Haider Al-Mosawi

Let's face it, starting your own business is both intimidating and challenging. There are lots of moving parts to any business: You have to understand your customers, their problems, and their needs.

You have to understand the business financial equation of keeping costs low and increasing revenue. You need to work on branding, marketing, and selling. Need help getting your work done? Where do you find talented men and women to join your team? And how do you ensure they perform at their best? You may soon discover that leading a team is a lot more challenging than juggling tasks on your own.

Need capital to get started? Well, where do you find investors and how do you approach them? With traditional businesses, you can look at companies doing similar things and conduct a feasibility study on the potential of your business idea. But with a startup, it's likely that no other company is doing what you're doing, so there's no real benchmark to compare yourself against and no data to do a study on. Add to that the internal conflicts and doubts you'll inevitably face as an entrepreneur, which may be the biggest hurdles you'll come across. And we didn't even get started on all the bureaucratic paperwork you need to get sorted to be a registered business, which can leave you scratching your head on good days and pulling your hair out on bad ones.

Yes, starting a business can be challenging, but the rewards are often worth the effort and sacrifices. You will regret the dreams you didn't pursue more than the mistakes that you made, so it's worth overcoming the initial sense of intimidation and getting started, because it's not going to get any easier.

The Founder Institute Program... Coming To Kuwait

If you feel like you need a helping hand guiding you through the entire process of starting, establishing, and growing your business, then perhaps the Founder Institute Program is what you're looking for. The Founder Institute is a Silicon Valley-based company seeking to promote entrepreneurship throughout the globe. It does this by offering a 14-week program (with only 1 evening session a week, plus simple assignments) that covers the full spectrum of everything you need to cover to establish your own company, and it does so through local mentors who understand the unique struggles entrepreneurs will face in the cities they want to grow from.

The Founder Institute has launched in over 100 cities, with some impressive stats to boast about: 86% of Founder Institute participants register their businesses, 70 percent ahead of their plan, and 45 percent get funded.

The Founder Institute has helped 1,500 companies get established, with several notable graduates, including Udemy, the online educational giant.

The Benefits of Joining the FI Program

Many startups begin with a burst of energy and enthusiasm, only to fizzle out a few short months later. That's because maintaining momentum is crucial to the success of any startup. Without momentum you may have a blueprint, but no building (or worse: a building that's abandoned half way through construction. Think of the wasted time, effort, and resources).

A comprehensive program like the Founder Institute's program helps increase the likelihood of seeing your business through from A to Z, without dropping out when you face a hurdle.

The Program is also designed so that it's part-time, allowing you to pursue your dream of starting your own business without taking a huge risk. As part of the application process you will also take an entrepreneurship test to determine whether starting your own business is the right match for you, so you can feel confident in your decision to continue with the registration or not.

Being part of a global network of entrepreneurs will help you build both local and international connections, which can greatly enhance your chances for business success.

Upcoming Founder Institute Events

To learn more about the Founder Institute program, and to get a feel of what the training sessions will be like, you can attend any of the upcoming Founder Institute events (at Sirdab Lab, Dasman Complex):

July 20: Startup Funding 101: How To Raise Capital For Your Idea (Register at:http://FI.co/e/93621)

July 27: Making The Leap From Employee To Entrepreneur (Register at: http://FI.co/e/93611)

You can directly apply to the upcoming program (scheduled to launch in late September/early October) on: fi.co/join

*Haider Al-Mosawi is a cofounder of startup hub Sirdab Lab, and user experience design firm Catalyze Co. Want help with your startup? Email him at: [email protected]

By Haider Al-Mosawi