From the ashes to success Kathryn Minshew

   Kathryn Minshew, CEO and co-founder of New York-based The Muse, which is the only online career resource that offers a behind the scenes look at job opportunities with hundreds of companies. Kathryn quit her job at the Clinton Health Access Initiative to run Pretty Young Professionals (PYP), working as an unpaid CEO and editor in Chief. In the spring of 2011 she  had managed to get the attention of 9,000 users. Then, a redesign increased users to 20,000, and the other members of the founding team began to get more involved.
    Kathryn and her co-workers broke apart after an argument about who should take charge of the company. Kathryn stated that she and her co-workers divided their equity on a piece of paper without consulting a lawyer as they felt that they did not need one. She was at a standstill for three weeks trying to figure out if she should fight for the existing company or strike out and do it over.
   Minshew did  a do-over on PYP. In September 2011, she launched The Daily Muse (now called The Muse). "It was painful, but being forced to start over was a unique sort of gift, because having been through a lot together, the team comes out of it with the confidence that nothing is going to stop us." Minshew says. After being accepted  into the prestigious Y Combinator program in November, she added mobile, local and social media functionality to her platform to look more like a "billion-dollar" startup.
   At the end of 2012 the Muse website had nearly 2 million users in more than 160 countries, increasing at a rate of 30 percent every month. The Muse, now has partnerships with 60-plus companies, including Intel, Sephora, NPR, Pinterest, Twitter and foursquare.

Reference: Wang. J. 23rd January, 2013. How 5 Successful Entrepreneurs Bounced Back After Failure. Retrieved from: http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/225204 

What makes a successful Entrepreneur?

          Anyone can be an entrepreneur, whether they are male or female, young or old, or tall or short. However, not everyone can be a successful entrepreneur. I think that to be a successful entrepreneur, one must have traits such as: determination, the willingness to fail, the ability to manage finance, the readiness to take risks, and lastly the ability to build good relationships with people.
 

       Once someone has decided to become an entrepreneur, they should be determined to stick with their business through thick and thin. Determination can and will bring you success! Let's say that you own a small business that is in the eye of a bigger business but you were not aware. You went through a disaster during the first few months but never gave up, and the bigger business witnessed that you went through a storm and have emerged successfully. Maybe that is the kind of determination the bigger business wanted in a partner and they would be more inclined to partner with you thus forming an even more successful entity. That's just one example as to how determination can bring success.

       Failure just might be one of the best things that can happen to someone. I often say to myself that most people fail twice because after they have failed the first time, they tend not to focus on the positive side of that failure and end up failing again. When an entrepreneur fails he/she should know that it doesn't mean to pack up and leave, it means that they have just found another way not to do it. If you are going to start a business, do not let the fear of failure take you over because it can have negative impacts on your confidence and determination. So grab failure by its horns, toss it aside then keep moving forward.

   

       One of the most important traits an entrepreneur must possess is the ability to manage his/her finances. Whether someone becomes an entrepreneur just because they enjoy doing what they do, for the profit or both, they should know how to spend and invest their money wisely, otherwise, they will just be wasting their time and resources. Keeping a budget is very important because it gives you a spending limit and helps you to save some money but if you feel like you cannot manage your finances, I suggest that you hire a trustworthy financial advisory to help you out.



        All entrepreneurs know this, however, if you are new in the business you must know that risk taking is a huge part of being an entrepreneur. Now, when I talk about taking risks, I do not mean that you should jump on every risk out there.You should do some homework on the risk you want to jump on first. Taking risks ties into the traits of being willing to fail and determination. If an entrepreneur does not apply those traits, they will not reap any reward because they will not make any progress. I'm still a student of entrepreneurship and I have more to learn about taking risks and the other traits of an entrepreneur but I will encourage anyone who is willing to become an entrepreneur to do a little research on the risk, get a plan A and a plan B then jump on the risk.

     People people people! In order for an entrepreneur to grow his/her business they must have good relationships with people who can help them. Building good relationships with people is not only just for growth, but for building trust with your customers to gain their loyalty and respect. Just in case new competitors arise you can count on your costumer's loyalty if you have good relationships with them.

Can I see Myself as an Entrepreneur??

         Can I see myself as an entrepreneur? Of course I can! Ever since I was introduced to who an entrepreneur is and what their characteristics are, I have since then evaluated my own characteristics and saw that I have what it takes to not just become an entrepreneur, but a successful entrepreneur. Yes it is true that to be an entrepreneur you have to take risks but I believe that once you are doing a business or service that you enjoy, you would not even be too troubled about the risks you are taking. I personally love working with computers but that doesn't mean that I have to wait around to be employed by a company to do so. One of my business ideas is to create a computer hardware and software repair business in my hometown once I have the necessary resources.

I have all confidence that I will succeed in establishing my business one day. Even though it wouldn't be easy once it is established, some of the profits made will be invested back into the business so that it will grow. For those wonderful people out there wanting to become an entrepreneur, have confidence in what you want to do and take risks and invest in your ideas and make a difference in the world.