Short answer, NO!

There is a reason why so many businesses fail. It is because some people who try to go into business are simply not aware of what it takes to become successful at business. Thanks to motivational speakers, a lot of people believe ‘they can’ even though they have no clue as to what the first step is.

But, isn’t believing ‘you can’, important in the quest to become successful at business?

Become-Successful-At-Business-Pragma-Insight1Yes. But believing you can is just a tiny part of the whole journey to success. It’s not enough to want to be successful and to believe you can, no, you must be willing to DO what it takes to become successful. And this is the secret to success.

Put simply, you must want to be successful, believe you can be successful, know what you need to do to be successful and DO IT! Even if you must fail a few times.

“You don’t learn to walk by following rules. You learn by doing, and by falling over.” – Richard Branson

Millions of people want to become exactly what you want to become. Millions more have the exact idea you have. But this is why only a few (or none of you) will ever achieve it, few to none are willing to put in the necessary work.

Unfortunately, most people lose the battle for success in their minds even before they have anything on paper. A lack of confidence is one of the biggest problem since most people believe they will fail without trying. This lack of confidence in self is mostly rooted in past failures where a trend – that is most often than not – of not achieving goals is misinterpreted as an inability to achieve goals.

Most people who consider themselves failures in today’s world are a big joke. Thomas Edison made a long lusting bulb after testing over 6000 different materials. Most of today’s innovators don’t try past 5 attempts. Impatience is the new trend. We all want everything yesterday and are not willing to put in work that extends further that our short attention spans will let us.

So you open a business today, have no idea what you are doing, never bother to learn how a business works and in 6 months you shut down and claim business is impossible in today’s economy. You then quickly blame the government, the economy, the competition, the customer…. Anyone but you.

To become successful at business you must learn how to do. You must learn the specifics of each task that has to go into making you good at what you do or want to do.

There is nothing too unique about your business so there are hundreds, even thousands, of books that cover the specific elements of your business. Find them, buy them or borrow, and READ them. You probably watch TV every time you feel you have time to kill, so, grab a book and get better at what you do.

Talk to those who have done it before you, those who are doing it today and those who have their own accomplishments. If you cannot give examples of at least 3 people who are successful at what you are trying to do, then you have no idea what you are trying to accomplish.

The simple first step to success, is to find a role model. Someone who has walked the same path and succeeded. Then study how they started, worked their way up and finally improve on their design.

You can be successful if you will take this first step.