Do You Have What It Takes To Start A Business?

How do you figure out if you have what it takes to be an entrepreneur?

"The first thing you need to consider is whether you have a passion for whatever product or service you sell," said Colleen DeBaise, a financial writer for the Wall St. Journal and the author of " The Wall Street Journal Complete Small Business Guidebook."

" The start-up phase is stressful; it's tough," continued DeBaise, " It's going to be hard to get through it, so you have to have that passion. It will drive you.

" You also have to be good at decision-making," she said. " No one is going to be making decisions for you. You have so much to figure out: whether you're going to rent office space, whether you're going to be hiring employees, whether you're going to sell to the masses or whether you're just going to sell to high end clients."

All these things you're going to ask yourself and you have to make these decisions yourself.

" Also," said DeBaise, " You have to be good at many things. You have to juggle a lot of roles as a business owner.

One of the toughest roles for people starting a business, is they don't know anything about finances.

" They might be extremely creative. They might be someone who can be a fashion designer, who can design wonderful dresses, but they don't know a thing about accounting."

DeBaise said they have to get that knowledge.

" So if you're a person who wants to start a business you have to make sure if you can't do this, if you can't beef up your own skills, you need to hire people who can help you.

" Also, owning a business is not for the risk adverse," said DeBaise.

One of her clients explained it this way, " You have to jump off a cliff and figure out how to fly on the way down."

"That's something that people who are used to working for corporations might not have; that risk tolerance. You really have to ask yourself if you're ready to handle that."

Money is another big issue.

" You have to be able to figure out how much money you'll need to start your business. Entrepreneurs chronically underestimate how much money they'll need to start a business and that's why so many small businesses fail in the first couple years. It's because the entrepreneur hasn't figured out how much they'll need to get started and how much they'll need for an operating budget."

For more information, go to www.wsj.com.