Advice for Entrepreneurs: Mistakes Are the Key to Success

Considering starting your own business? You are not alone. In fact, entrepreneurship has become an increasingly popular career choice in the last few years.

Some people decide to build their own businesses out of a desire to be out on their own or because they have dreams of turning a hobby into a career. Others may have been laid off and are frustrated with their current job prospects, or they may simply need greater flexibility in their lives.
But starting your own business can be challenging, and requires long hours and a lot of hard work and determination. In fact, only 30 percent of business start-ups survive more than five years. To avoid the pitfalls, new entrepreneurs need to do their homework and seek out all the advice they can get.

Michael Kerrison, 50, an IBM salesman turned self-made millionaire has recently chronicled his entrepreneurial experiences in a new book called “Landing on Your Feet.” The author, a pioneer of the high tech industry who launched three technology companies that eventually reached multi-million dollar levels, uses examples from his life, including the mistakes he made along the way, to give a real world view of what it really takes to start and build a business.

“I believe real learning comes from our mistakes,” says Kerrison. “Embrace your failures, for they are your true teachers. Success teaches us little; it’s just the way we keep score,” he explains.
Kerrison’s book started out as a personal quest to “get down on paper” all that he had learned about business over his 25-year career. The final result is a business book that mixes business strategies with personal stories that the author hopes people will be able to relate to.

There is a lot of practical advice, including guidance on strategic planning, time management, compensation strategies, marketing techniques and human resources. There’s even a useful “tool kit” at the end with concise advice on the sales cycle, and planning and management tools.
Kerrison, who is currently the president of Endurance-America,

a management consulting firm specializing in executive development and business planning, loves business and he wants the reader to love it too. For would-be entrepreneurs, he sums up his philosophy this way: “Starting and building your own business isn’t about making money, getting famous, or obtaining power. It’s about staying in the boat. It’s about outlasting the storms. It’s about trusting God. . . . Because in the end you have finally figured out that your business -- your boat -- is about enriching the lives of people: your employees, your clients, your loved ones.