Top 5 Reasons You Have Not Yet Started a Side Venture And How To Get Past Them

So you have thought about starting a side venture, maybe even investigated some ideas and done some research, and even spent some money on courses, training and start-up packages, but still have not yet gotten off the ground with any ventures. Here are the top reasons why folks are hesitant to “take the leap” and how to get past these effectively:

Problem 1: You Do Not Have a Clear Plan. This is the top #1 cause of not moving ahead. Without a clear plan of what your business / venture is what your goals are, it is like you are trying to drive somewhere without having an idea of where you specifically want to go and not having a map or GPS to indicate which direction to go.

Solution 1: Commit to investing the time and effort to first create a clear plan of what you want to accomplish based on your objectives, requirements, and some research. The plan does not need to detail out each and every step to getting set up but should include the purpose / mission of your venture and how this will be accomplished.

Problem 2: You believe you do not have the time. You believe that you are too busy and do not have the time needed to plan out, start up and maintain a side venture. So you put this off until “someday when I have more time”. The problem is that if you currently believe you have not time now, you likely will not believe you have any time later either. There will always be other responsibilities which will require your time. So this time just keeps getting pushed off and you never get around to actually starting anything. Someday
never seems to be today.

Solution 2: Time management is really about managing yourself within the time you have. The really successful people (and I’m sure you have some examples in mind) have much of the same time constraints as you do, but they have found ways to work with them and not let time work against them. Think about how much time you spend “waiting”, waiting in line, waiting for the dentist or doctor, waiting in traffic….. Is it possible that during this time you could be brainstorming ideas for businesses? Or jotting down an outline for your plan in a notebook or on your phone? Or listening to training audio in the car? Or on the train? This could add up to several hours per week.
What about the time you spend watching TV or on social media? Can you reduce this by 15 minutes per day (that’s almost 2 hours per week) and work on one task each day to set up a side business? Can you get up 15 minutes earlier or go to bed 15 minutes later? Can you be creating advertising material in between watching a youth sports game? Can you be jotting down an outline during a boring meeting? The point here is that you actually have more “free” time (meaning time that is under your control) than you realize.
Use this time to the max by fitting in tasks that match the time slots and you will find that it really adds up to significant results.

Problem 3: You feel that you are all alone and have not support network. You have lots of questions and uncertainties and folks around you either have nothing helpful to offer or worse, they tell you to give on your crazy schemes because “these never work out”, or when one plan does not work out, they are the first to say “I told you so”. And even worse that that, you believe them that there is no hope and give up.

Solution 3: Hang out with the right people. These are folks who are positive and provide you with useful feedback and instill confidence in you. These can be friends, family, people you meet through church or other networks, or you can seek out professional mentors though the small business administration (SBA). The point is you need positive feedback and reinforcement to build you up as you gain momentum on your path and you need to avoid negative energy which will drag you down to a grinding halt.

Problem 4: You try to think of and do everything at once and keep shifting your focus around many different tasks which all seem important and take up a lot of time. This overwhelms you feeds into the “I have no time” belief noted above.

Solution 4: With a good plan, you can focus on doing the most important things first and everything else in the appropriate order. By focusing on one item at a time, you will get better results, avoid overwhelm and gain confidence. See the article on first things first.

Problem 5: You have not yet experienced any significant success. If you set your expectations as “I will be successful when I make $10,000 per month and not before”, then you are setting yourself up for serious disappointment, leading to deciding to quit in the early stages of your venture. Then if you go off and try something else having the same expectations, you will experience the same thing and keep spinning your wheels until you are so exhausted with the whole process that you conclude “it’s just not worth it!”

Solution 5: Reset your expectations so that you experience success along the journey, not just at the end. There is nothing wrong with having a large end goal, but don’t ignore all the successes along the way. When you develop your plan when you set up your website, when you get your first customer, or publish your first eBook or your 10th eBook…..these are all successes, and you need to have the feeling that you are accomplishing good things leading you down the path to where you want to go. This feeling of success and
satisfaction will drive you keep on pursing the venture and result in even greater successes!