5 deadly sins of the entrepreneur

and (although unlikely and laborious) creating your own project is still in your plans, you need to make sure you do it for the right reason. Often, moving forward for the wrong reasons can doom the project from day one, ruining the motivation of the founder and all his followers. To avoid mistakes that so many others have made, I'm going to list 5 deadly sins that stand out in the (little publicised, but vastly more instructive) bankruptcy stories.

1. I want to be my own boss because I will have more freedom

Unfortunately, anyone who knows successful companies knows that the first years (sometimes the first decade!) require a phenomenal effort of attention and detail that makes us have little free time. Our boss becomes our team, our clients, our bank, our suppliers and everything that involves the reality of our company. The end of holidays is a direct consequence of this.

2. I want to make money fast

Any successful project usually needs more money than we calculated, for longer than we thought and with results taking longer to emerge than we planned. There are exceptions, and there will always be exceptions, but the reality is that many potentially successful businesses fail for lack of funding and liquidity during the first few years of their life. Therefore, it is crucial to be very conservative in financial management during the genesis of the project. In this context, if the reason you are starting your company is to make money fast, remember that being an entrepreneur implies living very frugally at the beginning.

3. I want to work with my friends

When setting up a business, many entrepreneurs hire the possible people and not the right people. They invest little time in recruitment, and even less in analysing and building recruitment processes that help the project to prosper. The price is extremely high and will be paid with attention, control and missed opportunities. The reality is that choosing the right people is most likely the second most important thing, right after securing enough money for the company to survive.

4. I am capable of bending my ethical values to save my company

During the first years of a company's life, situations will arise in which we are faced with decisions of dubious ethical and moral value, because we believe that the survival of our project is more important than anything else. Experience tells me that these are the decisions for which we will later pay dearly and it is therefore essential to root the values and purpose that led to the creation of the company. Maintaining our ethical code will ensure that we always have the "certainty" we need to fight through the difficult days.

5. Celebrate the first year more than the ninth

We have every right to celebrate the day of company creation, from choosing the name and logo design to our first office. But remember that it is very easy to create companies: nowadays it takes an hour. The hard part is, ten years later, seeing that the company still exists and is growing, with the certainty that another ten years of life await it. Being a founder is easy, being a builder is difficult. So, you have every right to celebrate at the beginning, but in my opinion, you should only really celebrate after the eighth or ninth year of existence.

Lesson to be taken away

If you are going to create a company to be your own boss and have freedom, to get very rich very quickly, to work with your friends, to spend money as you see fit and you are willing to give up your values to maintain your project... it is better to keep your job, because creating a company may not be for you.