It’s all about the people.
This is the most crucial point. One of the best things about running a successful business is that you get to build meaningful relationships with people on the journey. The journey is arduous, it is difficult, and just like anything else in life, when you go through tough experiences with people and persevere, you develop strong connections. Just like entrepreneurship, building these connections also takes work and does not come easy. You have to show people that you care. Both with your words and with your money. There are many ways to describe this, but it boils down to this: communicate with honesty and respect, agree to disagree amicably, pay people handsomely for their honest and hard work, and people tend to stick around. These are the keys to a low turnover rate for employees, which arguably is one of the biggest preventable expense a business can incur.
Everyone always talks about delegation – well, trust me, it is key.
As the leader of the business, you have the responsibility of making the highest level and best quality decisions, because the livelihood of everyone in your organization depends on it. Thus, by necessity, you must delegate all other decisions and tasks to a trusted team of employees that hopefully you have already surrounded yourself with. You are the engine, and you must remain well maintained at all times.
It takes money to make money.
When a business first starts to turn profits, it is indeed very tempting to take owner distributions and spend it on lifestyle—after all, this is one of the perks of successful entrepreneurship. However, I would argue that it is important, at least initially, to reinvest profits back into the business, whether in the form of giving raises, offering new product lines, passing off the savings to customers, or expanding your business to support new jobs and community growth. One of the responsibilities of a successful business enterprise is to give back to the community, and the things discussed above are a few ways to do just that. Many people consider making these moves as detractors of personal wealth. I would argue that in the long run, this actually contributes to personal wealth, and the journey to get there benefits society as well. Truly a win-win solution.
The mission has to be bigger than making money.
Entrepreneurship is hard work, and those that do it well will tell you that if it was just for the money, it wouldn’t be worth the price of admission. The fuel of an entrepreneur is novelty, risk, passion, and the chance to contribute to a cause bigger than yourself. Money is the exhaust. In order to create a successful business, you have to ask yourself WHY this business needs to exist, and the answer does not lie in the finances. SmartPhone ER always had the foundational mission of keeping the community connected so that members of society can continue to leverage technology and engage in personal and professional relationships to contribute positively to society. This mission became more and more refined and granular over time, but I am proud to say that our team never lost sight of this original creed. However, that being said, it is important to remember that these audacious, bold, and seemingly altruistic missions are not possible without profit. There is no substitute for a financially successful business in order to then fund the broader mission that started the business in the first place.
The American Dream is possible.
My story—an initially undocumented immigrant who eventually became an ophthalmologist while running a successful business enterprise— would have had a much higher threshold to become reality in almost any other country except America. The freedom to start your own company, fund it, create jobs, offer great products, and make a good return on your hard work is the bedrock of a vibrant small business economy in the United States, and I have been the benefactor of this freedom over and over again. I am living proof that in order to become successful in America and live the proverbial American Dream, one only requires creativity, ingenuity, and hard work. The systems that will allow for this combination to succeed are already in place in this nation.
