Protect Your IT Company from Entrepreneurial Excesses

If you’ve founded an IT company, you no doubt have entrepreneurial tendencies. A provocative article in USA Today reminds high-flying entrepreneurs of the old adage that one’s strengths can also be one’s weaknesses.

Writer Steve Strauss cautions that the same confidence needed to strike out on your own can lead to problems. You need to believe enough in your idea that you abandon the security of an office job, but you don’t want to start falling under your own hype either.

Strauss offers a few areas to look out for:

• Don’t oversell – The standard business advice is to set realistic expectations, and then exceed them. Be careful not to over-promise on what you can deliver or over-state your capabilities.

• Check your risk tolerance – You needed some risk tolerance to start your own IT company. You might have a taste for gambling, but try not to put too much at stake. If you underestimate too many risks, without some cautionary steps, you may fall out of balance.

• Give up on bad ideas – We’ve written a lot of blogs encouraging those who aren’t comfortable networking. If you have the opposite problem—you like to schmooze and see every person as a possible client—be willing to accept “no” as an answer occasionally. Some clients or projects just won’t work out, no matter how optimistic you are.

When you start up an IT company, it can be a tricky balance to have enough confidence to launch, but also enough humility to keep your business on a smooth sail.

If you have some cautionary stories from your own experience, share them in the Comments section below.

And to follow-through on the tips introduced in this short article, be sure to download your free copy of the special report on How to Start a Computer Consulting Business: 6 Proven Ways to Build Your Initial Client Base.

Creative Commons Image Source: flickr Grand Canyon NPS