CleverStart

Many times those are one in the same.  A Mentor will often be a partner, and a partner will often be a mentor.  Learn from my experiences when i say that building your "team" really is a big component to the future success of your business.  When starting off in business, you NEED someone you can turn to.  The local SBA chapter is a good resource, often times free, so are networking groups such as business networking international (BNI), the Center for Entrepreneurial Development (CED), and others.  Word of mouth is also huge.  don’t be afraid to ask people you know as well as people you don’t know or barely know, to find out if they are interested in talking to you about your small business and giving you any valuable insight that they may have learned along the way in their illustrious careers.  Work with people that are smarter than you, and that compliment your skill set.  A mentor or a partner should always have more knowledge, more skills, and more experience than you, if you want to be able to learn from them and leverage your relationship to further the success of your start up.  This sounds so simple, yet i am completely aware that it is more difficult in practice to achieve this.  Heck, i am not going to call up Warren Buffet on the phone and ask him if i should buy a particular stock or bond, or invest in a certain industry or not, even though he is the oracle of Omaha and is the best investor in the history of the universe.  okay, i am biased because my grandparents live in Omaha, but being consistently the worlds #1 or #2 richest man behind or ahead of Bill Gates is pretty impressive.  So no, i am not going to leave you with a general directive which is very difficult and unrealistic to follow.  I read a million books and articles and i feel they all lack the same thing, a personal connection.  It’s like my old soccer coach who never played soccer in his life.  he sure could tell me what to do, but i never believed him because i KNOW he didn’t do it himself.  If anyone has ever invested in or thought about investing in real estate, then you know all too well the scams and thieves that idiots are running out there to separate you from your money by posing as so called "guru’s" who will train you on how to make 20K per month in passive income.  Let’s be real, if they were able to teach me and a bunch of other wanna be’s how to make 20K a month investing in real estate, then why the heck are they sitting in some hotel conference room charging me $500 bucks for this lame class instead of making the "big bucks" themselves?  well, it’s simple, they can’t and they’re not (making the money).  if it looks and sounds too good to be true or to be real, then it probably is (too good to be true).  again, i digress.  if anyone wishes to discuss real estate, i will speak more about real estate investing in future posts, as i have gained a lot of valuable experience in this world through being ripped off numerous times by experts and gurus and by failing miserably at several attempts to hit it rich, only to find a nice happy medium of actually making some money (although not the promised millionaire in two year program). 

So, let me break it down for you.  Talk to everyone you know, find someone through your own process of 7 degrees of Kevin Bacon to get to somebody in your circle that is smarter than you and knows more about the industry you wish to break into with your small business.  Pick their brain, discuss your idea, thank them graciously for taking the time to talk with you, and lastly, ask them if they would be willing to mentor you as you take your journey.  It really is that simple.  I wish i would have known that earlier in my life, because the value it has and can add to your business is beyond comprehension.  It can save you time, save you money, and help you achieve your goals.  BUT, start with the first step, identify WHO you want to talk to whether it is a specific who, or a profile of "who", and then figure out how to reach them.  Do it, don’t skip that vital step and just read my blog and the million other expert websites, do it, find that person, sit down and talk with them.  If you do not or are not willing to do that, then please stop reading my blog, it is that important! 

can i make a shameless self promoting plug here?  well, it’s my blog, so i guess i can.  Clever Start is here to help you with ALL of the ups and downs, questions and concerns, fears and uncertainties, trials and tribulations of starting and owning your own small business.  we are probably NOT smarter than you, but we genuinely care about your success and are here to provide you with our first hand experience in what works and what does not work.  Therefore, we are more than a fee for service company, we are a partner in your business.