I spent 5 years working in other people's businesses before I started my own, in the same industry, doing (almost) the same thing. It goes without saying that everything I learned along the way became invaluable knowledge that went into my own business.
That being said, the notion that I knew what I was doing lasted all of about 1 day, or maybe less. I knew what I wanted to do, but the truth is I had no idea what I was doing.
If someone had told me I'd be responsible for directing 7 different freight containers across the ocean to 3 different continents, and that that was just one of many obscure and complex processes I'd have to get dialed in order to ensure the success of my business, I'd most definitely have freaked out at the thought of it and called it quits.
There's just no way I could have ever imagined myself doing that. But luckily, I didn't just wake up one day with 1000's of scooters sitting in China ready to hit the open seas. It was a gradual build-up. The first shipment I handled myself was for a single scooter handlebar to a single person. I packaged it up and took it to the post office. The next step up was a wholesale order for a few handlebars to a scooter shop in another state - same method. Next up was a batch of scooter forks I had made by a factory in China. Fedex door-to-door got the job done, and it was mainly organized by the factory. Each time, the orders got a little bigger, the shipments became more complex as they went from a couple boxes being airfreighted to a couple pallets in an LCL (less than container load where your goods share a container with strangers) to eventually being multiple 40-foot long containers filled with scooters and parts.
I just kept chipping away at it, piece by piece. The demand for my product forced me to learn things I never thought I could or would, for that matter. If I couldn't get the goods to the customer, I didn't get the sale. The things I learned and the way I learned them, there is just no possible way I could have been taught them in advance. There's no way I would have known that's what I was going to need to know.
When there's life-changing money staring at you, all of a sudden you'll be a lot more open to learning exactly how many cubic meters fill a 20-footer vs. a 40-footer and what the f#ck a Telex Release is. Releasing your Telex too early means the receiver can claim the goods even if they haven't paid for them, so yeah, this shit's important.
I learned just as much about sales, marketing, e-commerce, 3D design software, graphic design software, and cameras as I did about logistics. I learned what I needed to as I needed to, directed purely by whatever thing I didn't know how to do that stood in the way of me and my business succeeding.
We often stop ourselves from starting by focusing on what we don't know how to do. We've all heard the saying, "Done is better than perfect, because perfect is never done." But what about this one: "Starting is better than ready, because you'll never be ready.”
You don't need to get ready; you need to get going. Settle on a name, make the logo, get the most minimal version of your product ready and release it. Everything else comes after that. And when it does, just take it piece by piece.
Keen for more Freedom Frameworks? Check out: 35mm Of Freedom, The Fairway to Freedom, Fortune Favours Freedom, Unfollowing Freedom, Don't Stop Yourself From Starting and more.
What makes me qualified to speak on these topics? Check out My Story or view my Proof of Work.