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Entrepreneurial lessons I got from sailing in a real storm

Hey there! My name is Tiago and I am the host of Wannabe Entrepreneur. If you are a listener of the show you probably know that I have a huge passion for sailing. Two years ago I faced my first storm and I have learned a couple of lessons that can actually be applied in other aspects of life including entrepreneurship.

How did this happened?

In the summer of 2020 we decided to rent a 10m sailing boat in Croatia for my first experience as a skipper. I have been sailing smaller boats since my teenage years but it was my first time as a captain in a bigger boat. We planned 4 days of sailing in the beautiful and calm Mediterranean sea but we were not very lucky with the weather.

Lesson 1

There are things beyond your control

As when building a company there are many factors you can not control like shifts in the market, financial crisis, competition, etc... The same applies to the weather... We were unlucky enough to have booked the 4 days when the Bora, a typical Croatian storm was hitting the country. With winds blowing more than 30 knots...

Lesson 2

Focus in what you can control

There was no point in complaining about our bad luck since this would not blow the storm away. Instead we focused in what we could actually control. For that we checked regularly the weather predictions and adjusted our sailing plans accordingly avoiding the times of the day with nastier forecast...

As I am building my remote coworking space business there are plenty of things I can not control like for example: members dropping out, possible internal arguments or copycat products. I can only take as many information I can and try to implement measures that attenuate this less optimal situations. Some of these measure can be: collecting feedback from the users and improve upon it or making sure there is a positive and inspiring vide in the space.

Lesson 3

Prepare for the worst and hope for the best

In one of the days the storm came earlier than what was predicted and we saw ourselves in the middle of it. The thing is that once the wind starts blowing things start happening faster, louder and with much more force. It's important to have all the ropes organized and the crew ready with life jackets and proper footwear before the storm hits because once it does all this small actions can take much more time.

In the same way you should ask yourself what can go wrong in your business... Before I do and interview for example I try to prepare myself by: testing the equipment, making sure the internet is good and that there is a potential back up like using the phone's data, reducing the echo of the room, etc... Having already all this in mind and planned helps the whole process to go smoother.

Lesson 4

Learn from the mistakes

After we have safely reached the marina we were all pretty tired. As a new captain I asked myself what we could have done better and believe there were many things to improve... I discussed it with the crew and with other sailors and now I feel much more prepared for a storm.

Things will eventually go wrong as you are learning but it is crucial to avoid the temptation of pointing fingers and try to prepare yourself better than last time.

In a company for example if a junior engineer commits a crucial mistake like deleting a database many managers would heavily blame the new developer and possibly even fire them. However, that is completely the wrong approach... The right questions they should be asking their team is how do we avoid this from happening again?

Conclusion

I love sailing and will always find an excuse to speak about it... XD Also one year after this first sailing experience I returned to croatia to do another sailing trip and this time I actually recorded daily podcast episodes from the boat about the experience.. Make sure to listen to them if you like this kind of content.

Cheers

  1. 2

    It's a beautiful list of lessons, matches the startup journey exactly 🔥

    1. 2

      thanks Dago. I am sure that you also have tons of lessons. When is the book coming out?

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