Found this, love it, had to share.

So you decided to go into business for yourself. Well here are twelve critical pointers you will need to succeed in your entrepreneurial venture.

1. Purpose
Very simply stated, you need to know what you want to achieve in life and be willing to go after it.

2. Project
Your business idea that recognizes: a need in the marketplace and involves a product or solution that brings value to the client.

3. Passion
You must possess a strong or extravagant fondness, enthusiasm, or desire for something. ou have to want it badly. You have to feel it at a gut level.

4. Planning
Your business plan is the document that summarizes the operational and financial objectives of your business and contains the detailed plans and budgets showing how these objectives are to be realized. It should have the following sections: Executive Summary, The Company, Products and Services, Market Analysis, Competition, Business Strategy and Implementation, Operations, Organization, Financial Analysis, and Supporting Documentation.

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You have to be a little touched in the head to be an entrepreneur even though in this Digital Age that’s now unfolding, there is no better time to hang out your shingle,  test your ideas and allow your passion to play and find its way in the marketplace. We’re living in a time where are so many opportunities and reasons to just go for it.

It’s not easy but my gosh isn’t it effing exciting though?! . You learn, you lose, you cry, you dance, you nail it, you miss one, you push hard, your curl up and hide, you win big, you get scared, you wake up with middle fingers on both hands high to the sky….what a ride.

Yet, because you are human, there are times when fear dulls your nerve, paralyses you. You find yourself in a space where you wonder if you are out of your depth, you’re not sure if you can take hearing another no, you are waiting for that damn client to have that goddam cheque ready in time for you to pay the rent, you scream holy sh*t I just landed that big client now I better raise my game and deliver.

ConnectiMass is my fourth startup….the first was Maverick Media, we published the first internet guide for Jamaica back in 1999 and won an Innovation in Media Award for it. Then, I put Maverick Media on ice to go join an American dot com called HomeView Media as their Chief Content Officer. The second startup was Passion Fruit Studio I still don’t know what the hell I was doing with that one and I can’t remember the services I was supposedly offering. The third was Dutchpot Interactive a web development and online marketing agency. It was there that my then business partner Susan LeeQuee introduced me to blogging and I started TechWatchCaribbean which became SiliconCaribe.com. It was during that time too I hatched the idea and launched Kingston BETA and worked with some of the Caribbean’s largest brands Digicel, JMMB, Ja Stock Exchange and more.

And now there is ConnectiMass, one part Digital Marketing agency and one part tech evangelist. It’s a deft mashup and a streamlining of my vision and boy am I going for it like never before…big scarey goals and all. Also, in between there somewhere I  co-founded CaribClix – online advertising network with 4 guys and that tanked.  I’ve also launched and closed a niche social network, tried my hand at mobile content with an idea called Teez Mobile ahmmm… I think you can guess what that was about. lol. God knows I’ve tried out ALOT of ideas, tested many, succeeded at a few, failed at a couple. ‘Cuss pure claat and taken out my frustration on food and raised many very full glasses of wine in celebration along the way. The things is, because of all of that …working with different kind of business partners, people all over the world, snagging small to large Jamaican and Caribbean clients….I have learnt ALOT and that knowledge and experience is what’s making me be better at a number of things I’m doing right now, even as I know that there is still lots more to learn and that’s a never ending process.

So my point is this, when fear tries to dull your nerve, when it puts you in an uncomfortable place with people and things…remind yourself of why you are doing what it is you’re doing now…remind yourself of where you’re coming from, how far you’ve travelled already and the dreams you still hold as special and achievable. Remind yourself of the things you’ve done well,  the things are your excellent at, the failures you can look back on, laugh at and be thankful for the wisdom it left with you. And if you need some outside help to help you to refocus, then call that friend or mentor you know will hold you accountable, call you out on your self doubting bullsh*t and motivate you and make you feel like Mohammed Ali again. Then, to close the deal, look fear dead in the eyes and say FCUK YOU! I’m doing it anyway.

Enjoy the vlog from one of my online mentors Gary Vaynerchuk. He gives one of his usual straight no chaser talks, that will challenge you and make you feel like crap for wanting to be a spectator in your own life.

And if he doesn’t do it for you, as he kinda looks scary in that video…lol…then nod your head to this one by Esperanza Spalding. If you’ve never heard of her till now well…just listen…she sings ” Remember you are black gold”

Thanks to Wayne Chen, Jamaican entrepreneur for sharing this on Facebook. I had to share it here with you all.

I do not choose to be a common man,
It is my right to be uncommon … if I can,
I seek opportunity … not security.
I do not wish to be a kept citizen.
Humbled and dulled by having the
State look after me.
I want to take the calculated risk;
To dream and to build.
To fail and to succeed.
I refuse to barter incentive for a dole;
I prefer the challenges of life
To the guaranteed existence;
The thrill of fulfillment
To the stale calm of Utopia.
I will not trade freedom for beneficence
Nor my dignity for a handout
I will never cower before any master
Nor bend to any threat.
It is my heritage to stand erect.
Proud and unafraid;
To think and act for myself,
To enjoy the benefit of my creations
And to face the world boldly and say:
This, with God’s help, I have done
All this is what it means
To be an Entrepreneur.

- from Common Sense
by Thomas Paine, born on this date in 1737

Regarding ideas, Google founder and CEO Larry Page has said this: “Even if you fail at your ambitious thing, it’s very hard to fail completely. That’s the thing that people don’t get.”   I’ve found that all too often, founders overlook this. The start-up landscape is littered with examples of less ambitious things people don’t want.  That’s why on the first day of entering Y Combinator’s start-up incubator program, each entrepreneur accepted is given a simple gray t-shirt that says: “Make something people want.”
An even better mantra for start-up entrepreneurs, I propose, would be: “Make something a lot of people want a lot.”

If you’re going to create a product or service, consider these two simple things:

1. The severity of need addressed by your product or service.

2. The number of people who have that need.

Read more here

Entrepreneurship has been trending across the world big time over the past year especially and it’s no different here in Jamaica and the Caribbean. The state of things economic, the job loss, the rise in the numbers of the skilled and self taught  independent worker plus  access to so many people and things online – has made starting a business both necessary and sexy. This is actually a good thing. It also helps us acknowledges the fact that the nature of work and doing business has changed forever, as the world goes through this period of adjusting itself, having closed off the industrial age to now embracing and creating the new rules of the Digital Age.

With this focus on startups,, entrepreneurs, incubators, funding…comes the stories – of the young, the funded, the game changer…the hype machine that champions the entrepreneurship movement by celebrating the “winners”. This  skews the big picture though, because if you read only tech blogs like techcrunch plus others business magazines, you would think it’s all coconuts with a pink hibiscus on top, because you rarely hear the full stories which includes the flops and the pivots that move companies forwards. This is actually not a good thing.

It’s important for us to know the whole truth…to read about the many startups that fail and gain the wisdom of the why, to hear from the mouth of entrepreneurs more rounded stories of their journeys – the ideas, the personality conflicts, sleepless night up with thoughts of risk, debt and doubt, the bruising from mentors, the rejection of customers, the sweetness of blowing past targets,the ideas that evolved, the dance when that first big cheque cleared from a customer or investor.

Why? because while we crave the success stories to keep us inspired, to encourage governments and investors to keep things the support growing,  we have to be real about both the warts and wonders of the journey.  Looked what happened when Disney and Hollywood sold us only on the “Happily Ever After” relationship story – over 50% divorce rates and in the Caribbean especially, more common law relationships with regular side orders of other men and women. Why? too many people believed that great relationships just happened to them, not knowing that they all had to work to make the magic happen and that along the way, while it can be alot of fun, their is some frustration too.

This is why for you who maybe thinking about starting up or are already on knee deep in it, I recommend watching the Foundation series by serial entrepreneur Kevin Rose and any video interviews of Rose himself. I enjoy his candidness. Have a read too of the blogs of  people like billionaire Marc Cuban and becoming a regular at Mixergy.com.   And when sharing your own “How I did it” story – keep it real and share it all.

There is nothing like hearing it from someone who has done it. You get too much of a false impression when you read magazine and blogs online that glorify the very young, just got funded entrepreneurs. Truth is most people can and do bootstrap and also too many of those well funded startups….fail. That said, we’re living in a world where trying, testing your ideas and even failing is a badge of honour, it means you risked and did something better than those who’s only sport is lip service.

Read this you may see yourself in it.

” Reading TechCrunch, you’d think that every company under the sun has just raised millions in series A and is about to “change the world”. Reality is most companies don’t fit the VC’s profile to begin with, let alone actually raise capital.

I’ve already discussed how I’ve bootstrapped my company — initially because I didn’t have to raise capital, then because I tried to convince myself that I didn’t want to — only to refuse to accept what came with the territory when I came around, then simply not playing the game properly when the money was there.”    More

It’s like the best time to start a business, to test your ideas…why? It’s cheaper and faster to do so with all of this access to people, information and technologies we now have. Even as I grow my startup ConnectiMass, I am big believer in planting seeds and see which one grow. In that spirit I am always reading blogs and I always meet up on some gems. This is one of them.

“He was employee #30 at Facebook, #4 at Mint, had previously worked for Intel (where he frequently took naps under his desk), and had turned down a six-figure offer from Yahoo. Since we first met, Noah’s helped create Gambit, an online gaming payment platform and a multi-million dollar business; and AppSumo, loved by entrepreneurs and moms everywhere. He also helped pour fire on both the 4-Hour Workweek and 4-Hour Body launches.

The purpose of this post is simple: to teach you how to get a $1,000,000 business idea off the ground in one weekend, full of specific tools and tricks that Noah has used himself.”

You are going to enjoy reading this.

The Tipping Point

A Connector is a person who “link us up with the world … people with a special gift for bringing the world together.” They have a truly extraordinary knack for making friends and acquaintances. The social success of Connectors is their ability to span many different worlds is a function of something intrinsic to their personality, some combination of curiosity, self-confidence, sociability, and energy.”  – Malcolm Gladwell, The Tipping Point

I remember when I was first called a Connector I didn’t quite fully understand what it meant. My friend Kevin was on his second read of Gladwell’s book and during one of our usual catching up sessions, I was telling him about what I’ve been doing and what I wanted to do…in business and tech in the Caribbean, when he blurted out…” You are such a Connector”.

I was like “ahmm oookkk.” But later I realised that him seeing me as a Connector was fortuitous. I always knew I had this knack for connecting with people and connecting people to who they needed to meet, or information they needed to have to move them further on their path. I’ve been doing it for years and see great things happen between the people I connected. It was fulfilling. But didn’t view it all in any deeper or wider context that that. Or maybe I didn’t see the full value of it as yet. So It was cool it had a recognised name and in a context of business and society on this book. However, that “Connector” label and that book came at a time though, when I was at a place where I just trying to figure out what next to do with my professional life. In a previous web development business I had done ok, made some decent money, had a decently enviable client roster but was seeking something more. It felt pointless, empty…there was money…but no mission, no meaning and it made me uncomfortable. I want to know how to leverage and maximise who and what I knew then, for something greater. What had always driven me since my days as a columnist and journalist was this obsession almost in helping to bridge the gap between the information haves and have nots, the opportunity haves and have nots. I bought Gladwell’s book read it a couple of times.

All this happened too, around the time too when I need a name, a brand for this thing I wanted to do, felt compelled to do.  I wanted a name that could tell the story of what I was seeing as its focus, the context out of which it was being born and the environment in which it was going to live and growing over the next number of years. I didn’t have all of the answers of course and didn’t need to,  but I had this clear intention and decided to trust that the people, things and answers would unfold with time. So back then four years ago, ConnectiMass-C0nnecting People, Ideas and Technology became more real. I actually went on to explained it some more  below as I did on the company website.

Why ConnectiMass?

Pronounced Connect – I ( like when saying In) – Mass.  Connecting people, ideas and technology is at the core of who we we are and what we do. When we were thinking about what we do, the process to naming the company went a little something like this.

We said:

Connect – We’re connecting the dots of the various local, regional and global trends and how it call be leveraged. We’re connecting the Caribbean Tech Community to each other, to information and opportunity.

I- Represents the Digital Age we’re now living and doing business in with the Internet  at the heart of it all.

Mass – Means people, in fact lots of people. Connecting them to other people, to information, opportunities, products, services that help make their lives so much better through technology.

So our name is a mashup  of  our intentions, mixed with a couple of definitions and that’s how we got ConnectiMass.

The Symbolism of the Dragonfly

Then thankfully my friend Marlon James, now an internationally acclaimed author, at the end of his previous life as one of Jamaica’s top 3 graphic designers, did the logo for me based on what I told him I was planning on doing. He insightfully used the image of a dragon fly in the logo…symbolic of  agility, power, courage and victory and the ability to get things done in a short period of time. ConnectiMass was becoming more clear.

Of having Meaning and Money

I enjoy connecting people to who and what they need and want to succeed. Oprah did it and continues to do it in an effective way,globally. It’s what makes her happy, most fulfilled, always in a the mode of continuously sharing and learning and it also happens to be what made her a billionaire. I’ve always loved, followed those kind of entrepreneurs, leaders, change agents…people whose intention it is to change the world, to make people’s lives better…and yeah do so profitably…so they have both meaning and money…people, who love what they do and what they do, loves them right back.

That too has always been my intention. We’re on a mission with ConnectiMass…growing tech entrepreneurship in Jamaica and across the Caribbean and taking Caribbean ideas and talents to the world. We have so much to share and give to the world. We have given to the world Bob Marley, Usain Bolt and soooo many others who have made their mark on us…still, we’ve only just begun. I just want to be part of the movement that helps people to see it, go for it and achieve it, then pay it forward to others. It’s the reason we’re here nuh so…to leave people and things better off than how we found them. It’s how you can put a little dent in the universe.

We’ve kicked off a movement…tech entrepreneurship…we started with SiliconCaribe.com, KingstonBeta.com, Caribbeanbeta.com, StartupWeekend Jamaica . We’re taking things up a few notches with the help of you, the community, friends, partners here, there and everywhere. We have many more things we will be launching for the Caribbean Tech and Business Communities in 2012. I’m glad you are with me,with us on this journey. It’s so much more fun this way.

“When you expose yourself to the opportunities that scare you, you create something scarce, something others won’t do.” – Seth Godin. Taken from this article he wrote on “Your Competitive Advantage”