BEFORE YOU QUIT YOUR PAID JOB

By ZOE OLUWABUSAYO MADARIOLA

A lot of people are tired of their paid job, they want out, they want to run businesses of their own so that they can call the shots, be the boss, control things and have time for themselves and the family. If you are in this category, I ask that you pause a bit before turning in your resignation letter. 

Having the desire to start a business of your own, that is, to become an entrepreneur is a laudable idea, in fact, it is a welcome idea because it has lots of advantages for you, your family, community and the economy of the nation. When you run your own business, you create jobs for people, especially the large unemployed youths. When you have a business, you contribute to the economic development of the nation.

However, the underlying truth about entrepreneurship must be known and told. Entrepreneurship looks glamorous, enticing and simply but it is not any of those attributes. 

Entrepreneurship is a slow, deliberate and excruciating process that tasks the person first (the entrepreneur), before it builds the structure of an idea in a profitable business. Anyone who desires to take up the mantle of entrepreneurship must be ready for a changed mindset, for the process of entrepreneurship alters the thinking pattern of the individual to think and behave in a certain way.

Get ready to have the quality of your person tried, tested and refined in your pursuit of starting and owning a business. 

One of the most important factors in running a successful business is the quality of the person or persons running the business for the strength of a business cannot surpass the quality of those who run the business. The foundation of any enterprise is built on the values, application of knowledge, tenacity, vision and purpose of the purpose of the person or people at the helms of affairs of that business.

So before you quit your paid job, ask yourself if the quality of who you are and your value systems are solid enough to start an enterprise for entrepreneurship will test your belief system, confidence level and decision making abilities. 

While still thinking of quitting you paid employment to become an entrepreneur, know that you will work many times harder than you did as a paid employee. As a paid worker, you had your job descriptions and worked with other staff to achieve a common goal, that of the organization. As soon as you start your own company, you become the only one or with some few people doing all the main tasks. 

You become the one to build the organizational tenet for your business idea as against the already laid down organizational structure of the organization that employed you. 

You will begin the buildup of your company from the scratch, putting structures in place, planning the methods, processes and procedure for a venture you probably have not even started. 

This process will task you mentally and physically. You will determine your target audience and how to reach them; you will outline the value proposition your business idea will be delivering to your potential customers and the appropriate pricing for the value in question. Mind you, all your initial deliberations would mostly be on paper.

After you are done with building processes and procedure for the business idea, then, begins the real work of rolling out the business to reach the target audience and sell to them.  When you get to this stage, you most probably will find out that there is a difference between potential and actuality. The business idea you thought will benefit certain target audience may turn out not to be that way.

Then you will have to find out from those who didn’t purchase your product what they truly need. When you find this out, then, you begin another process of revisiting your initial plans about your business processes.

If you are intellectually, mentally and physically lazy, you will not make a successful entrepreneur. If you give up too soon, you will not get a good outcome in the business of entrepreneurship.

Quality persistence and tenacity of purpose are most-have attributes of anyone desiring to become an entrepreneur. You must be willing and ready to constantly update and upgrade your processes to suit the market need. 

Selling your product isn’t about how well you conducted your strategy session and for how many hours; the main determinant of the outcome of your strategy is your target market. When your target market embrace your product and make demands from you, then your strategy becomes successful but if otherwise, you will have to look for ways to re-strategize to reach the consumer.

The making of the entrepreneur is done through the process of building the person (the entrepreneur) and the business.  Credibility in entrepreneurship is achieved through the slow process of building the business venture which means that you (the entrepreneur) must be willing to put in the time and the work.

So, before you quit your paid job, ask yourself, am I willing to work many times harder than I am doing on this paid job? Am i willing to constantly upgrade my skill level to meet market demand? Can i consistently review my business processes to meet changing customers’ tastes?

If your answers to those above questions are in the affirmative, then you can start putting structures in place for your resignation from your paid job. 

However, as much as entrepreneurship isn’t glamorous, it is a very rewarding and fulfilling path to go.

ZOE OLUWABUSAYO MADARIOLA, is a Principal Officer at ZOE&PHIL, email: thezoeconcept@gmail.com

Photo credit: Stock Photos: Masterfile