I am a successful Entrepreneur! Fail Harder

On a wall at the offices of advertising agency Wieden + Kennedy sits this mural.

The biggest winners in life started as losers

Failure is often viewed as negative. Most people fear failure. It’s not their fault. The education system is built to discourage failure. If we take a risk and get a bad grade, they make us think we are mortgaging our future. Conformity is the rule. Divergent thinking is frowned upon.

But the reality is no one can be successful if they don’t take risks. And if we are going to take risks, we are going to fail. Let us shared some examples of very successful entrepreneurs who failed spectacularly.

• Thomas Edison changed the world by making mistakes. He reported failing 3,000 times before inventing the electric light bulb.

• Henry Ford went bankrupt before Ford Motor Company became a success.

• Jeff Bezos’ Amazon-offshoot zShops failed.

• Larry Ellison struggled for years and was on the verge of bankruptcy and mortgaging everything before Oracle took off.

• Fred Smith received a failing grade in business school for his business plan which today is FedEx.

• Colonel Sanders had to reinvent himself many times and found himself broke at age 65 before KFC succeeded.

When we look at that list of people, we wouldn’t think “losers”. But that’s what they were, each and everyone of them...before they were winners. They understood that the key to success is taking risks and failing before we succeed.

Want to be successful? Ask, “How can I fail harder?”

Most people try to minimize failure in their life, so they don’t take risks. Successful people don’t fear failure but understand that it’s necessary to learn and grow from. They take big risks knowing that they might fail harder than they ever have in their lives.

Of course, they might succeed more than they ever dreamed instead.

They’ll only know after they’ve tried.

The thing we love about the W+K mural is it forces the question:

How can you fail harder? And why aren’t we doing it?

Embracing failure means overcoming fear

If we have read our posts for a time, we know the importance of financial education. It's only through increasing our financial intelligence through financial education that we will be able to become rich. That being said, it isn't an easy path. Financial education is hard work, especially in a culture that doesn't understand or value it.

When it comes to increasing your financial intelligence, we will inevitably come up against fear that will push us to either bear down and fight through or give up. How we respond to fear will set the course for whether we live a rich life or a poor one.

Here's five ways we can overcome fear in our life as we move down the path of wealth.

Acknowledge fear is real

Fear is real. Everyone has it. And everyone has fear of losing money, even the rich. But it's not having fear that is a problem. It's how we handle your fear. No one likes losing, but often the dividing line between champions and perennial losers is how they handle failure when it does happen. Similarly, the primary difference between a rich person and a poor person is how they manage their fear.

In all our years, we have never met a rich person that hasn't lost money. But we have met a lot of poor people who have never lost a dime—investing that is. The poor are like this. They feared losing money, but rather than face their fear, they ignored it. They did nothing. The poor simply avoid the issue, and refusing to discuss the subject. Playing it safe helped them not lose money, but they never got rich either.

The ultra rich, on the other hand, told us that if If we wanted to be rich, we have to first acknowledge our fear and then overcome it. The best way to do that was to think like a Texan.

Think like a Texan

"I like Texans.” "In Texas, everything is bigger. When Texans win, they win big. And when they lose, it's spectacular."

"Texans like losing?" We may wonder.

"That's not what I'm saying.” "Nobody likes losing. Show me a happy loser, and I'll show you a loser in life. Rather, we are talking about the Texan's attitude toward risk, reward and failure. They live big. They're proud when they win, and they brag when they lose. They have a saying, 'If we are going to go broke, go big.'"

We can use the Alamo as an example of this Texan attitude. The Alamo is a story of brave people who chose to fight, even when there wasn't any hope of winning. They chose to die instead of surrendering...and they got their butts kicked. But, how did Texans handle this? They said, "Remember the Alamo!" They took a loss and made it a win.

"The Texans took a failure and turned it into inspiration...and a tourist destination that makes millions," said rich dad.

Learn from failure

"The formula for all winners," said the ultra rich, "is that failure inspires them to become winners because they learn from their failures."

Nobody does anything great without failing. Championship bikers had to first learn how to ride a bike, and they fell off their bikes in the process. Each time they were faced with the decision to either quit or get back on. The same is true for pro golfers. I'm sure they've lost many golf balls over the years. The difference between winners and losers is whether they look at failure as an opportunity to learn and grow, or as an opportunity to quit.

For winners, losing inspires them. For loses, losing defeats them.

Play to win

Former NFL quarterback, Fran Tarkenton, said, "Winning means being unafraid to lose." People like Tarkenton are not afraid of losing because they know who they are. But just because they're not afraid to lose, doesn't mean they like losing. There is a difference between hating to lose and being afraid to lose.

People who are afraid to lose never take the field, and when they do, they play not to lose rather than to win. Unfortunately, they rarely win.

People who hate losing take the field and play to win. When they do lose, they use it as inspiration to get better. It's that attitude that makes them champions. If we want to be rich, stop playing not to lose and start playing to win.

Be focused

The conventional financial wisdom is to build a balanced portfolio of stocks, bonds and mutual funds. That is a safe and sensible portfolio. It's a portfolio of someone playing not to lose rather than playing to win. And it's a portfolio that won't get us rich.

The rich don't play it safe with balanced portfolios. Rather, the rich are focused. Balanced people go nowhere. They stay in one spot. To make progress, we must be unbalanced and focused.

Thomas Edison wasn't balanced. He was focused. Bill Gates wasn't balanced. He was focused. Steve Jobs wasn't balanced. He was focused. If you have any desire to be rich, you must be focused. Do not do what the poor and middle-class do: put their few eggs in many baskets. Put a lot of our eggs in a few baskets and focus. Follow One Course Until Successful. Overcome our fear and don't play it safe.

Hedging against failure make success more likely

All of this being said, while failure is a very valuable component of success, no one wants to fail all the time. The only reason failure is valuable is because we take the lessons we can from it in order to be successful the next time. The whole point of embracing failure is so you can move from it to success.

So, while we encouraging us to embrace failure and to even fail harder...I also want to give us some tips on how to hedge against failure.

Entrepreneurial success and the B-I Triangle

People who want to be entrepreneurs often approach me. They say, “I have a great idea and product. What does it take to be successful?”

I tell them that it’s a good thing that they have a great idea and product but that is just the beginning. In order to be successful, you must have eight integrities, which we show them in our B-I Triangle.

The eight integrities are:

• Mission

• Leadership

• Team

• Product

• Legal

• Systems

• Communications

• Cash flow

Increase our chance of success by being a generalist

In life there are generalists and there are specialists.

Most of the world is made up of specialists. Specialists only focus on one aspect of the B-I Triangle, and because of that, they make poor entrepreneurs.

Students who graduate with a degree in product design seek jobs at the product level of the B-I Triangle. Students who graduate from law school fill roles at the legal level of the triangle. Those with degrees in engineering or computer science tend to focus on jobs at the systems level of the triangle. Students who receive degrees in marketing focus on jobs in the communication section of the B-I Triangle. And students who receive a degree in accounting typically find a job at the cash flow level of the triangle.

Successful entrepreneurs are generalists. One reason why entrepreneurs, like Steve Jobs and Bill Gates, leave school is because they did not want to be specialists; they hired specialists.

Generalists must be mission driven, have strong leadership skills, and surround themselves with a smart team, often “A” students with experience in the real world.

Why most entrepreneurs fail

There are three primary reasons why most entrepreneurs fail. They are:

1. The entrepreneur does not have all eight integrities in place. For example, most new entrepreneurs focus on product. They may have a great product, but are likely deficient in some or all of the other seven integrities.

2. The entrepreneur is a mono-professional. The saying “Birds of a feather flock together” applies here. For example, attorneys get together with other attorneys to form a business such as a law practice. Or techies get together with other techies to form a web company. Again, they may be smart professionals, but they will lack professional strength at the other seven integrities.

3. The entrepreneur lacks a sense of mission. We will recall that, among the Seven Intelligences, emotional intelligence and a sense of mission is essential in carrying an entrepreneur through the ups and downs of starting a business.Share

Generosity is the key to success

Contrary to popular belief, many of the most successful entrepreneurs are generous. If we look at the B-I Triangle, we will see that to start a successful business, a B-quadrant entrepreneur must provide jobs.

Most students come out of school looking for jobs. They need a job because schools don’t teach students how to satisfy one of Maslow’s basic needs, the need for Safety. That is why most “A” students work for “C” students.

Building the eight integrities takes financial education

Without financial education, many people are financially desperate, needy, and greedy. Financial education, the kind of financial education that transforms both the mind and spirit, opens our eyes to other points of view.

If we want to be a wealthy entrepreneur, we must become a generalist who hires specialists. Begin today learning about all eight integrities in the B-I Triangle and building relationships with those that specialize in each.

Most of all, focus on building your mission and finding specialists who are inspired by that mission. Being an entrepreneur is above all being generous. If we build a great company, we create great jobs for talented people, and we will solve problems for our customers and clients.

To fail harder means to do harder

Finally I’ll leave you with this: trying harder takes strength of character that most people simply don’t possess.

If we are to do anything of worth in this world, it will mean that we will fail. And if we are to do anything big in this world, it will mean that we will fail big.

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