Three Must-Have Career Skills for Small Business Owners

Three Must-Have Career Skills for Small Business OwnersThree Must-Have Career Skills for Small Business OwnersA recent Bentley University study found that 66 percentof millennials who responded want to start a business and 37 percent want to work for themselvesAs a self-employed millennial, Im not surprised by this number. I worked in the nonprofit world, the government world and the corporate world before finally setting on self-employment as the best job for me. However, without the skills I learned at each of these jobs, I doubt I would be as successful as I am today. If you have a dream of starting your own business, you dont have to jump in whole hog. Its much more realistic to position your career path to learn the skills youre going to need as a small business owner.Here are three must-have skills you need to practice to be a successful small business owner and the jobs you can take to get themDeep work ethicBusiness owners work hard year in and year out to make their business es successful. If you settle into your career as a 9 to 5 paper-pusher, you may not be challenging yourself enough to develop the strong work ethic you need to be successful on your own. Whether you take a generic entry-level position or a position related to your degree, give the job 100 percent of your attention and talent every day. Dig into the projects youre assigned and overdeliver on whats expected of you. That will help you build a habit of hard work that will pay off when you work for yourself. Clear communicationWhether you like them or not, small businesses run on people. Your clients are people, your employees are people and your business tafelgeschirr providers are people. Therefore, one of the most important skills to invest in is how to communicate clearly with a wide variety of people. Luckily, most entry-level jobs involve internal or external communication. Take every opportunity to practice your communication skills and get feedback on your performance. If you wan t to take a job specifically to hone your communication skills, project managementand administrative assistancemight be particularly helpful in developing communication skills youll need to find success in small business ownership.Thorough customer serviceThe high school version of customer service is to smile and be polite. However, a friendly demeanor isnt enough when you own your own business. Customer service must go deeper than your appearance to speak to your customers needs, fears, hopes and desires. Today you may have a position that doesnt directly involve an external customer, but you still serve someone. For example, the customer of the payroll department is the entire team of company employees. The customer for the engineering team is the product marketing team, whos waiting for the product to take steps to make it sales worthy. The customer of the marketing team is often the sales team.If you want to dive deep into developing these skills, there are many positions in th e business world that will allow you to tap into a deeper understanding of customer personas and buying journeys. Consider taking a job in salesor account management.Do you have a dream of starting your own business? Before you make the leap, make sure you have the skills youll need to be successful. Strategically position your career path to gain those skills, or find creative ways to develop them in the job you currently have.