Life as an entrepreneur is never dull, always busy and filled with hourly surprises. After working at Apple for many years, I began my own journey to becoming a small business owner, starting with my pursuit of an MBA. But, today, when I look back, my one year of flight school was better preparation for life as an entrepreneur and small business owner than any MBA class
From all my flight school lessons I’ve distilled three major ideas: 1) Preparation prevents problems; 2) Resilience works the problem; and 3) Focus creates calmness.
The checklist
Running a business, especially a tech business, is complicated. I like to tell people that the tech industry is not a friendly industry, but is instead one that sits at the intersection of Wall Street and Hollywood Boulevard!
More seriously, though, running a business can bring about physical changes, and not for the good. Specifically, when things get complex, our memories fail due due to our increased tendency to be distracted when under stress. With this condition, known as an “all-or-none” process, we’re overwhelmed, our memories fail, and we skip steps to get out of an uncomfortable situation.
In a similar regard, flight school taught me the importance of a checklist. Simulation Studios does something akin to a checklist by creating exceptionally complicated business simulations for companies. Using the custom software we’ve created, we bring the solution to a client company and run its executives through a one-day, live business “war games” simulation.
In these simulations, the execs confront an endless list of tasks they have to complete in order to ensure success. This is where checklists come in: Using a piece of paper for complex situations has saved our own company more times than I can count. We live by checklists. They create consistency and drastically reduce errors while ensuring quality.
Comfort in rapid change
Anyone who has started a business or worked in any entrepreneurial capacity knows well that one constant: change. Creating a list of all the things that change in one week in any small business is tough because it’s endless. Small businesses by necessity must move…