Back days during my university studies, I was always wondering what is the source  of multi-billion dollar/euro enterprises. How can you create such a company, and what do you need to be able to run the company. There are still many people, who are thinking about the same questions and trying to seek the answer.

Let me make the answer easy to understand. Any living object in this world has a start. Even our world had its own start during the big bang process. Companies are established for different reasons, but Start-up is a different and unique type of creation model. Most of the times I compare companies to humans, so I would compare a start-up to a just born baby. To evaluate yourself and to see if you are ready to create a start-up ask the following questions from yourself and compare your answers to mine. Then it is much easier to have a start.

Why you should not create a startup?

• You have heard about a successful company, and you just want to have a try with the same idea to see maybe you will be successful. Don’t you even bother yourself! If the existing company is making a fortune with the idea, they have already used the opportunity and they will be always a step ahead!
• The $/€ signs are in your eyes and you want to become rich really fast. That is the worst reason to become an entrepreneur and establish a start-up. There are so many other ways to become rich with less effort and responsibilities.
• You are a control freak and you want to keep the power in your hands. A startup is a wrong choice for you, and maybe a bigger and more traditional company is the place you can show your power to the stuff.
• If you are running from the responsibilities and trying to pass everything as fast and easy as you can, forget to becoming an entrepreneur.
• Negativity and laziness does not fit in the life of an entrepreneur, and I guess you wouldn’t be reading this blog post if you were belonging to those group of people.
• The idea of becoming an entrepreneur and creating a startup might cross your mind, because you are talented and experienced business person. BUT you have a golden cage around you (a good job, position & salary, with bonuses which generates consistent income). The golden cage makes you too  scared to lose everything, and not to achieve them again.  With the cage around, you will not dare to give a try and create the startup.

You should only establish a startup if you feel that there is a problem and the best way to solve the problem is to create a company. What you need for the establishment is the passion and the love for the thing you are creating. You should be absolutely ready to become the parent of the new born child which is the company.

Why did I do it?

• As I have told in my previous blog posts, that I am from an entrepreneur family. As a child I saw how my dad created a company from 0 and built a successful enterprise.
• I already created once a company which failed. I hate to fail and failing gives me new ideas and motivation. But the most important thing is that I’m not scared from failing and I try to learn from my mistakes.
• I worked for the big and mid-size companies with the experience of different processes and failures in the companies. I noticed the reasons, why they were failing. Unfortunately most of the companies never learn from their mistakes nor try to solve their problems.
• I was wondering why I’m doing this for them and not creating my own, with the better and agile way of doing the business.
• There was a gap in Finnish ICT market and the gap needed to be filled with the startup I was going to create.
• The market was not mature enough and the big size clients were too scared to buy from small companies. But I guess if the market was mature enough, there would not be a place for Digital Illustrated at that time.
• I found out that few of my ex-colleagues became an entrepreneur. That gave me more courage to leave the golden cage and create the startup.
• I love to be challenged and use my innovation to solve up-coming problems.
• The last but not least is my love and passion for the IT/ICT business. The idea to create something new and unique makes me extremely happy!

Always remember the highlight:

Before becoming an entrepreneur and creating a startup, first evaluate yourself carefully. After the evaluation, think about the problem the start-up should solve. If you still have enough passion and love to do it, then you are ready to go and face the reality.

The road is long with lot of barriers, but the more you travel the more you will love it. Most of the entrepreneurs who I know, and who has created an startup have said “They couldn’t imagine at the beginning how hard creating a startup could be!”. One of the most important thing to keep in mind is that, if you go for it, be ready to spend 7 to 10 years of your life rising your “child”.

The rewards and the experience you will gain will be so great that you will never even thing to become an employee again and work for someone else!