by Kevin Payne
One of my personal beliefs as an entrepreneur is that if you want to be successful, do what successful people do. That is why I enjoy reading success business stories, especially about Black startup founders. As an African-American myself, there’s a sense of pride reading their stories. If they can do it, why can’t I?
In today’s post, I will be sharing the most valuable lessons I have learned from the most successful and respected Black startup founders today.
The startup founders that we will be learning from today come from different backgrounds, and their startups are involved in various industries. Even their journeys are unique. Yet, many of these startup founders share similar lessons when it comes to building and growing a startup.
These are just some of the lessons I observed many of these Black startup founders share:
*Companies were chosen based on their websites Domain Authority, Alexa rating, and the startup founders social signals on Twitter/LinkedIn. Follow and comment below to gain access to the extensive list of 100+ black startup founders upon this post update.
Having a business idea only the beginning
If you want to want your startup to become successful really, you need to have a detailed—yet simple—strategy, especially when it comes to your marketing campaigns. Break up large, complicated tasks into smaller milestones. That way, you and your team would not feel overwhelmed.
Be emotionally and mentally prepared
Launching a startup can be extremely demanding of your time, effort, and resources. If you are not careful, you will not only run the risk of burning out but also experience conflict between your team and family. Understand and expect that there will a lot of setbacks and challenges along the way. Don’t take them too personally. Instead, charge these as learning experiences that will motivate you to go further.
Build a secure and stable team
Behind every one of these successful startups is a strong team made up of talented, like-minded professionals with complementary skills. Make sure that you take the time to choose people who share your vision and purpose carefully. Of course, make sure that you take time to care for them as well.
16. Dr. Tye and Courtney Caldwell (Founders of ShearShare)
Maintain a healthy work/life balance
“[When starting a business with your spouse] make sure when it’s business, it’s business. When you get home, you can talk about it, you can dabble with it here and there, but do not breathe it all of the time. When the day is over and we’re both exhausted, and we’re both mentally drained, we say: “We’re going to go home and watch a movie” or “we are going out tonight and have a glass of wine.” Then, it’s easy to talk about the other things that are going on.”
“For us, our marriage is definitely number one. It just so happens we both run our business together. I always tell Tye there’s no one else that would trust with my life, so it’s easy to trust him with business decisions. We’ve heard horror stories from different co-founder teams about trust or people stepping on each others’ toes, but we fortunately don’t have that because I trust him with the biggest decisions and the smallest decisions. It makes for a really fun working environment.”
– Excerpts taken from their interview with Dallas News
