I was talking with my friend the other day when she lamented how tired she was of her routine. It wasn’t that she didn’t like her chosen profession - she loved what she did. She was just tired of it following the same pattern, the same drudgery day in and day out. I had to admit to her – I had no idea what she was talking about. Ever since the first day I went out on my own 12 years ago, I can’t say that sameness has been a problem. On the contrary, there are days when I wish I could know what to expect.
If you find that you are comfortable with routine and like to know what is going to happen next, don’t become an entrepreneur (or a mother, for that matter!). You don’t know when, you don’t know where, but you can be sure that things will not go as planned at some point. In my book I call this “Spit (up) Happens” and the best advice I can give new business owners is to expect the unexpected. For example, I started the company without contracts – I did work based on a hand shake. When our first large (six figure) opportunity came up, I knew in my gut we had to formalize the agreement. Even though I had a strong relationship with this client and there was a great deal of trust between us, I had to treat the transaction as just business. It was a good thing I did, because shortly after it turned into a multi-million dollar deal, my customer was bought out by a multi-billion dollar company. I would have been at risk of losing the business had I not had our agreement formalized.
Do you have anything that you have done to prepare for the unexpected? How about going against your gut instinct and then regretting it?
