If you’ve come this far, great. Well done!
You’ve selected your niche.
You’ve done all the study, attended clinical courses, even treated a few patients within your current clinical setting. All this was relatively easy and familiar and unthreatening. You’ve even played around with business plans, website designs and logos.
Now its time to assemble a business and monetise all this knowledge, effort and time. Its time for the rubber to hit the road.
It is at this point that some of you will get cold feet. Because, suddenly, its time to get real. The rest of the world can pass judgement on your project. And you’re scared. And afraid to be embarrassed in public. And you don’t like not being in control. Because you are used to being in control.
This is the point where you may fail to launch. You may be tempted to delay. You’re not ready. There is more studying to do. This another course to do before you’ll be ready. Maybe an update or tweak to your business plan. And numerous other reasons as to why you should delay and not get started.
Dont. Please don’t not get started. Don’t delay, procrastinate or allow yourself to get distracted.
Here’s the point. You must know that you’ll never be completely ready. The traffic lights will never be all green before you start your journey. So, you need to go. This is where the rubber meets the road, where it’s time to take action. So do it. Just do it.
Of course, things will not be perfect. Of course, there are improvements to make. There will be numerous course corrections, most of which you can’t possibly predict at this stage.
We, as doctors, like to be in complete control. But, this is business. Things are fluid, and things will change. Often, for the better, and in ways that you could not possibly predict.
Remember, as a medical student, when you had to go onto the wards to meet patients for the first time? You had to leave the comfortable world that you were confident in, that involved studying from books, and go and meet real patients in a real ward. Who remembers how scary that was?
Remember how scary your first day as an intern or house doctor was? When you no longer were a medical student, but a real doctor, whom patients and nurses looked to for leadership and advice and expertise. Who remembers how scary that was?
Well, you surmounted those obstacles. You did not fail to launch at that stage.
So, don’t fail to launch now.
Take a deep breath and get started.
