What skills will you need?  

You may think it takes a certain 'type' of person to run a business. A person with certain strengths, skills and characteristics. Well you'd be wrong. Businesses are run successfully by many different sorts of people, who have loads of skills and abilities.

There are however some skills and attitudes that are commonly displayed by business owners and are summed up by ACRO - Attitude, Creativity, Relationships and Organisation.

The information below explains each of the 4 dimensions and gives a case study helping you understand what it means in action.

1. Attitude - read Marie Griffiths's experience
2. Creativity - read how Sue Wyn-Jones solved her financial problem
3. Relationships - read how Annette Chinn strengthened her relationships with colleagues
4. Organisation - read about Dynamix's excellent organisational skills

1. Attitude

The right attitude is the number one priority if you're going to achieve your goals. A proactive outlook is the essential quality that drives people to do something different and gives them the resilience to overcome the inevitable hurdles along the way.

Encouraging a positive "can-do" attitude is a crucial dimension of entrepreneurial behaviour. Self-knowledge, heightening self-awareness and self-esteem are essential if you're going to have the confidence to take the initiative in life.

Focusing your mind on your ambitions and being able to plan effectively will turn these aspirations into achievements.

We all need goals. Without them we can tend to lose motivation and purpose. With them, we achieve more and boost our self-confidence.

Demonstrating the will to win - Slimtone

Marie Griffiths is typical of many hundreds of proactive people in Wales whose positive attitude for life has enabled her to succeed in everything she puts her mind to.

Marie was a successful office manager for a construction company for many years.

Her positive outlook and manner enabled her to achieve her ambition, whilst she was working for someone else.

Her determination to lose some weight even sparked an idea that allowed her to launch Wales' most successful weight-loss business, Slimtone.

She tailored the business around the needs of busy career women like herself and began delivering slimming and healthy eating advice via the internet. The business became a real success after Marie's "can-do" spirit landed her a 4-page spread with a National paper that led to a flood of enquires about Marie's recipe for success.

She began to understand her own attitude and realised how much she enjoyed being in control of her life. Marie has learned to have faith in herself and even trained herself to use rejection as a spur to greater enthusiasm.

"I set myself targets, like a long distance runner, with milestones to achieve and pass. I learnt to stand on my own two feet, refused to accept closed doors and used rejection to fuel my enthusiasm – no matter what".

Marie is a firm believer that the right attitude will help you achieve your goals.

"If you're reaching for the stars – they're within your grasp. There will be good days and bad days but the only failures in life are the ones who don't try. Have faith in yourself – 100% self-belief."

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2. Creativity

You don't have to be a mastermind to be creative. For every situation you may encounter, every problem that comes your way, you will naturally generate ideas to solve problems and identify new opportunities.

It is a popular myth that some people are born creative. There is a view that there are creative personalities such as Mozart and then, of course, the rest of us. We all have the potential to be creative.

Creativity is all about the ability to generate ideas and put them to good use through problem solving, spotting and creating opportunities.

Whilst many people are structured thinkers – logically working through problems in stages – some times it's useful to think laterally and 'out of the box'.

Lateral thinking is fun, it's a way to escape from tried and tested ideas, coming up with the most ridiculous ideas, turning things upside down, opening up possibilities – then thinking them through with a sense of realism and testing if they can really work.

Whatever you choose to do, thinking creatively is a life skill, whether it is managing your money or solving a problem, it's about generating ideas and innovative solutions to solve both simple and complex problems.

Growing a new solution - Crûg Farm Plants

Former beef farmers Bleddyn and Sue Wyn-Jones from Caernarfon applied a classic piece of lateral thinking to a major financial problem, and the creative solution which emerged has transformed their lives.

In the wake of the BSE crisis the couple found themselves struggling in vain to make a living from a 200-acre beef farm. They knew something had to change.

Brainstorming the options, the pair realised that their shared interest in exotic plants and a passion for foreign travel offered a radical but viable answer to their predicament.

Over the past decade Bleddyn and Sue have moved out of their loss-making beef business into a new and profitable venture – Crûg Farm Plants – which nurtures and sells rare plants from around the world.

The successful enterprise gives them the opportunity to travel through remote regions abroad – mainly in Asia – for three months of the year, sourcing new specimens to cultivate at Crûg Farm.

Although the business can demand long hours and hard work, Bleddyn and Sue are thrilled with their change of direction which now gives them flexibility and freedom as well as a much improved financial situation.

"We feel so much more confident and satisfied than before. I'd hate to think of the mess we'd be in if we were still farming. Instead we have the fulfilment of running a fascinating business which is all ours."

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3. Relationships

There are very few jobs around these days in which you don't need to get on with people.

The individuals most likely to succeed are the ones best able to manage the many relationships they will experience, whether with colleagues, customers or friends.

Interacting well with people is a major asset requiring a whole range of skills. It's not dependent on natural instincts or an outgoing nature.

The success of establishing good relationships is all about understanding yourself and how you relate to others. It's also about reaching a satisfactory conclusion for everybody through collaboration and compromise.

Relationships with other people are often very instinctive but there are practical steps you can take to ensure you develop effective relationships. It's all about using your interpersonal skills and effectively sharing information with others by listening, negotiating and sometimes persuading people.

People are complicated. Learning to build better relationships with everyone you will deal with is a vital investment in your personal success.

It's a people thing - Taskforce

Annette Chinn's business is all about people. Groups come in their droves to her "Taskforce" outdoor pursuits centre in the Vale of Glamorgan to enjoy themselves and build stronger relationships with friends and colleagues.

The welcome and support they receive from Annette's 25-strong staff is critical to the success of these visits and to the prosperity of the enterprise.

She established Taskforce as a paintball centre in 1989 after deciding to turn her own passion for the sport into a business venture.

Her attention to detail and strong sense of customer care made the operation increasingly successful as the years went by. On average 250 people visit each weekend, including many parties from big blue-chip companies.

Such was her positive relationship with her customers that the business managed to retain its client base despite the Foot and Mouth Disease outbreak which severely restricted access to the area.

More recently Annette has diversified the business in order to offer clients a wider range of activities such as clay pigeon shooting, archery, fly fishing and falconry.

She has invested heavily in the skills of her staff so they can deliver this more varied product effectively. The business has continued to grow as a result.

"Our success to date relies on the knowledge, skills and attitude of our people. We've trained our staff to focus on communication and relationships in order to develop value, profitability and growth."

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4. Organisation

Organisation is all about understanding how to manage situations and tasks, it's about planning for what you want to achieve, considering the resources available and decisions to make.

Day-to-day life requires organisation skills. It means being able to make informed decisions, set goals, meet deadlines, research, plan, handle risk and face the many other practical demands of the world of work. Remember that managing risk is as much about taking risks in order to achieve something special, as reducing risk.

The right move - Dynamix

A company with 15 directors, who own, run and work for the business, (all the workers can choose to be directors), clearly know the value of excellent organisational skills.

Dynamix, established in 1988, is a workers co-operative providing training and facilitation, packs and publications that help people explore serious issues such as inclusion, bullying and the environment, in a fun way.

Based in Swansea, Dynamix' workers spend a great deal of time on the road, travelling all over the UK and as far afield as Italy and Finland. They promote social change and equality by running creative and empowering activities.

Dynamix's organisational skills were recently brought to the fore when a Fire Safety Officer placed a safety order on their offices, a grade two listed building. Relocating the business at a moment's notice, whilst maintaining services at the busiest time of year, certainly proved a challenge.

Utilising Dynamix' well developed organisational skills, the 'crisis' was transformed into an opportunity to buy, rather than rent new offices. With all the workers / directors sharing responsibility for the relocation of their systems and equipment which included a library, hundreds of items of circus gear, puppets and a computer network, the company continued to fulfil its contracts to the highest of standards.

Dynamix has always had a long term vision of owning an accessible office and training space.

"If you have the right support structure, risks can be transformed into opportunities. This 'crisis' enabled us to realise our dream."

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