Succeeding as a Solopreneur
Six Keys to Taking the Leap, Winning Clients, and Building Wealth
Preparing would-be entrepreneurs with a host of preparatory steps, Succeeding as a Solopreneur is an encouraging career guide.
For those looking to go into business for themselves, Liz J. Steblay’s Succeeding as a Solopreneur is a helpful guide.
About starting a business from scratch, this book outlines methods for becoming self-employed and successful without partners or employees. It acknowledges the risks, fears, uncertainty, and grind that’s required to do so, but it also touts upsides such as freedom and flexibility. Starting out, it notes, also requires an honest assessment of whether independent entrepreneurship is a lifestyle a person wants and will be comfortable with. Still, while it admits that independent entrepreneurship involves stress and challenges, its tone is motivational, and its recommendations for navigating highs and lows are encouraging.
Steblay draws on her own professional experience with launching and running a consulting firm, using this as a model for her recommendation. She writes about the common challenges that she faced in the process, including “fear of change, uncertainty about [the] situation, and doubt about [her] own abilities.” Polls and articles are included for outside reinforcement.
Streamlined to reflect six guiding principles, including being memorable and confident, the book is systematic in its approach. It follows from taking the initial leap to establishing a business and growing it, with information on a bevy of topics including websites, taxes, and relationship development. There’s actionable advice on subjects including self-promotion, building credibility, finding an in-demand niche, personal branding, and “how you present yourself, your skills and expertise, your degrees and certifications, and your work experience.”
Still, some of the book’s guidance is overly general, as with prompts to consult websites including Quora, LinkedIn, and Upwork to assess one’s potential market, and with its tips to pass out business cards and to charge what the local market will bear. It is more helpful when it is more specific, as with detailed recommendations about media content to make online profiles better branding tools, and with its knowledge on deploying tools for tracking one’s time or strategies. And it subverts some conventional wisdom, as when it suggests that the 1992 film Glengarry Glen Ross’s refrain of “Always Be Closing” should be updated to “Always Provide Value.” Its advice for avoiding demoralization, gaining momentum, and persisting is keen and peppy.
A motivational career guide, Succeeding as a Solopreneur includes knowledgeable instructions for going into business for oneself.
Reviewed by
Joseph S. Pete
Disclosure: This article is not an endorsement, but a review. The publisher of this book provided free copies of the book and paid a small fee to have their book reviewed by a professional reviewer. Foreword Reviews and Clarion Reviews make no guarantee that the publisher will receive a positive review. Foreword Magazine, Inc. is disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255.
