culled from:bizjournals.com
“Fake it until you make it” is a common expression in the startup community, but this attitude is best reserved for a limited audience. In truth, a great idea with zero capital plus arrogance is a recipe for complete and utter failure.
I’m constantly on the lookout for ways to improve my company’s offerings, and recently I was trying to nurture a strategic partnership with a promising healthcare IT startup.
Early on I realized the startup had zero monetary backing, discord among the board members. and a weak idea of how the product would function in the marketplace. But I saw value in the founders’ connections and advised them to use their network to set up a pilot customer to develop their product.
The startup was able to get a meeting with the CIO of a large hospital chain, but the founders ended up botching the discovery meeting. They were arrogant and pushed their idea, failing to listen to the potential client’s ideas and concerns. Seeing their egotism and pushiness from the sidelines, I severed my strategic partnership with the startup and ran.
The failure of this partnership is a prime example of why entrepreneurs must strike the right balance between humility and confidence if they want to succeed.
There’s a time and place for confidence and humility
Building a business from the ground up is not for the faint-hearted. It takes extraordinary confidence to strike out on your own, but entrepreneurs must develop enough humility to incorporate feedback and receive help.
See Also
Failure is only feedback: How to overcome failure to emerge as a leader
How to push your ego aside so your company can succeed
Executive Job Search Tip No. 1: Don’t let your ego ruin you
1. Have confidence when presenting your ideas to investors
You won’t sell an idea or solution if you aren’t confident in yourself and your business. Your job is to convince investors that you have what it takes to execute your idea.
2. Have confidence when presenting your services to clients
Clients will not hire you if they don’t trust that you believe in your solution’s ability to meet their needs.
3. Have humility when trying to woo a partner
To succeed as an entrepreneur, you must understand your weaknesses and focus on what’s best for your company. Sometimes that will involve an outside partner to support your solution or bring new ideas to the table. You must be humble enough to realize where you need help.
4. Have enough humility to seek mentors
If you are not self-aware enough to realize you don’t know everything, you have a problem. All successful entrepreneurs seek out people who are more experienced and can help guide them away from making mistakes in their business and personal lives.
A humble attitude will allow you to see your business’s full potential and weaknesses, which will help you become a more effective leader. Practicing humility also allows you to empathize with customers and understand how your product or service can alleviate their pain points. Once you take the time to discover where you excel and struggle, you’ll have the confidence to make better decisions for your company.
