THE PRINICIPLES

OF CREATING AND RUNNING

YOUR OWN BUSINESS

OGUNMOLA M.D
OGUNMOLA O.O
OUTLINE
1.0 Introduction
2.0 Literature Review
2.1 Why Start Your Own Business?
3.0 Starting
3.1 Look for a Real Problem to Solve
3.2 Overcome Inertia
4.0 Planning
4.1 Your Business Plan
4.2 Your Vision and Mission
5.0 Funding
5.1 Getting Finance for your startup
6.0 Marketing
6.1 Create Customers
6.2 Keep Your Customers
6.3 Create More Customers
7.0 Growing
7.1 Feed Your Business
7.2 Grow Your Business
8.0 Conclusion
9.0 References

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1.0 INTRODUCTION
Starting your own business is one of the most exciting, fulfilling and life
affirming things you can ever do. But like every other human endeavor,
creating and running a business venture is not such an easy feat. (Rachael
Bridge,2008)

That explains the reason why a minute percentage of individuals in the society
dare to venture into business. If running a business was such an easy endeavor
everybody will be successful business owners.

However, with the right principles, the mysteries behind successfully creating,
running and growing your business becomes demystified. These principles
determine to a large extent the difference between a success entrepreneur and
an un-successful one.

In this text, we will carefully examine the principles that have helped
successful entrepreneurs create and run their ventures from conception to
actualization.
We will first examine existing literature and body of knowledge in the fields
of business creating and management and then we will proceed to explain the
generalized principles of creating and running a business from the ideation to
the venturing, funding, management and eventual growth and evolution of the
business enterprise.

At the end of the text, we would have made a contribution to the business
body of knowledge that will be an easy-to-digest and apply for individuals
hoping to create and run successful business ventures.

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2.0 LITERATURE REVIEW

Business creation and management is a common subject matter amongst

professionals both within and outside the business environment.
Several authors have expressed their opinions and ideologies about what it
means to start and run a business venture.

In his book the Lean Startup, Eric Ries defines a startup as an organization
dedicated to creating something new under conditions of extreme uncertainty.

On starting a Business, Tim Berry in his book Start, Run and Grow your
Business itemized four questions which he believed every entrepreneur should
ask before starting a business venture. These questions are
I. Do you have a choice?
II. Will people buy what I want to sell?
III. How much will it cost?
IV. Do you have a plan?
Guy Kawasaki had a different point of view in his bestselling classical The
Art of the Start . In this book Kawasaki expressed an unconventional point of
view in the art of starting and running a business venture. He also divided the
business creation and growth process into four stages namely;
I. Articulation
II. Activation
III. Proliferation and
IV. Obligation.
Several other authors too have thing or the other to say about the art of starting and
running a business, but for the purpose of these text we will not be able to examine
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all literature available on the subject matter. We will not go ahead to discuss the
general principles that cut across the business body of knowledge from those of the
well-organized academic business texts to those unconventional ideas like that of
Guy Kawasaki and a couple of other authors who believe in doing business the other
way round.

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3.0 STARTING

3.1 LOOK FOR A REAL PROBLEM TO SOLVE

At the core of every business is problem solving.

Business is all about meeting needs profitably. It is simply the art of providing
goods and/or services that solve certain problems for individuals and
organizations who will pay you in return. A business that doesn’t solve any
problems whatsoever is simply a busyness endeavor and it will go extinct in
a short while.

The first step in creating a business venture is looking for a problem to solve.
Not just a problem but a unique problem that you can solve given the available
resources and infrastructure and people will be willing to pay you for.

Problem identification is the bed rock of idea generation.

As Leke Alder rightly puts it in his book The Great Alchemy;”ideas are
everywhere, just look around you. Somebody is either not doing something
right or somebody is doing something wrong” (Leke Alder,2008).

Your first job as an entrepreneur is to look inside you and around you for a
problem your business can solve for individuals and/or organizations which
in turn they will pay you for it. Once that is done, you are on your way to
wealth.

3.2 OVERCOME INERTIA

After narrowing down on a sellable idea, the next bane that confronts
individuals who intend to start a business is what I call “FEARNERTIA”;

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that is Inertia induced by Fear. New entrants into the business arena are
usually afraid to launch into business for several reasons.

There are various fears stopping people from venturing into their already
conceived business ideas. There is;
1. The fear of venturing
2. The fear of failure
3. The fear of criticisms
All forms of fear.
The good news is all those are most times mere illusions, they are not real.
The fact that many have plunged into business and failed or rather did not
come out as expected is not a justification for not test-running your idea in the
market.
Amidst all the failures, individuals and organizations are venturing and
making successes out of business on almost a daily bases.
Therefore, overcome your fears, get a jump start into the actualization of your
vision.

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4.0 PLANNING
Planning is the bed rock of the success of any business venture.
You need a plan to bring your business ideas into reality.
In this section we will examine the art of planning for your business.

4.1 YOUR BUSINESS PLAN

Your business plan defines and describes the architecture of your business.

The business plan describes what the business is all about, its products and/or
services, how the business intends to create or produce these products and
services, the human resources and the infrastructure involved, the financial
needs to keep the business up and running, information about the business
owner(s), the estimated income and profit of the business and so on.

In short the business plan should contain all valuable information about the
business from conception to the realization of the goals of the business.

The business plan will not only assist the business owner in piloting the affairs
of the business in the right direction, it will also enable prospective investors
and financial institutions to determine the economic viability of the business.

A business plan can give a prospective investor a clue as to whether the

business is worth investing in or not. Also banks and other financial
institutions will always require a business plan before they can consider
granting the business any form of loans or financial assistance.

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4.2 YOUR MISSION AND VISION
When you have come up with a viable business idea, and then workable
business plan, at the core of the planning process is the Mission and Vision.
These duo can go a long way in determining how long a business thrives in
the fiercely competitive business environment.
Simply put, the Mission is what the business is set out to do.
Whereas, the Vision is where the business hopes to be in the nearest future;
next one month, 6 months, one year ten years etc.
The Mission and Vision serve as driving forces for the business owner in
piloting the affairs of the business to success.

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5.0 FUNDING
Funding has always been a problem confronting business startups.

In economics, Capital is a one of the factors of production, therefore the

process of creating and running a business is not complete without having
enough funds to get the business up and running at least before the business
begins to generate any income whatsoever.

In this section, we discuss some of the ways an emerging entrepreneur can get
funds for his startup.

5.1 GETTING FINANCE FOR YOUR BUSINESS

Several authors have expressed their ideas of how an emerging entrepreneur
can get funds for starting up a business. Some of the ways itemized include;
personal finance, loans, financial gift from friends and family, funds from
angel investors and so on.

For the purpose of these text, we will itemize practically proven ways of
generating funds for your business start-up. Some of which includes;

1. Personal Funds: The easiest and most accessible means funding

your business comes from your personal funds. Could be your
savings, income from your regular job and so on. A portion of
your own money must go into the financing of your startup if you
are really keen about growing your business financially.
2. Financial Gifts and Support from Family and Friends
Another proven way of generating funds for a business startup is
through monetary gifts from friends, families, relatives and other
individuals who believe in your vision.

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 3. Venture Capitalists and Angel Investors
In the absence of personal funds or financial gifts from relatives,
venture capitalist or what the business experts call angel
investors are also a very good option.
Venture Capitalists are basically individuals or group of
individuals who have a well-established net worth and are
willing to support business start-ups with funding usually to be
repaid back after an agreed period of time or sometimes in return
for shares in the ownership of the venture.
4. Loans from Banks and Financial Institutions

Banks and similar financial institutions can also provide funding

for businesses but it is not always an easy tasks for business
startups with little or no track record to obtain loans easily from
banks. Banks usually require a considerable amount of paper-
work and collaterals which are most times not at the disposal of
an individual just delving into business.

Having itemized some of the various options available to you as an

entrepreneur starting up a business, it is up to you to decide which one suits
you most. But it very important as stated earlier that your personal funds go
into the funding of the business at least at the very beginning. This gives
whoever is willing to provide fund for your business that you are also
committed to the growth of the business.

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6.0 MARKETTING
As we have established earlier, business is all about selling products and/or
services to individuals or organizations who are willing to pay for them.
Marketing therefore is to business what broadcasting is to a television station.
Without marketing, nobody gets to know about your products or services and
then nobody patronizes you and in a matter of time, you are out of business
no matter how brilliant your idea was or how much funds you have at your
disposal.
6.1 CREATE CUSTOMERS
The first stage of a business’ marketing process is creating customers.
At the beginning of the business, people will hardly know about you
and your business and even if they do, they will not just walk into your
shop or office as the case may be and offer to patronize you. It is your
responsibility then to take your products and services to your potential
customers and convince them to patronize you.
This can be achieved in several ways, via proposals, brochures or flyers
if that suits your business type or offering them the product or services
directly.
If you are successful at doing this, then you would have accomplished
one of the major goals of business which is creating customers.
You are now set for business.
6.2 KEEP YOUR CUSTOMERS
One of the major causes of failure for startup businesses is that they
devote a lot of energy into getting customers at the onset and then grow
complacent after they have acquired the customers.
Customers; whether individuals or organizations are human beings,
they want to be served right with respect and integrity. They want to

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 get more value for their money, they want a product or service provider
that solves their problems efficiently and effectively.
If you fail to do this, you will inevitably lose your customers to your
competitors who are working round the clock to get their fair share of
the market.
As an entrepreneur, you should not just devote your energy and
resources into getting more customers that you neglect your existing
clients.
Serve them appropriately and chances are they will help you in the
marketing of your products/services to others.
In business, Customer is king, long live the king.
6.3 GROW YOUR CUSTOMERS
After you have developed an effective way of serving your existing
customers and you are getting a positive feedback from them about your
products and services, it’s time to grow your customer base.
With word of mouth referrals from your existing satisfied customers
and a strong marketing strategy, you will increase your customer base
and also get more market share from your competitors who are not
serving their customers well.

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7.0 GROWING
There comes a time in the lifetime of a business when it’s time to grow and
move from the shallow waters into the deep waters of the industry.
Some business consultants term these “Swimming with the Sharks”.
But then we should sound a word of caution, you should not attempt to face
the giants in your industry without consolidating your business otherwise the
bigger sharks can swallow your business up.
In this section we discuss the necessary steps to be taken when you want to
grow your business.
7.1 FEED YOUR BUSINESS
Business is an anthropomorphic entity, just like human beings, if you feed it
well it will grow well if you don’t feed it well it will have a stunted growth.

So how do you feed your business?

There are several factors a business feeds on but for the purpose of thistext
we will discuss three. They are;

• People: A business is as good as its people. If you must grow your

business then you must build a team of individuals who will
collectively contribute to the day to day growth of the business.
With the right people on your team your business will grow faster
than you can imagines.
• Systems: Well-structured systems make the process of growth
efficient. Systems ensure that your people are doing what they should
be doing when they should do it. Well-structured business systems
will help the entrepreneur to easily discover lapses in the overall
performance of the business. Also systems ensure the longevity and

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 continuity of the business. When systems are put in place the exit of
an individual will not put a halt to the business process.
• Ideas and Innovations: A business devoid of ideas and innovations
will soon become obsolete. And obsolesce in the ever competitive
market means the business will lose its market share to competitors
who have innovative products and services to offer to the customers.

As an entrepreneur if you must grow your business, then, you must feed
it with the right people, systems and innovative ideas. A combination of
these three will no doubt make your business a force to be reckoned with
in the market.

7.2 GROWING YOUR BUSINESS

It is not enough to have the right people, systems and innovative ideas.
As an entrepreneur, you must take deliberate actions at expanding your
business.
The expansion could be vertical or horizontal.
In what we term horizontal expansion, you looking at other areas in
your current industry where you can expand.
In vertical expansion, you are looking at other industries where you can
expand the frontiers of your business to.
Also the expansion could be location, you can open branches of your
business in other locations within your geographic region of even
expand the frontiers of your business across borders.
Whichever strategy you decide, keep it in mind that the purpose of the
process is to grow your business exponentially.

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8.0 CONCLUSION
In the course of these text we have examined the various steps and process
involved in creating, running and growing a business from conception to
actualization.
We started with a review of some of the existing literature in the fields of
business creation and administration, we also examined carefully the step by
step process for converting the problems you see around to business ideas that
people will pay for, planning for the business, getting funds for the business,
marketing your products and growing your customer base and finally growing
the business into a market leader.
This text is aimed at providing a straightforward roadmap for individuals who
have want to go into business and have little or no idea of how to go about it.
Also, this text should serve as a springboard for other researches in the subject
matter of business creation and running a successful business.

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9.0 REFERENCES
• Rachel Bridge (2008), You can do it too, Kogan Page Publishers USA.
• Eric Ries (2011), The Lean Start-up, Crown Publishing Group, USA.
• Guy Kawasaki (2004), The Art of the Start, Penguin Group USA.
• Leke Alder (2008), The Great Alchemy, Alder Media, Lagos, Nigeria.
• Tim Berry (2010), Start, Run and Grow your Business, Palo Alto
Software Inc., Palo Alto California.

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