Traits of Successful Women Entrepreneurs

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Recently there was a Tweet chat hosted by Bella Naija with guest, She Leads Africa. The subject was women entrepreneurs and one of the issues treated was whether women entrepreneurs faced greater challenges than their male counterparts. We know all the many barriers; as a female entrepreneur you have a harder job convincing investors that you are serious about your business and that you won’t abandon it to raise children. Those barriers are there, but one huge barrier is the lack of support from other women.

When women begin to generously support other women with their time and resources, we will see more successful women entrepreneurs. When Nigerian women begin to generously support other Nigerian women … we see more successful Nigerian women entrepreneurs.

This is an underlying principle on which Naija Housewives was founded. It appears we are not the only ones who think that way. We read about 3 Traits of Successful Women Entrepreneurs on Huffington post and the article absolutely appealed to us.

The three traits were:

• Be generous
• Be fearless
• Be intuitive

The generousity trait captured what we are talking about. Writing from her own personal experience, Lisa Abeyta, Founder and CEO of AppCityLife Inc and co-founder of Hautepreneurs talked about how to be successful as a woman entrepreneur. She said, “If you want be successful, learn to be generous with your time, your efforts, your knowledge. This does not mean you let others take advantage of you or that you agree to so much that you’re overwhelmed and left with no time to meet your own goals; it means you give when and where you can provide value without expecting anything in return. The interactions will likely bring more value than you realize at the time.”

If you have a group of people who are willing to give you their time, expertise and experience; they are willing to listen to you and give you expert advice in your business, then you will grow at an unbelievable rate. This is even more important than getting cash.

As women, we owe it to ourselves not to see other women as being in competition with us, but to take the view that when one woman succeeds, it is a victory for all women everywhere. If you want to be successful, be generous.

Trusting your intuition is another important trait you need to cultivate; it is one that all successful women entrepreneurs have honed. Lisa Abeyta put it beautifully in her article, here’s an excerpt:

It just doesn’t feel right. Sometimes, even when it isn’t apparent what specifically is right or wrong with an opportunity, we need to trust our intuition. When we do, we often make choices that prevent future difficulties. A fellow entrepreneur was recently weighing a partnership opportunity, worried what she would miss if passed it up. Despite the upside, she expressed that something about it just didn’t feel right. Eventually, she followed her instinct and turned down the offer. Not long afterward, news broke that several legal problems were uncovered in the business she’d been considering for a partnership. Instead of a missed opportunity, she’d avoided serious consequences.

Intuition can also move us to leap quickly when we know it’s right. I founded my second company with my current cofounder by the end of our first lunch together. Her vision and values aligned with mine, and I knew in my gut that this was the right move. We formed the company within a day, and over a year later, I can still say it’s been one of the most rewarding decisions I’ve ever made. One of the best measures that I’ve learned to trust is this: when it’s wrong, it won’t feel right event when it looks good on the surface; when it’s right, there is joy even when the going gets hard.

you can read the rest of the article on Huffington post.

Success is not elusive. It is something we all can attain. TOGETHER.

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