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Entrepreneurial life is rewarding but is far from being a straight line without a hitch. It is full of surprises and unexpected that we face during its journey. It is in these specific moments that we distinguish ourselves as an entrepreneur.

It is therefore important to reduce the number of errors to the minimum for an efficient development of your business but also for its survival. As a management consultant, here are 5 that I meet regularly.

1) IMPROPER ASSESSING YOUR PRODUCT AND MARKET

Have you ever tried to sell a bathing suit to nudists ... or tried to sell a harp in a metal rock concert? Yet this is what some entrepreneurs are trying to do, persuaded of having an excellent product but neglecting to check if it meets a real specific need of the market. Each product has its market and each market has its product.

Whether it is a product or a service, at a minimum, everyone should study a market analysis, its competition and its distinctive advantages in order to position itself properly on the market. If you misjudge your product and your market, you simply cannot sell enough bathing suits to Adam and Eve, so no income = no business.

2) ADOPT THE "WE WILL SEE IT" STRATEGY

"We will see well" is like living on love and fresh water and letting chance decide our fate and that of his business, hoping that chance will always choose what is best for its bank account . If this system works well for your business, I believe you were born under a lucky star and should also consider playing 6/49 because luck is obviously on your side and you are part of the 1%. For the 99% other entrepreneurs, know that today we can no longer run a business on the basis of "we'll see."

A company must develop and implement a real business strategy that will serve as a road map and GPS in order to know where we are, where we are going, what path is best for us with the resources available. while adjusting along the way. If you don't firmly take the wheel of your business, you will find yourself everywhere but never in the right place at the right time. A company that knows where it is going is more likely to get there with a lot more love and fresh water.

3) BELIEVE IN SANTA CLAUS 365 DAYS A YEAR

Did you have a great holiday time? Father Christmas was busy distributing gifts to everyone during the night of December 25. If you have been wise, I hope you were able to get what you wanted. By cons in business, being wise is good but it is not enough to receive a gift. An entrepreneur must quickly realize that in business, there is no gift because he is the Santa Claus of his business. You have to be ready to roll up your sleeves and work the other 364 days of the year to do what you have to do as an entrepreneur to market your business, products and services. To harvest, one must have plowed the market and sowed enough.

4) IS THIS A BIRD? AN AIRPLANE?… .NO IT'S SUPERMAN!

I am a big fan of superheroes (Superman, Batman, Spiderman…) and despite all their superhuman skills or powers, even they understood that they cannot do everything and are more effective by working together than alone (as in X- Men or in The Avengers) ... then why do some entrepreneurs persist in continuing to want to do everything themselves? An urban legend says that it would be cheaper to do it yourself, is it true? To answer, multiply your hourly rate by the number of hours you consider necessary to become competent in accounting + corporate law + marketing + business strategy + IT + social networks + communication = $$.

Investing your time developing your business and looking for a new contract will always be more profitable than trying to save money by wanting to do it all yourself. You have to know how to surround yourself and understand that specialists are there for us and can do it much faster and better than we do. You are an entrepreneur, not "Superman"!

5) DO NOT TRACK ITS EVOLUTION

At the start of the year, among the New Year's resolutions, many decided to get back in shape and lose a few pounds. How to follow our evolution? The easiest way is often to track your weight on a scale every week. Have you weighed your business on a scale to see where you are? You progress or regress ... in both cases, you have to know it to implement the right actions. Continue what works well and stop what doesn't. But if we do not take the time to do this monitoring periodically, often we do exactly the opposite so we stop what works and continue what does not pay because we are based on a perception and not on facts to measure.

It is crucial to follow its evolution, its successes, its progress, its failures and what can be improved. It is one of the best simple and effective ways to be able to improve yourself and to strengthen the base of your business.