Talia D. a wannabe COREageous entrepreneur from Bloomington, Indiana writes: I wrote up a business plan for a service startup, hailed by my professors and my mentor as ‘a winner.’ But they advised that I need to be more confident in myself to pull it off. How do I begin building more confidence?
The proposition of starting a business can be overwhelming. Plus, knowing the dismal startup failure rate takes another jab at your ability to “pull it off.”
The good news is that your team is confident in the plan – you’re surrounding yourself with supportive folks you trust for good advice and constructive criticism.
Whether you are a newbie to entrepreneurship or a seasoned self-starter, confidence is a major factor in startup success. Here are a few ways to scale up your confidence:
- If you’ve had any past failures that made you doubt yourself, label those events as “valuable data” to draw on for the future: naiveté, assumptions, blind passion, impulsive decisions, etc. What matters is how you view them.
- Capitalize on your strengths i.e. your industry knowledge, your attention to detail, etc. Accept your gaps and outsource or partner up with someone who can fill them.
- Go Micro and break down the big tasks into bit goals. Most tasks are less daunting and more do-able when they are broken into manageable steps.
- On a personal level, challenge yourself to do something difficult every day – 5 extra slow pushups, wake up a half hour earlier than usual, make that awkward phone call, or give blood. Whatever challenge you take on make it reasonable and a bit beyond what you think you could do.
As always, if you want to learn more about CoreCoaching with me, email Rebecca@MindfulCommunication.com
"It takes more than courage to be an Entrepreneur, it takes CORE."