Like it or not, but management skill is essential for anyone who wants to be a successful Entrepreneur.

Whether you’ve design skills, teaching skills, mobile app development skills, marketing skills or whatever skill that you’ve developed in yourself so far. The fact is, you also have to have the management skill.

Unless you want to create an image of being a failure and let people laugh at you and say - that guy was never going to be successful as he wasn’t capable enough to manage his company.

You don’t want that, of course. So let’s get real for few minutes and understand the impact of mastering management skill can have on the success of your startup.

Over the years, I’ve met and worked with several successful Entrepreneurs in my career, and the common mistakes I’ve noticed among them is the repeating management mistakes, and not understanding the challenges one has to face for scaling their startups.

Most people, or at least the people who I have come across since now, seek entrepreneurship because it allows them to be their own boss. And to be honest, it’s quite an appealing position as you get to make all business decisions from basics to important ones. But, that’s not how it works. It never has. Making decisions, managing a company and the people who work for it is far more challenging than you can imagine, and only the successful Entrepreneurs have realized it. And here, I’m sharing the management mistakes that I have observed till now.

# 1 Developing An Imbalanced Culture

When you had your startup idea, you might have dreamed of creating the ultimate stress-free work zone that no company has ever done, you set no fixed hours or limited vacation days.

This, down-to-earth, employee-friendly approach for your office work culture is good. They do improve job satisfaction and motivate your staff, but it’ll only work for your company if they’re balanced with the predefined company policies and professional expectations. Remember, the culture must be balanced equally.


#2 You Do Your Work And Let Them Do Theirs

Hopefully, you’ve hired dedicated developers sales head, vice president, marketing interns to do the work what they know to do the best. But, if you’re willing to make your startup successful, then let those people do their own work in their own way.

Of course, the directions, tasks, and expected outcome should be defined, but motivate them enough to handle their own role and responsibilities. Don’t get too much involved. It will not just take a huge portion of your own time which can be rather utilized in the further business planning, but it will encourage your staff to take responsibility on their own.

#3 Lacking The Ability To Pivot

Over time, after meeting many Entrepreneurs from the different range of industries, I’ve noticed most of them saying nothing ever has gone as planned. But, revisiting and modifying the business strategy is part of the game.

Changing the business strategy when the need arises is essential. But more importantly, being able to manage the team effectively and diverting them to a fresh business strategy is the sign of a good management skill.

For instance, Nokia was once into the business of paper and manufacturing rubber boots, but now it’s a popular telecommunication company. And for anyone to become successful in any industry, keeping a backup plan for every bad situation is the correct option. Last month, I had written a detailed article on how having a plan B is necessary for Entrepreneurs. You should check that out too.

#4 Thinking Too Small

This is the worse of all. If you’ve a startup idea that targets only a tiny niche market, then success is more difficult to achieve. But frankly speaking, if you’re making or providing something good, then sooner or later, you’re going to have competitors. In fact, Paul Graham also explained in “The 18 Mistakes That Kill Startups” that many Entrepreneurs believe in targeting smaller crowd so the competition doesn’t become an issue. But it never works, if your dreams involve running company with hundreds or probably thousands of employees in next 10 years.

The point is, if your product is perfect market fit, and is in constant demand, then competitors will be there so you might as well face that, one way or other. And remember, you can only avoid competition by avoiding good ideas.

Summary

The above-mentioned management mistakes are painfully common, but now that you’re aware of them, it’s time to prepare yourself and your company for the upcoming inevitable business challenges and grow beyond them.