I need to answer that question. Technical competency is important, but sometimes I have to remind myself that it is not what is always most important.

Creativity, you must have it. If you don’t, find it. It might be funny to think of a CPA talking about the need for creativity, but it is true. Whether it is creative tax planning or creative tax litigation, it matters. Maybe it is creativity in your business with your website and social media. Maybe it is with your technology. Maybe it is how you reach your clients. Maybe it is with you employees. I think you can be like everyone else, or you can use creativity to separate yourself. The beauty of being creative in your business: it is fun, for everyone.

Every day we can all improve. If you want to be on your own, or be extra successful where you are, be an entrepreneur. Take these points to heart, work hard, be creative and don’t be afraid to meet as many people as you can.