I just finished listening to an interview with Sara Blakely, the Founder and CEO of Spanx. Not only is she the youngest female billionaire, she has built her company from an initial $5,000 investment and still owns 100% of the business.
The biggest takeaway for me was her passion. She repeatedly said that it’s never been about the money, she has no “exit strategy”. She just REALLY cares about the product.
I don’t think all of us entrepreneurs are blessed with quite that level of passion for our product or service but we all care about our customers and clients, otherwise we wouldn’t be in business. Personally, the biggest issue I face in running my own business is being so overwhelmed by the day to day operations that I have limited energy left at the end of the day. To remain passionate requires energy.
When I wake up in the morning, while it’s still quiet, I think about my clients. I love and care for each and every one of them and think about how I genuinely care about the fate of their businesses. Immediately following this is a pang of guilt that I can’t help them as much as I’d like to. Some days I simply don’t have the required mental and emotional energy.
But as Sara Blakely has shown, CARING IS GOOD FOR BUSINESS. Lately, as we’ve started to bring in people to help with our workload, I’ve seen some of the pressure lifted. I now have a little more time each day to think deeply about my client’s needs.
I’ve always CARED, I just had to get out my own way in order to show it…
When I started this article is was meant to be about passion in entrepreneurship but it ended turning into a piece about delegation and workflow. Oh well…
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All the best,
Daniel
