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Entrepreneur lessons
Lessons I learnt as an Entrepreneur: Business of any kind is of course a risk at every step. And for the one who has started a new business of his own for the first time, it is like standing on the tip of the needle. Yes many of my well wishers, who are great entrepreneurs, advised me not to start my company as I have no experience in Business.
But for my self confidence, I felt that no one can ever learn swimming without getting into the water. So I took almost two years after getting the idea of entrepreneurship, to start our company, Ksheera Technologies. Now after just five months we are at a stage of rapid growth and in this process, I have had many a times lessons to learn.
As of now I will only mention the points I have learnt, and later we can discuss the what, why and how of these matters.
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Do not take projects from students as it is unofficial and leads to lot of unnecessary troubles.
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Have all the agreements and MOU signed by both the parties before starting the project.
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Stick on to the time line for milestones in project and also the final delivery.
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In a startup company, you cannot pressurize your employees for extra efforts in lesser time, and neither can you afford for extra resourses, so plan it such that there is sufficient time for development and testing.
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Avoid communicating with clients over phone, instead use emails, so that you will have a record for all that was discussed and agreed.
- In case there has been taken some decision after oral discussion with client, come to office and send the gist of that discussion and the taken decision by email to client with Cc to all your concerned people.
- Do not quote the vaue for any project, without complete in depth study of the customer requirements.
- In the proposal, also attach the list of customer requirements as elaborately as possible, and mention that proposed cost is specific to given requirements only.
- If a client cancells the deal, do not become rude, but finish off the formalities in a calm and polite manner. If a satisfied customer is valued as +10 units, an unsatisfied customer is -100 units for our business. This is because a word of disgust spreads faster and wider than a word of praise.
- Do not give promises which you cannot keep. To grab a project do not over rate yourself in front of clients. This will make them expect very high performance, which may not be possible really under those circumstances.
- As a first time businessman, there are chances of you being taken for a ride by someone. Do not repeat business deals with that person again, because he now has the impression that you are innoscent and can be taken for a ride easily.
- When your answer to someone or something is "NO", then learn to say a "NO".
The above points appear to be simple and also too common for our senior experienced entrepreneurs, but these are stumbling blocks for new entrepreneurs who are starting from the scratch...
TO BE CONTINUED ...
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