I started our company 21 years ago (yesterday). Countless people have told me over the years that they also have this dream of starting their own business; a ‘hand grenade’ of an idea sitting in their hearts and/or heads. Often the idea lingers for decades until some event, trivial or otherwise, jump starts germination in the fertile earth of their imaginations.

I use the term ‘hand grenade of an idea’ deliberately. Such ideas can be explosive, with blatant disregard for the impact it has on all those involved. Pulling the pin is easy. The hard work starts in addressing the many challenges ahead of you when you do.

Over the years I have seen great ideas fail and impossible ideas succeed. I have come to believe that success is impossible to predict, at best it is predicated by good luck and hard work. There is little we can do about luck beyond buying a rabbit’s foot (an appendage that was clearly not lucky for the rabbit) or finding a four-leaf clover. If good fortune looks like anything then I suspect it looks like hard work coupled with sensible decisions. Success does not reflect your genius.

Here are some tips that might help you be lucky:

1. Know your limitations

In the words of Clint Eastwood’s character, Harry Callahan, in the film Magnum Force “A man's got to know his limitations”. Effectively, you can’t know and/or do everything. In the early days of your business you might try to save money by preparing invoices and updating the books yourself (each night) but be careful not to get overrun. Identify your limitations. Some of these skills may be natural to you, but for some tasks need deeper understanding that can only be obtained from seasoned business professionals. Areas where you might need to invest resources are:

• Manufacturing processes
• Sales and marketing
• Business management and administration
• Information technology infrastructure
• Human resources/personnel
• Financial management
• Legal, patents, contracts, etc.

2. Look after the money

In the end, money defines success: by definition a business is an organization where goods and services are exchanged for money. The consequences of failure to balance the books is epitomised by Charles Dickens’ Mr Micawber when providing his oft-quoted recipe for happiness: "Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen [pounds] nineteen [shillings] and six [pence], result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result misery." These words are just as true today as they were in 1850.

Start your business with as much money as you can – decide what you are willing to lose if it all goes wrong and what you are going to need to survive while you business finds its feet. There are various forms of investment open to you to get your venture off the ground – ranging from your own savings, credit card or bank loans to private investors and/or venture capital companies. Think carefully about your options. Funding your enterprise through your own pocket can be tough whereas loans are risky and expensive and investment requires you to trade away ownership and control – possibly the one reason you wanted to go into business in the first place.

3. Resist the pin……for as long as you can

Money will start leaking out of your company as soon as you pull that pin. Any pre-work that shortens time to getting your first pay cheque will serve in your favour. Planning costs you nothing – and you can do plenty of preparation before making any sort of commitment. Service in the army taught me many things and I am proud to say that the old management favourite – proper planning and preparation prevent poor performance (6P’s) – originated in the British army. Plan for every eventuality! You don’t want to be asking silly questions when the shooting starts.

Writing a formal Business Plan, however rough and ready, will help. You will be required to have a plan if you want to secure outside funding. Why should you show less care and consideration for your own money than others might expect you to do for theirs? Writing a plan can be daunting. I felt like I was creating a work of fiction the first time I tried. Even if you are fully aware of coming challenges and opportunities, there is no substitute for conducting thorough research to help you build a realistic and credible model.

4. Believe in yourself

There is no returning once you have pulled the pin. From then on it is all about commitment. No one will be there to hold your hand. You can’t let self-doubt undermine your drive and determination. Remember good luck emerges from hard work. I found that adopting a pragmatic approach to self-belief helps. My mantra under trying circumstances has been to maintain a sense of humour and remain optimistic, unless a comprehensive analysis of the valuable evidence could lead me to believe in an alternative reality.

5. Be clear about what you are selling

You need clients and they need to know what they are buying. What will that be? Consider starting your ventures solving a problem common to your industry. It’s a lot easier to gain a solid customer base when your business focuses on fixing a problem. Alternatively, fill a hole or service a niche. Develop and clearly define your unique selling proposition – what makes you different from everyone else. Sometimes it's your product, sometimes the service and sometimes the people; perhaps a combination of three. Whatever it is, make your position clear and compelling.

Keep things simple and don’t let your enthusiasm for a perfect solution snowball into something over-complicated. You could end up with an expensive and elaborate product that nobody wants or needs. Keep ‘features’ to a minimum. As a new (small) business, you don’t need to provide all the bells and whistles of a giant corporation. It will be easier for potential clients to understand what you are trying to them. You can add features to your widgets as the business grows.

6. Prepare for a journey

Opening your own business is usually a learn-as-you-go process. Unless you have substantial start-up capital you will need to build your business in stages, transitioning from employee to owner as you go. Listen to what others have to say – friends, family and anyone with experience in your industry, be a sponge. Write things down. Keep notes and continually develop your plan, treating it as a living document. Successful businesses adapt to changes in the market. Be prepared to alter direction and to profit from any intelligence you pick up, coupling it with responsive navigation.

In the end, a company is a legal entity in its own right and it exists only to serve its stakeholders. It may start out as your baby but, as a rule of thumb, it will outgrow you. It often takes three CEOs to take a company to floatation – one to start it, one to develop it into a thriving business, and one to float or sell it – all different skills. Boards and executives will come and go and companies change over time as they adapt to markets. Your role quickly becomes one of service to the company once you have breathed life into it. You are not its messiah or father figure – your value is only what you continue to deliver. Keep up or get out.

7. Listen to your heart (or at least your gut)

…but only follow its advice if it stands up to thorough investigation and repeated testing. You might feel that this is a somewhat glib. When I started Niche I was relatively fresh from academia; where success tends to depend on an eye for detail and looking at problems from every conceivable angle. You have the luxury of being able to hold off moving until you believe you have fully assessed a problem. Businesses are different – the ecosystems involved are complex, and often resistant to testing or research with anything like the same degree of certainty. On occasion you must act quickly based on gut instinct alone. Make good decisions quickly if you want to be lucky.

8. Passion

One of the most important ingredients of a successful business is passion. Passion will drive you to consistently improve your processes and products so that your business grows. That said, don’t let passion take over all your decisions. Passion will move you forward, but knowledge will point you in the right direction. As your business starts to come together, think of it like driving a car. Let your passion manage the accelerator, your mind control the steering wheel and your Business Plan serve as the satnav. That way, you can focus on the road conditions, confident about the direction you’re heading and sustaining the momentum you need to get there.

9. Sell, sell, sell

Peace of mind comes from achieving a balance of points 1 through 8, extensive market research, a realistic business model and, above all, the application of good all-around business sense. But you are nothing without sales. Sales spell success.

As a new business owner, you will need to market and network constantly, confident in your ability to communicate using every available medium. Having the best product or service does not guarantee success. This is generally true of all businesses. Rarely is a product sufficiently unique and/or desirable to get instant recognition and open a ready market for sales. However great your product, your business will fail if no one knows about it.

Few business owners evolve from employee to competent and successful salesperson overnight (unless you were in sales beforehand). The challenge many start-up owners face is that they don’t know how to sell. It can be intimidating to share your business with the world, especially when you’re new at it. Be ready to boast confidently about your business, even if it makes you a little uncomfortable.

10. Follow your dream

…..in a rigorously logical and meticulously detailed manner within clearly defined parameters. Let these dreams keep your fires burning. Fear of failure often pops up in discussions I have with people thinking about starting their own business. Quite rightly. They generally worry about whether they will be successful – in some that translates as a fear of not earning enough to feed themselves and in others whether they will be able to maintain their current lifestyle. In the words of the internationally renowned author Susan Jeffers (in her 1987 book) “Feel the fear and do it anyway”.

In conclusion, starting a business can be tricky. It can also be rewarding. Once bitten by the bug it gets under your skin. You won’t have any peace until you go for it. Nothing beats the handshake that closes a sale, or the unsolicited testimonial telling you that what you produced helped someone. You'll meet lots of people you would never have met before and probably go to places (nice and not so nice) that you would not otherwise have visited. In the early days, remind yourself continuously that most companies fail: indeed, most venture capitalists will tell you that most business ideas can (and should) be rejected before they ever reach the planning stage. If you’re a belt-and-braces sort of guy (like myself) then it’s a good idea to come up with a Plan B. You might need to get a job on-the-fly or downsize your living arrangements (temporarily). When I started Niche I lived in a squat for the first 12 months and kept hopefully the money coming in by upgrading computers. Figure out how you will cope if your plans go south. Eventually you will earn the opportunity to take pride in having created something tangible that people value (they paid money for it after all).

One final consideration is to make sure that you look after yourself. Starting a business can be intensive and take a toll on your health. Look after number one. As the principal and possibly only member of the company, a period of ill-health could have a significant impact on the survival of your company.