Entrepreneurship is way of life – not a career

This is my first post on Rodinhoods, or any platform for that matter. It is about how I believe Entrepreneurship is more related to life and finding yourself, than choosing as a career option. Every step taken during Entrepreneurship teaches you something about life and the other way around.

The reason i choose Rodinhoods to write this, is because i see a community which shares similar experiences. I had read and made my girlfriend read this post.

and then i read this blog post.

The post isn’t about family or why you are tied down, but why should you jump in. Because there is no better way of finding who you are, without letting go of all inhibitions. 

Being an Entrepreneur is so much about finding you position your role in the world, and leaving behind whatever you have been told till date. Forgetting what your parents, relatives, friends and even girlfriends want of you or have been teaching you. It is about breaking the status quo, taking on hard decisions, and in most cases, forgetting about whatever way of life you have been taught to live till date. This can go on in an unstructured way, but let me point out 3 instances, which made me take this decision. 

Dropping out of Engineering

I had joined a reputable Engineering Institute, maybe not in the A league, but just behind it. I remember having an argument, because I would have been happy to join any institute that would have offered me IT (I had been coding since early school). But I wasn’t strong enough to battle it out and was forced to join the reputable institute in Mechanical. I continued for a couple of years, trying hard to get my branch changed, but I didn’t even understand half the subjects, neither was interested to. After 2 years, I called up my parents and told them I wanted to shift. The time for admissions had passed, but I had been able to find a new institute(it had no passed out students) that was offering an IT honours degree. My dad came to Pune(where I was studying) refused to let me shift and went back. After he left, I went to the principle, made all the necessary documents to drop out, and shifted myself. And then after a week called up my parents and told them the situation. They could hardly do anything then, just got mad and didn’t talk for a while.

But that was the best decision I made, I started loving my studies, taking up projects during my course, making small websites for companies, and to my astonishment for the first time I had good scores too(not that I expected, I had never been a good student).

That decision taught me two things,

1. If you take a decision, it’s yours and can go good or bad, but it will be yours, and you should be ready to take responsibility for it. If it’s your decision you would take responsibility for it.
2. Remember every decision is finally yours and blaming anyone else is useless because you have to live with it(see above how I conveniently blamed my parents for forcing me. I now believe it was my decision at that time too, I was just not strong enough to back it up with every force so I caved. Blaming them is just futile; it was me who could not stand up)

No Learning goes to waste

So around the time I was about to pass out, there was just one company that came for placements, and I got in. But somehow I did not want to join it. I got off-campus placements from all the big service companies but I just did not really want to join them(I know it seems like bragging, maybe I am). But there was this big world-wide gaming company that had a couple of openings, I applied, and after 5-6 brutal rounds I did get in.

I would have never cleared that interview, had I stuck to course books.

One of the interviews was completely on Image processing, now I learned that when I took up a project trying to create a face recognition project(The project did not go through, because no one else in the whole class wanted to do something that they weren’t sure of would even finish and they might lose marks. But I did go through on side time and do a significant bit of image processing at that time.)

Another interview was completely on Bit programming, again not something I would have been too familiar with, if I hadn’t sat down to help out a friend, who wanted to give an exam which had Bit programming in the course. I helped her out and in the process learnt it myself.

Joining a smaller product company – being humble

So after all the above, I finally ended up joining a fast paces product company in Mumbai, that was developing micro ATMs for rural areas. The idea intrigued me and I dropped off everything to get on board at a lower salary. The company hardly had any freshers, so working with experienced people one on one, gave me more insight into technology and product, various environments in an year, that I could have gained in 4 in a service company. I was always asking questions and everyone from the Tech Lead to the VP of technology were ready to answer them, from product to technology to business(I sat down with the VP of Business Product once, a 50+ year old guy with vast experience in Banking products. And he helped me understand how things work). Now which MNC would give you that level of insight.

I learned to be humble from that company and not let anything go over my head.

Starting out

Before I write this I have to say, I believe I have not achieved anything in Entrepreneurship till now, there is a long way to go and im still learning. But I believe I have become a much better person because of this journey and it has made me change my view of the world and life as such. Im not really here to share my experience in business terms but more in terms of my life.

I shut down my first venture after just 8 months of operation. The sad part is it was already profitable then. I gave up too early. I was running a normal, not to stylish, Web development business, had a team of 5-6 people, and we were profitable. I had to fire a couple of people, and a couple of people left because they were afraid. I know now I could have stopped them. I have no idea what happened in that month, I lost my touch, my mind had too much going on and I couldn’t handle it, and before I knew it everything was gone. I could have hired more people and continued. But I had already given up.

But now I know, never get too much on your mind, make decisions quick but rationally and have patience. Don’t give up if things get tough. You would get through it, if you believe in it. And I didn’t still believe in what I was doing. It was just some code being written for money, which can be a good business but frankly never excited me enough. That is why I gave up. Find something that you really want to see through and you would never give up.

I started working with my parents(They have a business that I don’t like at all), and selling Software solutions just plain selling, and earned a few bucks. I even got an upcoming partner award from TCS. But I still wanted to do something, and there was something in my mind since the time I was in college, a problem I had faced that I wanted to solve.

So six months later now again trying to solve this problem. This journey till date has been brutal, I started out without having any idea on how to go about doing this(I do recommend some bit of research before people jump in. Just to save time, if you have enough time, jump in today). But I haven’t given up, every week I believe I know so much more from the previous week, and am one step closer to solve the problem I set out to solve.

I have learnt to be honest, brutally honest if I may say so. And this change hasn’t just affected my work or profession, but just how I interact with everyone. The last few years have changed me beyond even my own recognition, all because of my decisions. And I have to admit, in the path to be an Entrepreneur I have found myself.

If anything this journey has made me stronger, flexible, honest and most of all an unafraid DOER. Will write again soon about the new venture i have started. Please share what you have learnt about your life, during your Entrepreneurial journeys. 

Will write soon about my new startup campuspedia