I've been an entrepreneur since the end of 2008, that's about 7 years now of doing all sorts of crazy things.
I still remember the time when I was still in Australia trying to get myself back to my hometown in Borneo. I had to think of a way to make money back home on my own, and it had to be my own business because I hate working for others.
Recalling my days as a delivery driver for a noodle shop in Queensland, a warehouse personnel in a big furniture company in New South Wales...all of those sucked big time. They were all terrible jobs.
There was one time when I tried to get a job through a recruiting agency and they just threw me in a session with a bunch of other fresh graduates. This was in Brisbane, Australia. Now if I knew beforehand how it was gonna play out, I would have stayed away from the whole humiliation. They gave us tasks in groups to see who was the best at, well whatever it was they were looking for. About 20 minutes in, I realized that this was pure BS. None of these tests could prove anything about each of the fresh graduates. For instance, I initially assumed that they'll end up picking the loud mouth ones...guess what, they did. Imagine picking the noisiest in a pile for your company, the headache. Well they'll probably work for some companies, I wouldn't know, I'm just an average joe.
Anyway, I just hate working for other people. I can't stand being told what to do, maybe it's my arrogance. That's just me.
So moving on, I had to figure out a way to come up with a product that would work back home. My background is in computers, media, multimedia and marketing. I have all of those certs lying back at home somewhere. I told myself, maybe a 'Publishing' startup. So I had to find funds. No banks would lend any money to me, I didn't know whether the government had any financial aid programs that could help me...I was stuck. So I went to my dad. He helped out. I had about 10K to play with. After few days of planning a budget, I realised, no way in hell 10K's gonna do any good! But I went on setting up my first ever company regardless.
The first publication my company started was a 'free to take' entertainment magazine, it took 4 long months for the permits to come out. Within those 4 months of operating, I had no clients, I ran out of money, I had all sorts of problems on the table. My business network was bad, really bad.
That's where I learnt, I had to go out more and meet as many people as I could. The number of meetings and beer sessions was crazy. I was literally exhausting myself out. But somehow I knew it was worth it.
Business started to grow, the magazine started to pickup some followings, towards the end of 2009 I saw some money in the company's bank account (nothing substantial though). All because of my persistence in creating my very own collection of contacts.
Networking is crucial in any business. If you have something to sell, but no one knows about it, your product or service would just end up in the garage. It's not just you in the world seeking networks, other people are too. They will want to know you. First impressions are important too. But let's save that for another article. I got work to do now.
I still remember the time when I was still in Australia trying to get myself back to my hometown in Borneo. I had to think of a way to make money back home on my own, and it had to be my own business because I hate working for others.
Recalling my days as a delivery driver for a noodle shop in Queensland, a warehouse personnel in a big furniture company in New South Wales...all of those sucked big time. They were all terrible jobs.
There was one time when I tried to get a job through a recruiting agency and they just threw me in a session with a bunch of other fresh graduates. This was in Brisbane, Australia. Now if I knew beforehand how it was gonna play out, I would have stayed away from the whole humiliation. They gave us tasks in groups to see who was the best at, well whatever it was they were looking for. About 20 minutes in, I realized that this was pure BS. None of these tests could prove anything about each of the fresh graduates. For instance, I initially assumed that they'll end up picking the loud mouth ones...guess what, they did. Imagine picking the noisiest in a pile for your company, the headache. Well they'll probably work for some companies, I wouldn't know, I'm just an average joe.
Anyway, I just hate working for other people. I can't stand being told what to do, maybe it's my arrogance. That's just me.
So moving on, I had to figure out a way to come up with a product that would work back home. My background is in computers, media, multimedia and marketing. I have all of those certs lying back at home somewhere. I told myself, maybe a 'Publishing' startup. So I had to find funds. No banks would lend any money to me, I didn't know whether the government had any financial aid programs that could help me...I was stuck. So I went to my dad. He helped out. I had about 10K to play with. After few days of planning a budget, I realised, no way in hell 10K's gonna do any good! But I went on setting up my first ever company regardless.
The first publication my company started was a 'free to take' entertainment magazine, it took 4 long months for the permits to come out. Within those 4 months of operating, I had no clients, I ran out of money, I had all sorts of problems on the table. My business network was bad, really bad.
That's where I learnt, I had to go out more and meet as many people as I could. The number of meetings and beer sessions was crazy. I was literally exhausting myself out. But somehow I knew it was worth it.
Business started to grow, the magazine started to pickup some followings, towards the end of 2009 I saw some money in the company's bank account (nothing substantial though). All because of my persistence in creating my very own collection of contacts.
Networking is crucial in any business. If you have something to sell, but no one knows about it, your product or service would just end up in the garage. It's not just you in the world seeking networks, other people are too. They will want to know you. First impressions are important too. But let's save that for another article. I got work to do now.