The 5 Must-Have Skills to Succeed as a Female Entrepreneur and Where to Learn Them

If you’re a female entrepreneur, you already know that personal development is a foundation of your success. Learning and honing skills is a must. It’s an ongoing journey that never ends, a journey that’s challenging and fun. Because when you grow, your business grows.

As your business scales, the specific skills you need will evolve. However, the must-have skills that you’ll need to keep improving fall into these five areas.

1. Leadership skills

When you’re a solopreneur, those skills are all about you first. And that’s perfect because, as leaders, we lead by example. Starting with self-leadership is key to launch a business off the ground, grow it, and get ready for leading a team.

So what are the very first leadership skills you should be working on?

Self-awareness – This is the first step to any growth. Once you know where to improve, then you can be strategic with what details on you learn and when. Know what’s preventing you from growing your business and double down on learning the skills that’ll help you move the needle.

Decisiveness and ability to take a calculated risk – fear is present in the entrepreneurial daily roller coaster. Whether it’s a fear of failure, fear of success, or imposter syndrome, all negative thoughts stop you from taking steps towards your goals. They’re pushing you to self-sabotage and make decisions that aren’t in your business’ best interest. A key to a successful business is learning how to make decisions and take risks. It allows you to stick with them, implement them and, in turn, see the results.

Communication skills – e-mails, newsletters, lives, webinars, any conversations, including sales, and networking: all of these require listening and clear communication. Without communication skills, you won’t be able to market, sell, or retain your customers. And what business can survive without that?

2. Strategy

Strategy is starting with an end in mind and picking a road that will lead you to your goals. It’s knowing how you stand out from the crowd and why your customers would want to buy for you (not your competition).

Strategy is understanding your industry, market trends, and risks, which allows you to take a detour on that road if the bumps are coming. It’s also being able to stick to the plan and keep driving even if there’re traffic jams, and the trip takes longer than expected.

3. Marketing & Sales

No business survives without these siblings. As a solo entrepreneur, marketing and sales activities must be part of your daily tasks. Honing these skills will serve you for long years to come. And yet I see a lot of women who avoid them or want to delegate the core of their business to others. My advice: before you delegate, learn them first yourself.

So what exactly falls into these skills?

In the online world, copywriting is the central part of marketing. Whether it’s your website, e-mail marketing, or social media, without a basic understanding of how to create content that attracts and engages your ideal client, your business will be invisible. If you have a fantastic offering that can help a lot of people, you have to make sure they can find you.

Next is social media. Understanding how to leverage social media, build your audience strategically, and market your business will allow you to scale exponentially.

Now let’s talk about sales.

And I’m not talking here sleazy or pushy ninja-sales tactics. I’m talking real human to human conversations where you listen to your ideal client and can clearly articulate how exactly you can help them. Sales are about being able to convey to your potential customers how you can help them succeed.

4. Technology

In the 21st century online world, no entrepreneur can survive without some technology skills. The great thing is that all the apps out there are getting easier and easier to use. Once you learn a couple, the subsequent ones are not that scary anymore. Yes, you can outsource a lot and have others do things for you, but as the CEO of your business, you need to understand its mechanics. And the best way is by doing some things alone, especially in the beginning.

5. Time Management

Being proactive, disciplined with your time, and highly-effective within that time are all “secret” habits of extremely successful people. These people understand that we all have 24/7/365, and what we do with that time is what matters. How you invest your time (rather than spend it) has a tremendous impact on our business and quality of life.

Creating time for what’s essential and what moves the needle in all crucial areas of your life is not as much of a secret as it is an art. When you master it, nothing can stop you from achieving your dreams.

Now that you know where your focus and attention should go in self-development, you’re probably wondering how and where you can learn all this. Well, I have a place for you to start, and it’s FREE!

That place is my free Facebook community: Women Entrepreneurs with Passion 4 Life.

I created it to empower women like yourself to become authentic leaders growing wildly successful businesses. What do we do there?

Every week we have free training to develop & grow any of the above skills (and even more!). The best part – all past training sessions are not lost. They’re available in the Announcements section of the group for you to benefit from.
We have Monday Motivational videos to set you up for success every week!
And weekly, I go Live to offer free business coaching and answer any questions you have.