7 Things Confident Entrepreneurs Never Do

If you want to be a successful entrepreneur, you have to
bleed confidence. Starting something on your own takes
tenacity, faith and determination to make it work. To
have a business that makes it past the first 18 months,
these qualities of poor leaders are certainly going to be
on your list of things to avoid:
1. Second guess themselves and their
employees
True confidence comes from being able to trust your
team and yourself. Make sure your hiring process is long
enough to find and keep the right people, as this can
make or break your company. Many employers are now
offering pre-cations or hiring employees for an initial
first project to make sure they are a good fit before
hiring them full time.
Content Continues Below
Offering a fun and secure work environment with great
benefits, profit sharing and new technology can let
employees know you appreciate them while also helping
them become more emotionally invested in the future of
the company.
Related: Ever Notice the Similarities Between Toxic
Business Leaders and Politicians?
If you find yourself second guessing yourself or your
employees, take the time to fix it before your confidence
becomes too shaken.
2. Compromise their priorities
When you are building a business, great employees are
key, but many entrepreneurs get so tied up in making
their business work that they forget about what else in
their lives are important to them. Building a business is
their main concern, but relationships with friends and
family can slip through the cracks if they don’t make it a
priority to schedule time for them.
This also goes for hobbies and “self-care” time:
meditation, exercise, reading and other things done for
enjoyment (even if it’s just browsing on ESPN or some
other news site for a few hours) deserve to be scheduled
just as much as work projects or meetings. It has been
shown that hobbies make people more happy than
money, according to the Portland Psychotherapy Clinic .
Confidence is boosted when stress is reduced through
hobbies and time with loved ones.
3. Refuse to learn new skills
The confident and successful entrepreneur has to adapt
to their business’s current needs. While you may need a
programmer or designer to make website changes, it
may not be in the budget, or they might stuck working
on a different project. Instances like this require the
confident entrepreneur to put aside any trepidation at
learning something new, such as coding or graphic
design. Websites such as Skillshare, Lynda,
CodeAcademy, UniversalClass and Treehouse (or local
community colleges) can help entrepreneurs learn new
skills without a high monetary cost.
4. Focus on external validation
It can be endlessly satisfying to hear positive feedback
from the media or others about your company or
products, but confident entrepreneurs and companies
shouldn’t take it less (or more) seriously than negative
feedback.
Focusing on internal goals and ideas is what built the
company in the first place, so while external feedback is
a great way to improve a product, it shouldn’t have the
power to completely overhaul how you work or ruin your
day. Too many business owners focus on what others
are thinking and it ends up impeding their creative
process, which in turn causes their products to suffer.
Related: 6 Skills Remarkable Leaders Execute Better
5. Worry about competitors
There’s a difference between worrying about competitors
and knowing what they are up to. It’s smart to see what
products and services are available in your current
market, but just like external validation, if you get caught
up in trying to “keep up with the Joneses,” it doesn’t
leave much room for actually outpacing your
competition.
If you want to stay on top, think of all the ways the
customers in your market aren’t being served, and focus
on solving that need.
6. Avoid networking and public speaking
When it comes to finding out industry needs, it’s a cold,
hard truth for introverts and other shy people that being
able to communicate confidently and well is key to
building a business.
For most entrepreneurs, having good networking and
speaking skills are key, as others’ impressions of you
will in turn influence how they feel about your product or
company. If you aren’t good at networking or speaking,
try joining Toastmasters or attending free events by your
local chamber of commerce.
7. Be ignorant of trends or current events
There’s a quiet confidence that comes from staying
up to date with the latest technology, national and
international news and other trends that are popular in
mainstream culture. Society has a huge effect on
businesses, no matter the industry or niche, and knowing
what’s popular now can help influence and improve
products and businesses.
While it’s important to look to the future to solve
upcoming needs, current trends can help predict what’s
happening next. Subscribe to blogs and websites such
as CNN, The New York Times, Wired and Reddit to see
what is new and part of current pop culture.
Whether you are networking in a room filled with
potential customers or working with your trusted
employees on a new, innovative product, confident
entrepreneurship means trusting in your brand,
business and yourself.