Michael Gerber

After decades of studying the men and women that make the decision to open their own Great, Growing Company, I'd have to say it comes down to the Vision they have for that business - do they expect to build the company or just have some income for the short term?

For decades, I've spoken of McDonald's as one of the premier examples of how to build a company, scale it, and ultimately sell it.

We all know that Ray Kroc founded the McDonald's franchise back in the 1950s, and it then became the most successful business enterprise in history.

You can't be the accountant in your accounting firm. You can't cut the grass in your landscaping business. You can't work on the vehicles in your auto repair shop... And you really can't spend all of your time managing those actions, either.

The Entrepreneurial Perspective is absolutely necessary for the creation of a great, growing business.

If you are planning to start a business, and if you want that business to have a hope of succeeding, be sure you are approaching your venture from a true Entrepreneurial Perspective.

A true entrepreneurial enterprise begins with a big idea - a unique way to solve a customer's problem. Your customer, after all, is the only justification for creating a company in the first place. Without a big, transformational idea, you can't produce a great result for your customer.

The Big Dream of any entrepreneur really has very little to do with the entrepreneur. If you truly love repairing automobiles, chances are, you'll be a lousy business owner. Likewise, if you are fascinated by debits and credits, the dream of building an accounting firm with you at the helm is probably best left unfulfilled.

Your success starts with how you are able to get clients in the door, get their business, and leave them satisfied. If you, personally, have to spend too much time doing that, you have simply bought yourself a job, not an enterprise. Take hints from success stories all around you!

Understand this - as a new company, if you don't know how to get interested prospects into your company, then you don't have a company. At the same time, if you, as a owner, have to drive every lead into your business, then you need a real lead generation strategy.

The world of the small business owner is all about moving multiple items forward at once, and it's a fool's errand to believe one person can do it all when the shift comes from linear to parallel.

One of the biggest challenges we have, as business owners and people, is that we think in linear terms.