For entrepreneurs, the motivation to start out a business starts out with descriptions that use words super-charged words: “exciting”, “a first”, “opportunity”, “impact”. The opportunity to confront and overcome challenges is also a major source of motivation.
When all is done and the business becomes “successful”, the entrepreneur progressively finds that the business’s biggest demand is the requirement of maintaining a status quo in many fronts: accounting; record keeping; asset maintenance; inventory r-orders; supervising work… nearly all of these drab routines can be boring and confusing for an entrepreneur.
Unfortunately for most entrepreneurs, and the reason that many get kicked out of their startups, is that boring is good for business. The key to running (note, not starting) successful enterprises is the boring stuff of managing the big four Cs: Customers, Cashflow, Credit and Compliance. Except for the first one, the demands of the other four Cs are cyclical routines. Unappealing but the key to business success. It is routine to ensure product availability; to review the company’s cash position; to process orders; to ensure that salaries will be paid on time. Routines appeal to workers, partners, suppliers and partners. It is routines that positively motivate everyone else that is associated with a successful enterprise.
Here’s a reality check for the entrepreneur: boring businesses remain relevant because they are meeting a need. Because people respond to an appeal to their needs boring businesses justify their existence. Therefore, as much as the entrepreneur may not find the business “exciting” or “challenging” it is the boring routines that keep a business in thriving mode. Entrepreneurs who fail in this reality check get kicked out of the business (usually by the venture capitalists) or, worse, the business fails. So found out the late Steve Jobs of Apple (who later bounced back and confessed to a group of graduates from Stanford that “getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened” to him.
Still, the question remains: how does the super-charged entrepreneur remain engaged/relevant in his or her enterprise after that first kick adrenaline runs out, when the challenge of starting is overcome and the business needs to run on the boring gear? I suggest three possible plans, all of which I learned “late” and painfully in my entrepreneurship journey:
1. Plan for the “boring part” from scratch. If you can find the right person, start off with a “managing” partner. An accountant; a lawyer; an administrator. It might shock you to hear this, but, yes, there are people who are cut-out for, and enjoy, doing routine work. A verse in the Bible puts it best, rhetorically, albeit in a church context: Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work miracles? The answer, in all cases, is, of course, no. The context here is church, but the application in business is the same.
2. Find a niche in the boring business. For Bill Gates, since stepping down from running Microsoft, he maintained his relevance in the company through his role as “Technology Adviser”, spending more of his time doing what motivated him to start the company — working with product managers, alongside his philanthropy pursuits.
3. Plan to sell after startup and become a serial “starter”. Envisage and entrench a succession from your first strategic plan. It may anticipate going public after a set of milestones (eg turnover, branding strength or business spread). In this plan, whether your company ends up going public or remaining private (with other investors buying out part of your stake), make sure the succession plan has your interests protected, e.g. through enforceable non-compete agreements or super-voting rights for your shares. Consider, again, Bill Gates: He now owns 4% of Microsoft, (having sold off most his shares), and is no longer running the company. But Gates remains a key player in Microsoft.
Haron Wachira 