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Embrace a Growth Mindset to Achieve an Infinite Amount of Success

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Being an entrepreneur isn’t easy. On top of all of your responsibilities, you’re also in charge of your own education. You can’t stop learning, or you’re going to fall behind your competition, no matter your industry. All of the pressure on you might make that feel impossible. How do you handle it? By embracing a growth mindset.

What is a growth mindset?

A growth mindset is a term coined by researcher Carol Dweck, that encourages individuals to view failure as a teacher. We’ve shared before that “By developing and altering our mindsets to develop, we are enabling ourselves to make positive changes in our lives, allowing us as individuals to aim high, achieve our goals, and live our dreams.”

A growth mindset is a different approach than a fixed mindset, which dictates that skills, capabilities, and comprehension are all set in stone. A fixed mindset means you take failure personally, don’t try to broaden your horizons, and let your pre-existing skills determine your future success. When it’s laid out like that, it feels like a no brainer for entrepreneurs. Obviously, you want a growth mindset.

Here are a few ways to embrace that mindset for your future success:

1. View weaknesses as opportunities

This is the number one key to developing a growth mindset. If you allow yourself to view failure as a final destination, you’re never going to succeed long term. “Fail fast, fail often” is definitely something you’ve heard before as an entrepreneur. It’s a common mantra for a reason! You need to be able to pick yourself up from failures.

Identify your weaknesses, and be honest with yourself about them. This way, you can start self-educating to make progress, and can avoid pitfalls at the same time. Do you have a tendency to be overly self-critical? Consult with a mentor to get a reality check. Are you a perfectionist to the point of self-destruction? Talk with your community to get a more balanced perspective.

You know yourself better than anyone. Admitting to mistakes and owning your failures is the best thing you can do for your long term success as an entrepreneur. Every failure is a chance to improve. Your next venture won’t make the same mistakes, and your awareness of your faults will only make you stronger. 

2. Become more independent 

Another benefit of cultivating a growth mindset is it increases your independence. Having a fixed mindset means that you rely on others for your confidence. If you’re afraid to take risks, you’re going to be reliant on the option of your peers to develop your opinion of yourself.

This isn’t sustainable for an entrepreneur. Overall, you need to rely on yourself, first and foremost.

Entrepreneurs need a thick skin to survive in the startup world! A growth mindset means you know your own value, and you take the time to invest in your success. As mentioned above, you certainly need a community to support you. However, your first and strongest sense of support needs to come from within. 

3. Keep communication open 

Balance is key when you’re running a startup. You need a solid work/life balance, you need a balance of input and output, and you need a balance of feedback and the independence we just talked about.

“Communication rules so many aspects of your business,” says Nexa. “It needs to move to the top of your priority list as a small business owner. Rather than settling for the status quo, continue to think about the point of view of others.”

Embracing a growth mindset means you need to learn to thrive on feedback. Don’t be afraid to ask your team for their thoughts and possible solutions! Learning from everything means learning from everyone you possibly can.

Move towards success by embracing a growth mindset 

Pursuing a growth mindset is an admirable goal for any business professional, but especially for entrepreneurs. While you don’t have to get there overnight, you can greatly improve your chances of business success by being honest about weakness and balancing independence with communication.

Parker Davis is the CEO of Nexa, a leader in the virtual receptionist and technology-enabled answering services industry. He believes that the application of data analytics, investment in technology, and fostering a positive company culture together create highly efficient and scalable growth companies. In 2016, Nexa achieved record revenues while also being awarded the Top Companies to Work For in Arizona award. Parker is also the Managing Partner of Annison Capital Partners, LLC, a private investment partnership. Follow him @callnexa and on Facebook and LinkedIn.

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Success Advice

How to Alter Your Business Approach With Technological Advancements

Keeping up with technological trends has become a challenge for almost every business owner.

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altering business approach
Image Credit: Midjourney

Technology’s evolution has impacted everything, and business is no exception. Keeping up with technological trends has become a challenge for almost every business owner. Entrepreneurs unable to do so are being wiped out of the market.

There is no doubt that AI (Artificial Intelligence) and ML (Machine Learning) have taken over the business world. These technological advancements are impacting decision-making, success percentages, and other entrepreneurial aspects.

Adapting to these developments is integral to business success. Let’s explore how you can accomplish these milestones.

Embed the strength of AI and ML.

AI has modified business operations in major ways. For instance, companies have employed bots for customer support. These bots go through an effective learning process via Machine Learning before being able to answer like humans.  

Bots can also perform detailed data analytics and make business moves with high success percentages.

ML is used more for the analysis of data chunks and generating successful predictions. This simply means that business owners do not have to worry about large-scale financial losses. 

In terms of deployment and usage, a reputed company like Netflix employs machine learning for decision-making.

Blockchain is increasing the count of business opportunities

Tampering of financial transactions is quite common and causes severe monetary damage to customers. With the rise of digital payments, this risk has increased. 

Blockchain is used to elevate your experience for monetary transfers. It combats penetrating events to extract confidential customer information. 

Most business sectors are using block chain but finance and supply chain management sections have a higher count. These two corporate sections have several monetary deposits and withdrawals taking place. 

In terms of percentage, approximately 72% and 5% of finance and supply chain firms have implemented block chain successfully.

Dedicate Yourself to Continuous Learning and Individual Development

You invest in learning some of the very important skills, including digital marketing, financial management, and how to gain customers as an entrepreneur.

You need to set up your knowledge base about doing business on Coursera and Udemy with the basics that are necessary for the business, building further by networking with experts through webinars.

Besides, Agile methodology will introduce elasticity to your company: this review and feedback system with further correction regularly will allow for enhancing efficiency and promptly reacting to the market.

Developing key skills to achieve goals

Running a business successfully is not only about having niche/domain knowledge. Business owners need to have communication / soft skills as well in addition to niche information.

Here are some key technical/domain-related areas that business owners should have a strong grip on.

Data Storage on Cloud: These days, companies do not store their data on physical servers. Therefore business owners should know how data is stored/edited/removed/updated via AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, and other platforms.

Data Analysis/Interpretation Qualities: These days, data is as precious as gold. Business owners with data analysis abilities make correct predictions. As a result, their ventures grow in volume.

Development/Coding Knowledge

Programming knowledge gives business owners an edge whether the application is developed in-house or outsourced. It assists in getting updates deployed and handling application underperformance without getting professional support every time.

Hacking proof framework

There is no benefit of having an advanced automated system if can be penetrated. Successful business owners have above-average knowledge of cyber security and hacking attempts. They are able to choose top-notch anti-hacking software without much of an ambiguity.

Communication Abilities/Soft Skills

Here are some key communication qualities that business owners should have:

Communication/Conversation: Business owners should use to-the-point sentences in both written and oral communication.

Issue Resolution Abilities: Business owners should be able to drill down to problems and solve them. This is done successfully only if an entrepreneur has in-depth business domain knowledge.

Agile Implementations

It is mandatory for business owners to have knowledge of iterative/agile models. With such a competitive environment, it is impossible for business owners to succeed without adopting an agile framework.

Create a productive well-crafted Business Strategy

A productive business venture starts with a clear vision. The first factor making a business successful is the idea behind it. It helps with endless growth and combating competition successfully. Katherine Philips once mentioned that business goals are inevitable if goals are set concretely.

  • Goals should be based on smart achievements instead of complexity. Focus on the value that each one of them adds. 
  • Business objectives should not be vague. Key indicators should be constructed to measure the success/failure of each milestone.
  • Be realistic when setting goals. Do not aim at impossible milestones since they can be demotivating.
  • Milestones/goals need to be time-bound. Set a completion deadline for each one of them. 
  • Business goals should not be alien. Owners can think out of the box but not be obsolete / unrelated.

Create a productive well-crafted Business Strategy

Business owners cannot succeed without having a network. Some tips help in this case. Attend conferences and professional gatherings to connect with other entrepreneurs.
Here are some other related points business owners should pay attention to.

  • Attend meetings and conferences to stay updated with trends and meet business owners who already have well-set ventures. This helps in enhancing the learning curve of new / growing entrepreneurs.
  • Being a part of business communities/groups is very productive. When one shares opinions and discusses decision-making tactics, it helps in preventing errors and enhancing success rate.
  • Even the most experienced business owners have mentors as learning never stops. Take part in mentorship programs so there is an assurance that you are following the correct roadmap.

Conclusion

There is absolutely no doubt that business dimensions have evolved with technological advancements. Successful entrepreneurs have grabbed these changes in due course of time and continue to evolve. On the other hand, people following old paths and conventional steps fade out of competition. In a nutshell, keep an eye on the processes and practices you follow as these factors decide success rate.

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Success Advice

Understanding the Power of Yes and No: How to Create Boundaries For Success

These words have a significant impact on how our success unfolds

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The two smallest yet most powerful words in life, “Yes” and “No,” have a big impact on our growth on both personal and professional levels. In addition to affecting the choices we make every day, these words have a significant impact on how our success unfolds. (more…)

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Motivation

From Couch Potato to Go-Getter: A Step-by-Step Motivation Plan for Everyone

By understanding what motivates you, you can turn your dreams into reality

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How to be motivated
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Are you tired of feeling like a couch potato? Do you want to transform your life and become a go-getter? You’re not alone! Many people struggle with motivation, but the good news is that change is possible. (more…)

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Success Advice

10 Micro Financial Habits for More Wealth and Peace of Mind

The World Economic Forum still reports that half of U.S. adults lack financial literacy

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micro financial habits
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You’ve heard about developing financial habits, but what about micro-financial habits? Micro habits are the tiny things you can do every day with minimal effort that, together, transform your future. (more…)

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