I was fortunate enough to be able to participate in the Invent Your Future Silicon Valley Conference this week, which focused on Achieving Influence and Impact. I moderated a session for Denise Brosseau, author of Ready to be a Thought Leader? She was terrific and the session was very interactive. I also had the pleasure of leading two roundtable sessions on Entrepreneurship titled Is Entrepreneurship Right for You? The blog today focuses on the tips we discussed at these roundtables.

I wanted to call out a few characteristics that I have seen over the years that successful entrepreneurs (no matter what the business was) possess. These traits focus on the true grit and tenacity that you will need to succeed in owning and running your own business.

5 Characteristics of a SUCCESSFUL entrepreneur:

If you are interested in becoming an entrepreneur, ask yourself these five questions to see if you have the characteristics of a successful entrepreneur:

Are you determined?

You need to have a goal and not waver from it. There will be many forces that try to draw you off course from this goal. You will run into many naysayers who tall you that what you want to do can’t be done. As the leader, you will be the guiding force for the rest of your team or company. You have to be determined to reach your goal.

Are you persuasive?

Not only will you need to be persuasive about your idea, and your ability to bring that idea to fruition, but you will also need to be more persuasive with people, wooing them and convincing them to work for you and your company, sometimes for little or no money to begin with. You will need to be persuasive enough to convince people to believe in you and your idea and to come along for the ride!

Are you fearless?

If you thought about everything that could go wrong starting a business, you’d never get out of bed. Sometimes things will go wrong. You will need to pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and keep working relentlessly towards your goal. Sometimes you will need to acknowledge your fear, your fear of failure, and continue any way. You will need to be fearless.

Are you persistent?

Do you take no for an answer or do you keep asking, or ask a different way or ask a different person until you accomplish what you set out to? You will be told no many times along your path to success. The trick is knowing when to ignore a no and when to accept that as an answer.

Are you your own biggest fan?

You need to be your own cheerleader and your own biggest fan. There will be people along the way that are unsupportive or try to dissuade you from pursuing your dreams and goal. You must be your own biggest fan (not arrogant, but believing in yourself). It can be very lonely at the top and you need to be unwavering with your belief in yourself and your idea.

Entrepreneurship may be one of the hardest, most rewarding things you ever do. You want it to be less like roulette and more like a roller coaster ride that you really enjoyed, even with all of its up and downs.

See the second in the 3 part series: You Still Want to Be an Entrepreneur?

See the last in the 3 part series: 50 Signs of Entrepreneurs