It’s Now or Never

This month, I was invited to attend a luncheon with high school entrepreneurs as part of Junior Achievement Entrepreneurship Week in Middle Tennessee.

I believe in lifelong learning and personal development, and that’s one of the core values of Blue Ivory Creative. It’s amazing that no matter the point at which you find yourself in the entrepreneurial journey, there’s always someone further along from whom you can learn. We have clients that make millions each year, yet they still have mentors that are doing better than them and have more experience or indescribable wisdom to share.

Just this week, I was talking with someone who was on the private jet of their company’s owner. He told me that the owner brought his mentor along because this was a very important deal that they were hoping to close. I thought, “Wow! Here’s a guy that has a private jet and he still has mentors?! He still sees ways that he can improve, learn, and get better – even at his level!

It’s this mindset that got him where he is today.

When you feel like you’ve hit the top and there’s no longer any way to grow or get better, that’s the only time you reach your peak. In fact, I’d dare to say that it’s when you start to fall back. However, if you always keep growing, you have no cap in your personal or professional life!!

So, back to my experience talking with students at JA Entrepreneurship Week:

These high school students impressed me so much!  Not everyone who attended had aspirations of owning their own business (although I hope that they all do after this week), but they were all eager to talk to me and the other entrepreneur mentors who attended.

I remember speaking with one student in particular who was a little unsure about her future. She told me that her parents strongly discouraged entrepreneurship. They wanted her to pursue a career as a nurse because it is “safe” and, “there will always be work for you”. She said that what she really wanted to do was to go into the business world.

My response (greatly paraphrased and probably much better than what I actually said):

However ‘safe’ your parents think that the career choice may be, don’t let them limit your potential. I’m sure your parents want you to pursue a nursing career because they want the best for you, and to them that means ensuring that you have a good job with a steady income. However, by pressuring you into something that you aren’t really passionate about, they don’t realize that they’re really having the opposite effect.

If you spend your life doing something you don’t love, you won’t find yourself fulfilled, nor will you reach the top in that particular industry. It’s like the old phrase, “Do what you love, and you’ll never work a day in your life.”  Who cares if the best nurses make 100K a year? If you aren’t passionate about it, there’s no way you’ll become a “top nurse”.

Yes, being an entrepreneur may be more risky, but now is the time to go for it. You can afford to make some mistakes and change your direction if you have to. Most people, when they are on their deathbed have a lot of regrets. They wonder what life would have been like if they had had the courage to pursue their dreams. They are much less concerned with the balance in their bank accounts and more about the experiences and relationships they enjoyed – or didn’t.

Besides the possible negative affects, the other aspect to this is the potential. Sure, you could start a business, fail, and be in a tough place. However, most people with the true entrepreneurial spirit will go on to start another business (or many!), and usually at least one eventually turns out pretty well. Starting this process when you’re 20 instead of when you are 50 is a completely different thing. Once you’re married, have a family, and other obligations, it becomes harder to make the jump. Essentially, every year you wait, you hurt yourself a little more.

Think about this: As a nurse, your average salary will probably be around 45-70K / year. If you are really amazing – you might make upwards of 100K or so. This is great, but as an entrepreneur, what is your salary cap? It’s whatever you decide that it is! You could make less than a nurse (and you all but certainly will in the beginning), but you could also make a half a million or a half a billion (or more!).

And, of course, there’s a lot more to life than money. Yes, money solves a lot of problems, but think about these two, very different, scenarios:

Person 1:

• Executive at a large company.
• Salary: $375,000 / year.

This wife and mother of two works very hard. That’s how she was raised and what’s she’s been doing her whole life. It’s this work ethic that she attributes to her success. It’s also this same work ethic that gets her to work an hour early, an hour late, and many weekends as well.

She can afford to send her kids to the best private school in the city. She’s going to set them up for success so they can be like her.  Sure she doesn’t get to see very many of her kids’ games, school plays, or class presentations, but that stuff doesn’t really matter, right?  She usually doesn’t have any time to cook dinner for her family (something she actually used to kind of enjoy) but she can afford to have gourmet meals delivered on most nights that are healthy and taste great!

She can afford some amazing cars (you should see her beautiful new Mercedes), but she hasn’t had time for a road trip since the kids were in preschool. The only time she’s not alone in the car is when she’s taking clients out for a business lunch or the occasional drive to church on Sundays (if she’s not working).

She gets to go on a lot of work trips, which used to be fun and sometimes still are, but company policy doesn’t allow any family to tag along. She’s been to some really cool places, but the people beside her in the pictures are clients she barely knows or her assistant.

She can, however, afford some amazing family vacations, and gets two whole weeks each year to do it. Unless, of course, she doesn’t take advantage of it all. I mean, she is trying to climb the ladder, you don’t want to take too much time off.

Person 2:

• Entrepreneur
• Income: $100,000(ish) / year

He can’t afford the best private school for his kids, but he gets to attend lots of baseball games, see his kids grow up, and be involved in their life on a regular basis. In fact, he can go on just about any field trip at any time (without asking his boss for time off). He’s aware of what they’re learning in school and can continue to educate his children and impart wisdom by spending valuable time with them.

He definitely doesn’t drive a Mercedes, but the semi-annual road trip he’s able to take his family on has created some priceless memories (mostly good).

He gets to go on some work trips, but not too many. When he does, the hotel isn’t the Waldorf Astoria, but his family gets to come along (when he wants). His photo albums are full!

Most of the family vacations are a few hours away to the beach, but they’ve been to the classics like Disney World and Washington, D.C. and he doesn’t have to worry about taking time off. Sure, taking too much time off does affect his income, but it’s a trade he gladly makes.

I’ve got to put this disclaimer on here because I know that I can’t generalize and group every person or family together.  Not everyone has the opportunity to be an entrepreneur, and not everyone has the desire or type of personality required. That’s okay.

In fact, as much as I’ve slanted my descriptions above to make my point, I truly feel that for many people a “regular” job, or climbing the corporate ladder is what will make them the happiest and be best for their family. And for some, they’re at a point in life where they simply can’t make the kind of jump necessary to be an entrepreneur. They might provide the only income the family has, and I have so much respect for these folks. One of my goals at Blue Ivory is to help lower the barriers to entry for as many entrepreneurs as possible,  so everyone who wants it has a shot at their dreams.

I’m sure this young lady had no idea what she was getting herself into when she asked me what I thought she should do with her future. I hope I made an impact on her, but what I know is that it had an impact on me. It reminded me why we work so hard at Blue Ivory.

You should never pursue something just because someone else told you that’s what you should do.

I’m not advocating that young people drop out of high school, but I did tell them today that they should absolutely 100% not go to college and rack up tons of debt just because it’s the next step you’re supposed to take. I told these young minds that they need to go to college when they have a purpose. Taking a year off after high school to do something truly worthwhile might be the best thing they ever did. They may never go to college and be much better off for it.

And, if they really are passionate about accounting, teaching, nursing, the law, or anything like that, they should dive right into college and treat those years as their career. They should focus on their education like an entrepreneur focuses on their business, and be the best dang financial advisor the world has ever seen. Even if they don’t want to pursue those types of careers, if they feel they need to go to college or if they are really unsure about what to do next, go to college. I understand it’s the right thing and very important for many people.

The key for these young people, and one that many of the rest of us can keep in mind as well, is that getting started early in entrepreneurship and making sacrifices like making less money than some of your peers right out of college, or missing the big party on Friday night can have a long-term, positive impact. If the man in my example had started earlier, and things gone his way, he could be making the same amount of money as the woman and still have that time freedom.

And even if you don’t get started at 18, getting started now is always better than getting started later, or worse: never starting.

As you go about your day and move onto your next project, phone call, or email, remember the reason you do what you do. Maybe you’re passionate about solving a problem. Or, perhaps, you are really aiming for that time freedom I mentioned, and you’d take half the money for twice the free time any day of the week. Or, it’s possible that you’ve just got some crazy, burning ambition inside of you that being an employee can’t fulfill. Be encouraged that, even if business is tough, the sacrifice and hard work pays off. If you can’t figure out why you are doing what you’re doing, maybe it’s time for a change, or at least some deep reflection.

It’s now or never.