Empowerment is the lifeblood of an entrepreneur. If you feel powerful, you can go on to achieve anything you set your mind to. For business owners, you need to back yourself if you’re ever going to succeed. Of course, empowering yourself doesn’t always come easy. Where should you start when it comes to putting some wind in your sails? Here are five actions that you can start taking today to help yourself feel more empowered.
Dress the part.
Making sure that you’re looking good goes a long way to making yourself feel good. Confidence often starts on the outside, so making sure you’ve got clothing that fits well and looks the part is a big part of empowerment. To make sure that you have the right clothes for your body, start shopping in more specialized areas. For smaller people, head to petite clothing sections to make sure that you find clothes that not only fit but are actually designed with bodies like yours in mind.
Get expert assistance when you need it.
You don’t need to know everything as a business owner. What you do need to know is when to bring in an external expert to handle the aspects you don’t know about. For example, if you want to buy or sell IPv4 blocks, but you aren’t sure where to even start, then hiring an outside team of experts to handle an IPv4 auction is a good place to start. That removes room for error and ticks one thing off your to-do list without much effort on your part. Professionals can provide you with clean IPv4 address blocks, so you’ll have plenty of address space and maintain your reputation. Once you know other things are taken care of, you have more time to work on yourself and your business.
Continue working on your skills.
We should all continue learning throughout life. Anyone who thinks they know it all will always have a cap on their abilities. Part of empowerment comes from continual self-development. Identify what areas you need to work on; it might be unsolicited calls as part of your sales strategy. If that’s the case, then research cold calling tips for introverts, and start practicing more. After all, practice makes perfect. You’ll be amazed at what you can achieve when you put your mind to it.
Don’t run from failure.
Did you know that just 78% of small businesses manage to survive their first year? That’s not a whole lot of successes, so why are we beating ourselves up over these failures when we share them with so many other people? Failure is a natural part of life, especially when it comes to business. If you come up against obstacles or difficulties that you can’t overcome, look at them as opportunities for learning, rather than examples of when you failed.
Empower those around you.
According to Forbes, 4% of employees are willing to go the extra mile when empowerment is low, but as many as 67% will when empowerment is high. That just shows how important it is to not just focus on your own development and empowerment but also on those around you.
If you work closely with employees or partners, think about how you can create an empowered environment that will suit you both. Maybe that could look like taking part in development courses together or planning goals for the business as a team. Whatever it is, their empowerment will mean they work harder, which will in turn help to motivate you and contribute to further business success. So much of business is about collaboration and cooperation, so when it comes to true empowerment, you have to consider those close to you just as much as yourself.
