W. Patric Gregory, a business owner, on starting a business

If you are interested in starting your own business, there are several questions you will need to ask yourself --the most important one: do I really want to start a business?

If the answer is still “yes," then you’ll be ready to ask the next set of questions: How do I begin? What can I expect? How can I grow it once I’ve started it? Here are five essential steps to help you answer those questions and prepare you for the road ahead.

Be proactive

There’s exactly one person that can make anything happen – that needs to make everything happen – and that person is looking out at you from the mirror. Without that person, nothing happens. Without incessant initiative from within that person, your fledgling business will stall. Gut check: Do you have an unquenchable fire in the belly? If not, stop reading this now and keep your day job. If you do, read on.
You need to be unfailingly proactive – and if you have what it takes to succeed, you already know that. Nothing will be handed to you. You need to reach out and grab it. If you don’t, no one else will and your so-called business will be stillborn. Not that there’s anything wrong with delegating, it’s just that in the early going, you’ll be disappointed by the trust you’ve put in others. They don’t want it as much as you do, and they’ll let you down.

Another point – one you’ve heard before but need to internalize: You’re going to fail as many times as you succeed. To keep blazing forward, you need the optimism of puppy, the fire of a dragon, the persistence of a tortoise, and the skin of a rhinoceros. You need to translate every misstep, every disappointment, every criticism into redoubled resolve. You need not to only learn from your failures but to be energized by them. Play the victim and you’re finished. There’s no self-pity on the road to success. That miscue that just happened? It’s a gift. It’s taught you something – something you won’t repeat and will never forget. Pick yourself up and tell that person in the mirror you’re better for it. In fact, you’ve never been better, period.

Begin with the end in mind

What does success look like? Now, what does your success look like? Throw away the conventional definitions of success and visualize where you want to be, and when. There’s no right answer. Whatever is right for you needs to bubble up from within. You need to be honest about it. And just as important, it needs to be real, something you can clearly envision.

So where do you see yourself once you’re succeeding? Visualize it. Verbalize it. Describe it to a friend. Only then will you truly have a prize you can keep your eye on. Keep in mind Earl Nightingale’s “The Strangest Secret”: You become what you think about. Think about success clearly and convincingly, and that’s what you’ll become.

Ask yourself: What kind of business is it? Do I want to run for the rest of my career? Or is this a stepping-stone to an even greater venture? Either way, make sure you have a plan, one that will get you through the near term or the longer term.

But here’s the key to any plan: you need to stay flexible. If the best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry, the best paid plans of entrepreneurs are in a perpetual state of churn. So by all means make a plan – start with a five-year plan – but always consider yourself in the first year of that five-year plan. And update it next year, and the year after.

About the Author

W. Patric Gregory is an experienced business professional from Glastonbury, Connecticut. Patric currently serves as the owner and CEO of Highway Safety Corp, a company that has contributed to the highway construction industry for over 40 years. As leader of the company's senior management team, Patric is a seasoned strategist and innovator in his field.

To learn more about W. Patric Gregory, click here.