027: Jeff Dorman – If You Act On Every Opportunity

“When running a small business, you are in a constant battle against time and resources. If you act on every opportunity thrown your way, you will waste your time and everyone’s around you. If you dismiss everything because you don’t have time, you will leave opportunities on the table that can help your business. Every business opportunity has a time for action. Being a good leader means finding the right time to act on certain situations, and monitoring others until the time is right.” – Jeff Dorman

This was drawn by Nizar86. Check out his other work too!

Jeff Dorman is a financial trader turned start-up founder. This quote is taken from one of his articles. I recommend reading the article, its about the skills he learnt as a trader and how he applied them into his start-up. As a part time financial trader myself (who also runs this website), I find his article to be particularly informative.

The lesson in this comic is something I wish I had learnt when I was much younger. As a philomath (or a philomath wannabe), I would always delve into and try to learn many things. I was trying to explore every idea. This habit moved on till when I started exploring business ideas. I would brainstorm some new and crazy business ideas in my head, make simple plans for them, but end up not pursuing any of them. I ended up getting nowhere by trying to go in all directions at once.

I also see this problem is other companies. Even mom and pop stores can suffer the same fate. For example, I live near this neighborhood ‘sundry’ goods stall. It has every miscellaneous item from children’s toys, to cigarettes, to photocopying services. I’m not sure what target market this shop was serving, but it definitely hasn’t grown much for the last 10 years or so.

I am wiser now and won’t try to do everything. I pick my business opportunities more carefully now. I hope you do too. Let me know your business opportunity stories in the comments.