So, most of the questions i get at a time is most people want to start a business with little or no money at all with them or How can I start a business from scratch? I will give out some breakdown steps for this explanation based on my experience as an entrepreneur.
Step 1: Shadowing the Elite
The first step as an aspiring businessman or businesswoman is to find a person who is killing it in the industry you want to venture into and I want you to work for them for about 18 to around 36 months to see the way they run their stuff and sit behind close door and notice how to handle some difficult scenarios like how they handle there employees, how they manage their anger, how they negotiate, how they handle conflict and after that you can now say I want to go do ABC I that particular industry.
There are too many people that just want to get to the course of starting a business and mostly things do not work that way. For instance let's say I want to start a business in the podcast industry, I would be better working for a person I see is doing better in that industry for about 6 months to see what they do wrong and taking note of that so that I can be at an advantage when I start my own podcast.
Almost everyone I know at a high level goes to a person they were able to shadow for a given period of time and see what the person is all about. And things like this give you an edge over some of other businessman who just go straight into business for 3 or 5 years and fail, lose their money and go get a job to raise capital and start again from scratch.
Step 2: Asking for Equity
If you increase value with the person you are shadowing then you can request for equity to get a piece of the company. The response you might get in return from the person is just two which is either a "yes or no". If the person says "yes" then you work with the company and you get your share, but if the response is negative, then you can go and start your own business.
Note: For any agreement you make with anyone in the business world, make sure you have all agreements written down.
When working for the person (Shadowing the Elite) give it your best that he won't want to lose you. Capitalism is all about you having leverage and that will make it an easy negotiation. Negotiations are hard when you do not have the moral authority to ask, but if you possess the moral authority i want you to ask because the other person doesn't want to lose you, the person sees the work you do and they need you. So bring the value, then make the "ask" then if they push back deliver on what they are doing.
Step 3: Picking your Position
It involves how big you think or your mind works. For me I want you to ask these questions: What skill do you want to go? Are you going as a right hand guy or supporter of the business maybe CEO, Director of Marketing or whatever role is available? So know your position and play to it.
If your ambition is that you don't want to be a CEO, marketer, or founder, you don't want the responsibility of these or that, then you know your position and play there to the best of your abilities.
For example I know a guy who was working for a law firm and the law was really making money and the guy at the end of the year he would take cash off the table because the law firm made a lot of money and put it in his pocket and he will pay his taxes that all. So I asked him when I met him at a restaurant "What is the vision of the CEO of this law firm" and there is no vision. So he was just there to pocket the profit made.
So you can't have a vision and work for someone that doesn't have a vision. So you have to decide how big you want to go and position yourself for that. Make sure you are the alfa or recruit a business partner and Start a business with them.
Source: Quora.com
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