Startup Talk

Overnight Success Is An Illusion

Perhaps you know of Thomas Edison, inventor of the light bulb, and assume he was an overnight success. What many people don’t know is that his school teachers said he was “too stupid to learn anything” and he lost his first two jobs for being “non-productive.” Knowing that he had more to offer, he decided to work for himself. After 1,000 unsuccessful attempts, he finally invented the light bulb. When asked by a reporter, “How did it feel to fail 1,000 times?” Edison said, “I didn’t fail 1,000 times. The light bulb was an invention with 1,000 steps.”

From the outside, it is easy to assume that inventors, entrepreneurs and founders are just lucky. Some people consider luck to be when preparation meets opportunity, but what is easily overlooked is the blood, sweat and tears that goes into preparation and creating endless opportunities.

“Success is the sum of small efforts — repeated day in and day out.” Robert Collier

We fail to consider the energy that goes into getting the first person to believe in your vision, and once that happens the endless steps that are necessary to get things in motion. Often most of your efforts will never pay off, and even when you do get a win, there is still a mountain to climb. It’s easy to forget the rejections, long hours, late nights, bad reviews, exhaustive product development, failed trials, constantly worrying about profits… basically everything that comes with setting up a business.

“There is no elevator to success. You have to take the stairs.” Zig Ziglar

Success is more than how much money you have in the bank, so you have to decide what your definition of success is. Perhaps you want to be able to spend more time with your family, or create a solution that helps makes people’s lives easier, or maybe be able to afford a luxury holiday every year. Whatever it is, it’s something that takes more than talent, without hard work and persistence there is a high likelihood that you may not succeed.

Talent over experience, consistency over talent

We are living in a time where everything is instant, due to social media anything less than immediate is old news. Unfortunately, this approach does not lead to success when it comes business. You might have lots of experience and be incredibly talented, but without consistency, success will always be an uphill struggle. Big breaks come to those that not only believe in themselves, and what they do, but are not afraid to fail and learn from those failures. Often by knowing what doesn’t work and why, is crucial to unlocking the golden egg. A healthy mix of passion, perseverance, self-discipline and resilience has more to do with your success than you think.

82% of businesses that fail, do so because of cash flow problems (Fundera).

That’s not to say that profit is not important, keeping an eye on your purse strings is essential to staying in business, and staying on top of the money going out is as important as the money coming in. The National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) estimates that 39% of all small businesses make a profit over their lifetime, 30% break even and another 30% lose money. Furthermore, only 50% of all new business make it to their fifth year, and one third make it to their tenth year. (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.)

Taking these statistics into consideration, overnight success is highly unlikely. The philosophy of “build it and they will come” is not a smart approach if you want a successful business, you need to be prepared to make sacrifices and prepare yourself for a roller-coaster!