Owning and running your own business is a rewarding profession, but entrepreneurial success doesn’t come without its obstacles along the way. In the ultra-competitive and ever-growing world of business, facing and overcoming challenges is a common part of everyday life for up-and-coming entrepreneurs. 

4 Common Obstacles for Entrepreneurs and How to Overcome Them

Twill recently interviewed a group of successful entrepreneurs who shared their business success stories, including the obstacles they faced to get to where they are today. We’ve identified 4 common obstacles faced by our successful entrepreneurs, and their first-hand advice about how best to overcome these. 

1. Creating a team culture 

Nowadays, creating a good team culture is so important to attract and retain the best talent. Building relationships with your colleagues is crucial to developing an environment where you and your people can thrive. 

Alessandro, owner of pasta delivery service Pasta Evangelists found that building a team culture was challenging, particularly with ‘large swathes of new people joining the business in a global pandemic’ and the ‘lack of face-to-face interaction’. 

With restrictions imposed from lockdowns and the rising popularity of working remotely, many up-and-coming entrepreneurs find themselves working with people across the country and thus navigating a team culture solely virtually. 

Alessandro’s advice is to keep at it, be ‘proactive’ and try to ‘get your team involved’ as much as possible, whatever this looks like for your business. 

2. Balancing other priorities

Owning and running your own business is a huge commitment and will take up a lot of your time, but this doesn’t mean your other priorities suddenly drop away. Nadia, owner of haircare brand Nu Elefa Naturals, finds that juggling your business with other priorities is an ongoing challenge. For Nadia, this was ‘balancing studying towards (her) degree and running a business simultaneously’.

When you’re facing balancing your business with other priorities, Nadia recommends ‘creat(ing) a schedule by dedicating certain hours to different responsibilities’, as well as remembering to ‘factor in downtime’ for a much-needed rest.

3. Learning your specialism 

When it comes to running your own business, an important thing to remember is that no one becomes an expert overnight. When you’re first starting out, knowing how to do and manage everything is impossible and as Lucie recalls, ‘there’s always something that comes up that you don’t know the answer to’. 

Owner of sustainable activewear company EYO Active, Lucie advises that this is ‘all part of the journey’ and ‘you can’t be put off by what challenges you’re going to face’. She emphasises the importance of not putting too much expectation on yourself and persevering. 

4. Establishing a Supply Chain

If your business involves shipping goods, getting to grips with logistics, transportation and setting up an effective supply chain can be a daunting prospect. 

Natasha & Jack are owners of lockdown-launched cocktail company, lockdown liquor. They told us one of their biggest obstacles was ‘getting materials and establishing a strong supply chain’. Jack tells us how they overcame this challenge by focusing on ‘using as much local produce and as many local suppliers as possible’ and their next step is to consider bringing freight shipping services into the mix. 

There are expert shipping and logistics providers, such as Twill, designed especially to help small businesses grow. These logistics companies can provide trusted expertise and guidance aiming to help SMEs establish an effective supply chain to grow internationally. 

Don’t let challenges get in the way, learn from them 

All our successful entrepreneurs admitted that facing obstacles in business is inevitable, but emphasised the importance of adapting, overcoming and learning from these challenges.

Challenges can highlight the parts of your business strategy and operation that might need some extra work, so it’s important to view them as a learning curve that helps you become a more experienced entrepreneur.