Freelance & Entrepreneurship ( Ultimate Principles for Online Business Success )

1. Introduction: Starting your entrepreneurship journey, whether as a freelancer, a company owner, a business owner, the list goes on could be very fulfilling. However, it's often depicted as something quite easy, something that's quite doable and requires minimal effort. Just simply wake up one day and start a business and that's it. Good job. Unfortunately, the realistic application is way different. There are a lot of hurdles, lot of mistakes, a lot of stuff that you could do and you shouldn't do at the same time, that will help you either reach your goal or delay the process of getting to your goal. In this current course, I'm going to be walking you through some important mistakes that you need to avoid or to learn from. And hopefully they will make your life easier and better as an entrepreneur, as a freelancer or business owner, where I'm going to share with you my own mistakes that I've done at the beginning of my entrepreneurship journey. And based on the feedback and based on research and the insights from various professionals across the globe sharing their mistakes as well that have been done along the way. And I wish at one point in time when I started my entrepreneurship journey as the founder and the CEO of my organization, that I was given such insights at the first place, saving me time and effort. In this current course, I will walk you through some of the key crucial mistakes that you need to avoid as an entrepreneur. This course is part of a series, so make sure that you stay tuned to have all of these latest updates that would surely supplement and help you grow as a professional and as an individual. What are we waiting for? Let's dive in. 2. Your Project: Your class project revolves around self reflection. And which, as we go through these key crucial mistakes that you need to avoid, you are going to create a list based on your own current circumstances, based on your own projects. Whatever you are doing, whether you are a freelancer, you are a company owner, a business owner, restaurant owner, whatever it is, if you are proceeding with the venture. As an entrepreneur, this project will help you out. Make sure that you take some time, ten to 15 minutes, to reflect on your day to day activities and processes. You are going to take a look at your activities on day to day and then match them with the key mistakes that we are going to highlight and go through in the current course. Are you actually committing some of those mistakes? And how are you going to resolve such mistakes? Or change the behavior or change the habit to become more productive and to push yourself forward, rather than get dragged behind by the common mistakes that many entrepreneurs starting off with their journey, they tend to fall or dive right into. 3. Dealing with the Unknowns: When you're starting your entrepreneurship journey as a freelancer, as a business owner, often it's quite depicted that you should have it all figured out like you know exactly how your business will operate, how your freelance gig will work from day one. Well, the realistic cases you do have, the theoretical, the philosophical that you have an idea, put it to practice it. However, the reality is quite different. Once you land and you dive into the execution of your idea, you will be bombarded with a lot of information, a lot of new upcoming stuff that you did not account for in the first place. You had no idea what they are, You had no idea that they are important for your project. Well, there are many unknowns when you are kicking things off, which is normal, which is part of the process that you should get quite comfortable with. I know at the beginning it could be quite troublesome dealing with a lot of unknowns, but as you are diving into your entrepreneurship ocean, you need to make sure that you do have the resilience to keep on swimming, to keep on moving forward. Because for sure, let me tell you from now, you do not have all the answers you do not have all figured out. On the contrary, the more you progress, the more you realize either two things. You need to know more or you need to adjust. One of the key mistakes a new entrepreneurs or freelancers they tend to fall into would be assuming that they know it all. Everything is quite clear from the get go. And this is quite burdening because if you fail and most probably will for a couple 100 times, let's say you will be disappointed, which might affect your productivity and it will slow you down. It might even make you quit your journey from the get go. When you're kicking off your entrepreneurship journey, you are moving forward with the entrepreneurship journey. Expect failure, expect a lot of unknowns. Actually not figuring things out from the beginning. It's like moving in a foggy street. You do have a vague vision, but you're moving forward and the more you move, the clearer it gets. 4. Setting the Stage for Success: One. Starting off with your entrepreneurship journey, it could be quite overwhelming. You might have a lot of things that you need to do, many things that you need to figure out. And the default mistake that new entrepreneurs tend to fall into would be diving into the activities without having at least an idea. Where are they planning on reaching? Not having a goal, not having a long vision. What is the purpose of your activity? What is the purpose of freelance gig? What is the purpose of your business? Why are you in it in the first place? You need to answer those questions. It couldn't be very straightforward from the get go. It needs a lot of thought, a lot of reflection, and still you would not get a full answer. But you need to have a goal. And what do I mean by a goal? What are you trying to achieve from your business or from your freelance activity? Sit down and ask yourself that question. What is it that I'm trying to achieve from my business? What is the end goal? Because you will be surprised, many entrepreneurs, many freelancers, they go into the entrepreneurship world just for the sake of pleasing others. They see people doing it, they want to do it, and that's it. It's not easy, it's not straightforward. Sometimes having a full time job is way less stressful than having a business or having a freelance activity. Let me break it down to you. You have to be realistic. Why are you going for such an entrepreneurship journey in the first place? The whole reason is, once you go further in your journey, things will surely get tough, you will end up having failures, unforeseen circumstances, things do happen, especially with a business. If you have your Y cleared out, you have a clear idea why are you doing something in the first place. It will help you stick to your path. In order to have a clear why, you need to focus on your goal. What is the goal from such an entrepreneurship journey in the first place? Let me give you an idea. Let's say you are an artist, a painter for example. You would like to start your own entrepreneurship journey by selling your artwork. Now, selling your artwork is the process. Selling your artwork is your business. But what is the goal? For example, having a certain level of income, living in a certain location with a sustained living ability. For example, leveraging or increasing your financial status. These are some basic goals that will drive your business, but these are not your business. You get the difference. Often new entrepreneurs, they do not take this into perspective. They think of a business, they see some people doing some businesses. And they decide, well, I'm going to become an entrepreneur. Let me see what they're doing and dive right in. It's not going to work from the get go. It might take you months, even years upon years, to actually see some traction and progress. And this is a fact, let me break to you, like statistically, 75% of the businesses closed with the second to the third year. Within the first three years, over 75% of new businesses, they shut down. You have to understand the reality of things, not the whole, let's say, fairy tale behind the entrepreneurship journey. We're not going to sugarcoat it or pass on some false information to get you pumped up that, go ahead, just dive and figure it out. On the contrary, you have to be realistic. Being an entrepreneur requires dedication, requires resilience. You need to acquire a set of skills to actually move forward. You need to have the sustainability in order to overcome failures, which is going to happen for sure. Most professionals, most entrepreneurs, they tend to fail a couple hundred times. For that one time to work, you have to be realistic about that. And the starting point would be setting a clear goal. What is the purpose of your business? What are you trying to achieve from your own journey, from your own business? What is the outcome that you would like to have? Let me guide you, but let me walk you through it. Let's say, like I mentioned again back with the example of a painter or the artist trying to sell their artwork. Their business model is about selling their art. But why are they doing it? First of all, for example, they would like to travel four to five times a year. Could be a basic goal such as this. Or they would like to increase their income by a certain figure in order to sustain their living or to increase their living or financial status. Or they would like to reach a certain goal financially, such as financial independence, whatever it is. But that's a goal which is acting as a drive behind your business. It's not the business itself, it's the goal behind the business. So you need to figure this out. It will save you a lot of trouble along the way. 5. Getting SMART: When you're setting your goals. You cannot just simply take a statement and take it as if it's a goal. It should follow certain criteria. And most probably you heard about smart goals, specific, measurable, achievable, relevant or reasonable. And time bound, Again, specific, relevant or realistic time bound. It means something that you would like to do within a certain period of time. It has a certain figure attached to it that you could measure. It's reasonable. Let me give an example to help you understand it better. Let's say I have the following goal. I would like to lose weight. This is a general goal, it does not fulfill these requirements. It's actually wouldn't be counted as a goal in the first place because most probably once you have a generic goal, you'll not stick to it. You'll forget overtime if I take that statement and rephrase it to become, I would like to five pounds of body fat within two weeks. That's a smart goals specific, it's measurable. I have five pounds time bound within two weeks. It's reasonable. Within two weeks it's doable. It could be done. If I say I would like to lose 20 pounds in one day, that's measurable time bound, but not reasonable, not realistic to fulfill those criterias. Smart goals, specific, measurable, relevant, reasonable, achievable, and time bound, you would have a clear goal that you could pursue and you would base your business activities. 6. Four is too many : Another important pitfall or mistake that many entrepreneurs and freelancers, they tend to do once they realize that they need to have goals. Once they come to that epiphany, it's time to have goals. What they would do is they would have too many goals. Like an endless list of ten to 15 goals that they would like to achieve back to back. This is a crucial mistake. It will set you off for failure. You'll end up being frustrated, demotivated, and you might even quit your journey in the first place. Why we're humans, we have a limited capacity, limited productivity, in terms of the hours or the energy that we're able to exude to get a job done. A realistic approach would be to have two to three goals that you would like to achieve within a month or within a year. You heard and right, you could have two to three goals that you would like to achieve within a year's time. Keeping in mind that there should be dense quality goals. Let's say losing body fat, increasing your income, getting your master's degree. Any of such goals that need actual time and effort to get them done. You need to have two to three of those tops per year. Why is that the case? Because once you allocate focus to two to three goals, everything that you go about your day as you're moving forward towards your entrepreneurship goal. Let's say all the choices, all the actions, all the planning will help you narrow it down towards those three goals. On the other hand, if you have ten to 12 goals throughout your day, you will be scattered, you'll stretch yourself quite too thin, you have no idea which direction that you're moving. The key take is stick to two to three goals per month or per year, depending on the size of the goal. And no more than that as you go about your day, as you go about your week, as you go about your month, all of the actions that you are doing should be aligned with moving you forward towards these goals. It doesn't have to drive you leaps towards your goals. On the contrary, even a slight push, a slight step, is a step forward in the right direction rather than having a step in the completely wrong direction. 7. The King of Success: One important key advice I wish I knew at the beginning of my entrepreneurship journey is that simplicity is king. It's king in every single way. Simplicity is very powerful when you are running a business or you're running a freelance activity, whatever entrepreneurship path that you are on. The more simple it is, the higher the chances of succeeding and maintaining that success. If you have an operational business, the more pieces that you have, the higher the chances of actually that business collapsing due to the fall down of one of the pieces. Simplicity is key. The purest, raw simplistic form would be the transaction between you and your client. Let's say you're providing a product or a service and you have a client, you get paid. That's it. This is as simple as it is. You deliver, you fulfill, and you get rewarded for that, or you get a payment for that. And that's it. This is as simple as it is. Often entrepreneurs, freelancers, whenever they're starting their own entrepreneurship path, they get overly excited. They would like to have the latest software, latest gadget, a latest tool, whatever it is, Latest packages, all of these stuff, which add extra layers of fat on your business. They need maintenance, they need operation, they need organization. When you get quite too excited with your entrepreneurship journey at the beginning and you try to incorporate many components, you are adding extra load to your plane. Keep in mind the, the simpler is the lighter your entrepreneurship plane is. And it could easily take off with minimal hassle, with minimal complications along the way. I understand. When you are trying to, let's say, pave your entrepreneurship path, you are very excited. You would like to get things done, get the project up and running, have the best equipment, have the best stuff, and the list goes on. But as you move forward with your entrepreneurship journey, you would realize that many of the stuff that you have been adding to your business are completely useless because they do not contribute to the success of your business from the get go. Keep in mind, simplicity is king. Keep it simple. Keep it straightforward. Why? Because it will help you make your entrepreneurship goal, entrepreneurship journey sustainable. 8. Multi Tasking VS Singular Tasking: And this is a mistake which I've done at the beginning of my entrepreneurship journey when starting my company is multitasking by default. You are drawn to multitask without even realizing it. When you are working on your own business, where you try to handle different projects, administrative tasks, marketing, media management personnel. You're trying to do all of these things at the same time simultaneously. This is very taxing. Multitasking by default consumes a lot of mental power based on research. This is something that I came across when I was dealing with that problem, which is called the mental switch. If you keep on switching between tasks, you're using a percentage from your mental ability, your mental power. Simply by switching from the task, it will take you some time to actually get your brain up and running to fully concentrate on your new task. It's like a source of distraction, which is eating away from your productivity. So multitasking does not work. Let's be quite frank. Let's be quite blunt about it. It does not work. When you have a task, take a look at it. Is it something important? Focus on it, get it done. Do not move to the second task unless this task is done. I came to realize this really hard way because I would have a long to do list ten to 15 items, even 2025 items per day. And by the end of the day, if you think about it, none of them got accomplished. All of them got partially worked on. I scattered my efforts, scattered my energy, scattered my productivity over various tasks. None of them got completed yet, some of them were partially completed. And guess what? A task which is partially done is a task which is completely undone. It's not completed at all. So once I came to that realization, and I hope that you do, and you apply it to your own practice as well. When I started focusing on one task at a time, I take on a task, finish it completely. I do not move on to the other task unless I finish the task at hand. If it takes me one to two days, so be it. That was way more productive. That was way more fruitful and helped me accomplished way more in the long run compared to having a short sided approach where I try to finish as much as I can within a day's time. So keep that in mind, multitasking does not work, singular tasking really works. 9. The Productivity Discovery: This involvement, let me to a point in time to use my engineering skills and my problem solving skills to actually design an analysis to figure out which one is better working on one project till you complete it fully. Or working on two projects at the same time. Which approach would be more productive? Which approach would help me get results quicker? Which approach would help me reach my end goal quicker? Unfortunately, I used to be working on multiple projects simultaneously, Project A, B, C, and D, where I start to work on Project A for a couple of hours. Then I start to work on Project B for a couple of hours. And Project C and Project D. Assuming that if I'm moving forward with all of them, I'm being more productive and getting more done compared to focusing on one project. Then I realized I was depleting my energy. I was depleting my focus. I was burning out and not actually accomplishing many of the tasks within all of these projects. So I designed an analysis to actually figure out once and for all, how does this work and what is the best approach to focus on one project? Even though you could have 100 projects and finish it one at a time, sequentially, you finish A, then you go to B, then you go to, then you go to D. Instead of working a bit on a bit on B, be bond. Here's the analysis again. This is based on my own discovery, based on my own designed experiment, based on my own engineering analysis. Now, walk me through it. Let's say you do have two projects, Project A and Project B. Both of these projects, they need seven days to be completed a week. Project A needs seven days, Project B needs seven days. Let's go for the first approach where I focus on one project at a time. If I focus on project A for seven days, I will be able to finish it in seven days. However, project B will not be complete in seven days, right? Zero progress. It will take me on another seven days to finish Project B. But I've completed A. Now I'm observing the functioning of A, and I'm getting, let's say, the feedback and the benefits from the completion of the first project. And the resources which I have used in the first project, project A. I could transfer them now to Project B to increase the pace. Here's the hidden truth or fact. Sometimes if you finish Project A, you might realize there's no need for Project B because Project A was able to help you reach your goals, and there's no need for Project B anymore. This is the first approach. Now let's go for the second approach, where you try to actually work on Project A for one day and Project B for one day, and you go back and forth. If you start working on Project A, it needs seven days. Like we have said, Project B needs seven days. Like we have said, instead of finishing Project A within seven days, you are switching back and forth between AMB, AMB, AMB, right? One day four A, one day four, another day four A, and another day four B. By the week's end, once the seven days the first week have elapsed, you are not done with Project A. Let's say you might be on day four or five, like almost halfway through. And similarly, on Project B, Project A is almost 50% done. Project B is 50% done. You have consumed all of your resources between AMB, none of them are done, right? However, once you finish for seven days and B for seven days, it means after 14 days, two weeks, both of them AM B will be done at the same time. So you are going to have no growth, no growth, no growth for two weeks then AM B are done right at that moment, that drag of 14 days, you are putting a lot of effort and lot of resources, a lot of time with nothing in return. However, if you finish project A, let's say seven days I finished A, then for another seven days I finished B. That momentarily burst of achievement, first of all, will help you analyze whether you need to move forward with Project B or not. Or mobilize the resources from Project A and move them to Project B, making things faster for Project B. You could finish up even less than a week's time based on that analysis. Now, I'm giving you a brief, I'm giving you just simply the base of the analysis. It was a very thorough analysis. I've conducted very detailed, let's say, engineering design, with numerical figures, which I might be providing at a later stage to help PU see how the numbers prove that working on one project, then finishing that project and moving to the second project, is way more productive than working on two projects at the same time. For a short period of time, it might feel that you are behind because you're working on one project, but you did not finish the other project. But fast forward, once you give every single project it's allocated time, you will be surprised that you've finished more. You are way more comfortable. You did not deplete your resources. You actually were able to manage your resources more effectively and more productively. The key takeaway is based on my engineering analysis, based on my problem solving skill set, let's say, and the experiment that I've conducted. If you have multiple projects within your entrepreneurship journey, within your freelance activity or your business, dedicate your attention, especially at the beginning. You are one man show. You don't have a team. If you do have a team that's a different ball game. But if you are just one person, you're trying to work on multiple projects, finish one project at a time. You might realize as you transition from one project to another, that some of the projects that you had, you don't need them anymore. Because the ones you've accomplished got the job done. But if you're working on all of them at the same time, you're going to deplete your energy, deplete your resources to figure this out way later. 10. The Change in Path: This was quite surprising for me that after going through this myself with my business, and taking a look at other business owners, other entrepreneurs, and some research, It was a surprising yet comforting fact that you might start off providing a. Over time you end up providing z. What does that mean? At one point in time, you might start selling apples. Fast forward, a couple years down the road, you're selling cars. How did that shift happen from someone selling apples to someone selling cars? This is the path that you need to take when you are starting your entrepreneurship and your freelance journey, your business journey. You have to accept the fact, like we have mentioned, you don't have all the answers. Not everything is figured out. And most probably, you are going to fail often and often and often. And you need to be flexible enough and resilient to pivot. So what does that word mean to pivot? As you are going about your entrepreneurship journey, you might realize that some things are working and some things are not. Just like you're moving into a dark room. And then one light pops out in that room, you chase that light once you get to that light, and another light pops out and you chase that light. And before you know it, you are moving from one light to the other till you reach your end goal. But within that dark room, you're not able to see it that clearly. You're going one step at a time. And this is the approach I need to keep in mind when you are dealing with your business, when you're dealing with your freelance activity or your entrepreneurship journey. Let's say as you go from point A to point B, you are given new circumstances in new chances, new opportunities, new knowledge that will open up doors for you. And then you go from B to C, then CTD, DTE, all the way till Z. Such that fast forward, a couple of years down the road, when you look back, you started off selling books, for example, then you ended up selling cars, for example. As you are moving, do not be stubborn, be flexible with the approach. It's an ocean. Your entrepreneurship journey is an ocean. It got waves, it got tides, it got islands. You go from one island to another, and hopefully as you are swimming and moving through, you'll eventually reach your destination. 11. Get Sherlock Holmes ready: Clues are everywhere. This was a very surprising realization. Many of the things you encounter during your day on your entrepreneurship path, they hold clues, conversations that you're having with people, certain circumstances, certain news that comes along your way. It could be a blessing in disguise. You might realize that as you are dealing with your day to day activities, you're actually sitting on a great entrepreneurship opportunity and you have no idea about it. You need to get quite conscious that you do have a lot of clues around you. You do have all what it takes around you to make that entrepreneurship leap. Often, many entrepreneurs, many freelancers, many business owners, they believe that based on their current circumstance, they do not have options. There's nothing that could be done, there's no entrepreneurship path for them. Or they need to be in a certain location or a certain country, in a certain circumstance to get things done. On the contrary, every single one of us on this planet, every single one of us got their own circumstances and your own circumstances, your own environment, your own ambience, your own surroundings, the hold what it takes to make a successful entrepreneurship journey, but it's up to you to look for it, to seek it, and to find it. 12. The winner of the Race: This is a very important lesson that I've learned along the way and I wanted to share with you. And I truly hope that you find all of these lectures, all of these lessons within this current course. They are quite helpful because include a year's worth of experience of trial and error research provided to you and this compact course which will hopefully help you and support you in your entrepreneurship journey and your development and your feedback would be highly appreciated. It's actually helping you move forward. Now in this current lesson, I want to highlight the importance of being a turtle, not a hair or a rabbit. All of us, at one point in time when we used to be kids. We've heard about the story about the race between a turtle and a rabbit, where the turtle obviously moves quite too slow and the rabbit has bursts of energy, dashes through the race, but tends to rest and waste time every now and then. Eventually the turtle won the race. The key lesson, which applies to actually in the entrepreneurship and the business world, you need to move like a turtle. You don't want to move too fast. If you move too fast, you might have a hard time scaling your business, and your business might actually crack and fall and break down around. You Move slowly, move patiently, and eventually you will win the race. Because with patience, you are able to move forward with calculated steps rather than just simply jumping and dashing through. And often in the business world, unfortunately, these sudden leaps of growth, they tend to have big downsides. Steady growth, gradual growth. Be patient. Move like a turtle, not as a hair. And another thing to keep in mind when you are going with your business or your freelance activity or your entrepreneurship journey, think about it. You're planting a seed, obviously, When you're planting seeds, it doesn't grow overnight. You give it nourishment, you give it water, you give it sunlight, you give it the support. But it takes days, weeks, months, and years for you to actually grab and reap that fruit. And the same logic applies to the business. You cannot just simply start a business and become an overnight success. The overnight success has at least 20 years of growth for you to see at this current point in time as an overnight success. So keep this in mind. Be patient. It's a journey, it has ups, it has downs. It's your own personal journey. Do not compare it to others. Do not compete with others. The only competition is you, yourself, enjoy that path. Move forward with that path, but most importantly, move like a turtle, not a rabbit. 13. The Attributes of Success: The attributes of success within entrepreneurship. They tend to be found within successful entrepreneurs. They share that common ground. Two key characteristics they always pop out, which are patience and consistency. You should be patient enough. Like from the previous lesson we said move like a turtle, not a rabbit. You should be consistent with your movement, keep moving forward. Sometimes it's easy, sometimes it's difficult. Sometimes you're able to take two steps. Sometimes you take one step, sometimes you might go back four steps. But as long as you are patient, you are consistent, you are resilient to failure, You will get there, keep moving, and you will get there. The only failure along your way would be when you stop, when you just simply quit and you leave your idea. Like I've mentioned, you could start off with selling product A, then down the road you're setting product z. But you've managed to achieve your goal. You're successful entrepreneur and this is the mentality that you should approach entrepreneurship with. It's a journey. It might be slow, it might take long. I need to be patient. You need to be resilient, and you need to be consistent. Eventually, you are going to win. 14. Whats Next: So what's next? Now, in this current course, I walked you through some of the mistakes that many entrepreneurs do. And yours truly as well, made them over the years to help you avoid such mistakes. Now this course is part of a series, so make sure that you follow that profile, share your feedback, and hopefully you found it helpful and beneficial. In the upcoming releases, we'll be dealing more into the realm of freelance and entrepreneurship in terms of productivity, how to get more done, how to be effective, how to deal with various circumstances within your entrepreneurship journey and with your business venture, which will surely help you out, saving you a lot of time, a lot of effort, and giving you that push to move forward and hopefully reaching your angle. 15. Final Note: On a final note, I truly hope that you found this course helpful, beneficial, and at least added some sort of perspective to your journey. If it gave you that motivation, it helped you realize that you are not alone. You are an entrepreneur amongst millions and millions of entrepreneurs who have shared similar journeys. Every journey is unique, every journey is special, every journey is personal. No two paths are alike, and your path is completely yours. You are the one to dictate. How would you go about your day to day activities? How would you like to paint your own entrepreneurship journey? It might be a success, it might be a failure, but at the end of the day, it's completely yours. So cherish that. Accept that you are special, you are unique. So as your entrepreneurship journey and venture, and I truly hope that you found this course quite helpful and beneficial. And I look forward to taking a look at your feedback and I'll see you in the upcoming releases till the.