Leadership isn't easy. Neither is entrepreneurship. For some, the rise to financial success is a long, slow, painful process. For others, things just seem to magically fall into place.

As entrepreneurs, we all follow our own path. For some, the rise to financial success is a long, slow, painful process. For others, things just seem to magically fall into place. I believe that the latter isn’t a result of magic, however, but is the sure sign of an entrepreneur who understands the importance of learning from, adapting to and growing with their business.

1. Do what you love

There’s nothing better than doing what you love. The thing that you learn from a business perspective makes all of that self-sacrifice worth it; do what you're not passionate about, and you'll begin to resent all of the time spent apart from your loved ones.

 2. Don’t go for shortcuts

 Some business owners who want marketing advice, but then go for cheap shortcuts cause according to them the right way is “too expensive.” The truth is, cheap marketing can make your brand look cheap.

Low-quality content, cheap ads and "budget" SEO may save you money in the short term, but the damage they do to your brand’s reputation can last far longer.

Workafy comes as a savior here for the people who don’t want to hire full time employees but can choose over thousands of freelancers to get their work done. This not only saves your time and money but you also get quality work done by specialists.

3. Just do it

“Better to do something imperfectly than to do nothing perfectly”, someone rightly said. If the work done now doesn’t pay off in near future that doesn’t mean you should quit. Successful people do the work anyway because they know hard work pays off one day.

4. Don’t be overconfident

 If you're going to stay with your entrepreneurial vision for the long run, there naturally will be days when you feel like you're on top of the world. Those can be a blessing, but also a curse.

"Don't let the successful days or months make you overconfident,”. "Conversely, don't let the bad days or months make you pessimistic. Keep focused on your long-term goals and not the short-term fluctuations."

 5. Outsource as much as possible

If you don’t have in-house staff to share the workload, consider outsourcing. Many entrepreneurs find that hiring freelancers on project basis significantly reduces the time they need to spend on routine tasks, freeing them up to work on revenue-generating tasks. This not only helps in saving money but also your project comes out as quality work.

6. Know that failure is OK

It's not uncommon that entrepreneurs have an intimate relationship with failure. After all, most of the entrepreneurs fail on their first, second, and third businesses before striking it big. But many of these very entrepreneurs do not teach their teams that failure is part of startup life. Failure isn’t something that should be frowned upon in the organization. Instead, it should be a challenge for your teams to take high-risk/high-reward opportunities that have the potential to fuel growth and capacity.

7. Not all money is good

This is a lesson many entrepreneurs struggle with, early in their career. When you’re getting your business off the ground, it’s easy to fall into the trap of taking money from anyone who offers it. The problem is, not all customers or clients are worth it.

Avoid clients who take up too much of your time, who consistently have unrealistic expectations or who, you just generally dread working with. It’s just not worth it! 

8. The customer is not always right

 From day one we’re told that ‘customer’ is always right and we’re expected to please them even when they’re clearly wrong. This practice can however do serious disservice to us, our employees and customers. You can benefit your customer and make them happy but not always on expense of your dignity. Rather you should be patient and polite in explaining to them why they’re not right.

 9. Time is money

 Money, customers, and ideas: all resources you can potentially gain more of. Time, however, is the one commodity you’ll always have a finite amount of. One way to ensure you make the most of your time is to assign an hourly dollar amount to your tasks. 

10. Maintain work-life balance

Work-life balance is something many entrepreneurs struggle with,

 When you’re passionate about what you do, and when you focus on happiness (both your own and that of your employees’), work isn’t just something you do to fund your "real life." It becomes infinitely more enjoyable and meaningful, and significantly reduces your chances of experiencing burnout.