Over the years I’ve worked with a number of entrepreneurs looking to grow their companies. One of the more common sticking points is that they need to transition from working in their company to on. But often they don’t know how to do this or worse, they can’t let go of the stage of success they have had. They only know how to do things themselves, make constant/rapid adjustments to stay in business and accept any new client project regardless of the focus.
The very traits that make an entrepreneur successfully eventually become the very things that limit their growth.
Here are the 3 greatest challenges entrepreneurs face in making the shift from working in to on their company.
- Learn to Lead vs. Do – The hardest part about this shift is it involves how we see our self. If I was an internet marketer that started a company, part of my sense of value of self is through my ability to do great internet marketing. Letting go of this is a form of death and birth of a new sense of self. This can be an emotional journey. Learn how to lead better through Building a Culture of Engagement.
- Set Strategy and Let People Execute – Entrepreneurs have the unique gift to live in uncertainty. This is part of the reason they started the company in the first place, they were willing to jump into great risk. They’ve learned how to rapidly change course and direction to stay alive. Most people can’t take this much change. In fact, later people will start to see this as a major detractor of the leadership’s constant ‘shiny object syndrome’. They always have a new idea or plan before the current one has a chance to be completed. Learn more 3 Dangers to Avoid for Visionary Leaders.
- Say ‘No’ to Bad Business – Lastly, the pivot that most often that leads to breakthrough is learning which customers are the best and most profitable. The more you can focus on serving a specific client with specific problems, the sooner you can be more efficient, laser focused on sales and marketing and able to scale.
It’s amazing that working on these types of things and transitioning from highly entrepreneurial organizations to one’s that have a spelled out mission/vision, clear values on how decisions are made, strong culture of engagement all backed with a methodical operational executional framework that I’ve seen companies double and triple in no time. It’s a radically powerful shift from working in to one the business.