How to Make It on Your Own

“U.S. entrepreneurs surveyed were more negative on tax and regulation than any other G20 country, despite the fact that the nation’s overall [entrepreneurial] performance was strong,” the study says.

For me, records must be kept of all bills, and at the end of the year, I have to correlate income earned with spending declared by my various clients, which will likely hit my wallet a little harder during tax time than I will probably like.

Another one of the tougher aspects of the job is simply getting your name out there. As I continued on in my quest as a freelancer, my biggest challenge turned out to be concerned with new client acquisition, a concern for all start-ups.

As with everything in business, it’s more about who you know than what you know. A very dear friend introduced me to one of my first high-profile clients, and through hard work and persistence, things started to snowball from there.

That client recommended my work to someone else, who saw me fit for another, and so on, until I was editing and writing on the side as much as I was working my day-job.

But does all of this make me a “great” entrepreneur, or even a successful one?

It all depends upon your own measure of what “success” entails; as I’ve already made clear, my own personal endgame is more about developing relevant experiences and branding myself as a competent writer and editor than creating a large, successful business. Everyone is different.

Some people are just shaped to create something game-changing and unique. I’m talking about the Richard Branson’s and the Bill Gates’s of the world. These are the geniuses who, like Shakespeare and Mozart before them, are just born to live the tough lives of global entrepreneurs.

Their genius is what makes them unique, but these people still retain the basic qualities that all entrepreneurs need to be successful in this world.

Steve Tobak recently wrote an article highlighting his observed attributes of the great entrepreneurs he has worked and hung out with–such as work-ethic, problem-solving skills, passion, etc.–, in an attempt to get to the root of what makes “great” entrepreneurs tick.

But what about the unsung heroes foraging their own paths who never get worldwide recognition? What do they have to say about the world of making it on your own, creating something from scratch and making it into a good business commodity?

Ryan Caloras is one of those unsung heroes, a young software engineer who co-founded Coolhandjuke.com, a web and mobile application that allows you to control the music at restaurants and bars using your smartphone.

“No one is going to tell you how to do something,” Ryan says about making it on his own.

“Discipline is super important. You have to know what you’re capable of, and how to accurately give estimates.”

Ryan successfully developed Coolhandjuke into a commodity–even pitched it to a high-end company–before settling down and finding his career as a software engineer full-time in New York City.

And, despite Steve Tobak’s emphasis on total work ethic, Ryan says it’s important to remember that work is work and life is life.

“Being able to separate work from the rest of your life is key. [I also] highly advise working outside of your home when possible when… starting a new venture. It helps differentiate and schedule time for you to think about and do work.”

Whatever your type of business commodity–whether it be a software program, writing skills, or merely a good public image–entrepreneurship is growing into a large, competitive, global industry. An industry that is built upon the basic principles of tenacity, discipline, hard-work and, probably most importantly, when to say “no”.