What Makes a Successful Entrepreneur? Discipline, Leadership, And More

Successful entrepreneurs like Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, Steve Jobs, Larry Page, Sergey Brin, Walt Disney, and so on tend to have certain qualities and skills. Even highly creative people who capitalize on opportunities in a different way, like YouTube creators with insane wealth or professional athletes who launch their merchandise, tend to have some of these qualities.

Today, we’re going to look at these qualities, the lifestyle, and the role that ideas play in the journey toward success.

Qualities of a Successful Entrepreneur

There is a host of good qualities or characteristics that you will find in many entrepreneurs. Now, it’s not a given fact that all successful entrepreneurs must have some of these qualities—There can always be exceptions. But it’s very likely to find some of these qualities regardless of which industry or region the entrepreneur is from.

Curiosity: Successful entrepreneurs have a sense of curiosity that drives them to continuously seek new opportunities and explore different avenues.
Decisiveness: Entrepreneurs must be able to make difficult decisions and stand by them.
Resilience: Entrepreneurship can be challenging and unpredictable. Successful entrepreneurs are resilient and able to bounce back from setbacks and failures.
Creativity: Entrepreneurs often need to think outside the box and come up with innovative solutions to problems.
Passion: Passion is what drives entrepreneurs to pursue their ventures and overcome obstacles.

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Being successful is as much about the mindset as it’s about doing the heavy lifting.

The Successful Lifestyle

Being successful is as much about the mindset as it’s about doing the heavy lifting. Book after book by people who understand wealth creation and corporate success try to drive this point home. For example, Rich Dad Poor Dad by Robert T. Kiyosaki and Sharon Lechter is an excellent resource to get the gist of it.

Sometimes, you already have a mindset that gravitates toward success, and at other times, you can train your mind to attune it to success. The core ingredient of a successful mindset is having a hobby to complement your personality.

Whereas the majority of people hardly have any hobbies as they are stuck in a 9-to-5 job, a successful entrepreneur will always have time for hobbies even if they are working long hours to bootstrap a new idea.

Like many successful people, entrepreneurs and C-suite professionals like to indulge in blackjack as a luxury hobby. Casinos have definitely been hailed as the top spot for the rich and famous, being associated with upper-class tastes and sophistication. For this reason, it’s essential for most entrepreneurs to master casino classics, such as poker, blackjack, or roulette – for the sole purpose to network with other professionals.

It’s no news that gambling is a luxury lifestyle option, however, many in the business world also like to collect rare art. It’s also not rare to focus on a new skill like a language or building things so that you can connect with other like-minded entrepreneur.

Basically, this gives you an outlet for expressing yourself and sets you apart from others, thus boosting your confidence. Overall, having an engaging hobby that you specialize in can improve your self-esteem, which, in turn, can help you achieve more success.

Don’t think of it as a waste of money and time. Many hobbies need you to invest significant amounts of time, money, or both to reach a particular threshold and as long as it makes you happy and helps you specialize in that one thing, it’s all worth it.

Another important aspect of a successful lifestyle or mindset is going for quality, luxury, or something longer-term compared to quantity, cost-effectiveness, or short-term opportunities. All of these have material advantages as well, like going for quality over quantity helps you save time and be unique.

Lastly, there are many habits that successful people have. We have covered the top 31 habits in one of our previous articles, so you should also check that out.

In the realm of unconventional success stories, professional athletes sometimes venture beyond their sports careers to showcase entrepreneurial prowess. A notable example is Rob Gronkowski, the former NFL tight end. Beyond his accomplishments on the football field, Gronkowski has delved into business ventures and entrepreneurial endeavors. Leveraging his popularity and brand, Gronkowski has successfully launched merchandise lines and even collaborated on unique projects, showcasing how athletes can manifest their success in different domains. His journey exemplifies the intersection of sportsmanship and entrepreneurship, highlighting that diverse qualities and skills contribute to success, even beyond the boundaries of traditional career paths.

Ideas & Creativity

In many ways, a successful entrepreneurial journey in the modern world is all about ideas and creativity. People who lack ideas and cannot create are usually not the ones who are creating valuable startups today, for example.

Highly successful people tend to get more ideas than they can work on. They see opportunities for making money in a lot of places. And a new idea is born.

In many cases, successful people already have the resources (money and talent/team) to work on any new ideas and automate them until it becomes feasible. At this point, it’s important to note that not all ideas are inherently good. There could be a flaw in the design or during the execution—It’s more common than you think.

Remember Lenovo’s bendy smartphone that was not necessary at all; or Google Glass that was ahead of its time?

Even the most successful people get ideas that are whacky, poorly thought-out, uneconomical, or simply impractical to implement. But a successful entrepreneur isn’t discouraged by a few failed ideas or projects. Their mind keeps working on new ones and they keep trying.

This goes on until they have the next idea that does indeed work.

We celebrate entrepreneurs for their ability to innovate in an industry or come up with brilliant ideas. What we tend to often ignore is the number of failed ideas and projects that they leave in their wake. But it’s all part of the journey and without failed projects, you can’t have projects that change the world.

Wrapping Up

Above all, it’s important to remember that not all successful people have all of these qualities and that some don’t even have any of them. It depends on the goals and the personality, not to mention the industry. So, take all of this as a general direction and not an exact technical specification sheet.