Employees have it easy. They have a boss to motivate them, tell them what to do, what direction to go. They have peer pressure and mortgage pushing them to do more.
How about entrepreneurs? Who or what motivates them, what keeps them going. What keeps them energised to go through another day. Don’t know about other entrepreneurs, but this is what motivates me to keep going.
Freedom My strongest value is freedom. And that is the theme in everything I do in personal and business life. Being entrepreneur gives me freedom to do what I want, when I want with whom I want. It also translates into my personal life in things like what to wear, which places to go, what to buy, what to read etc. Being free to make my choices and have control over my life is probably the most important thing for me thus a great motivator to be entrepreneur.
Creation Translating the idea into real working business with products, customers, employees, name, place and everything is such a wonder that I just love to do it again and again. Creating something from nothing. From intangible idea to tangible results. To real business that works. There is hardly something more rewarding and motivating than this.
Learning I use all my ventures as learning exercise which gives me tremendous base for teaching and mentoring. I learn more everyday tackling day to day requirements of the business than I did at my Uni business courses. Mistakes I make are pretty costly but greatest school I can get for that money.
Please note that all above are “internal” motivators. There is nothing from outside – contrary to most employees motivation. To succeed you need internal motivators not only they are stronger and but also last longer. Forever I dare to say. External motivators come and go and last very short time. Remember how long last salary increase motivated and energised you? A day or two I guess.I dare to say, that majority of what motivates entrepreneurs comes from inside.
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