Is it really possible to create a successful new venture without incurring heavy capital expenditure at the preliminary stage? If yes, Is there a particular tool aspiring founders can embrace to build a thriving business regardless of the industry sector of interest? I believe so. There is a strategic option I personally have applied to create functional businesses, circumventing all traditional myths demanding capital as a must have ingredient for successful entrepreneurship. In one word, it is called resourcefulness!

What is resourcefulness? In entrepreneurship, it simply means the mindset of using that which is readily available to produce the non existent. A resourceful entrepreneur is one who successfully learns how to activate power of leverage in dealing with business challenges. Strategic leverage is a tactical move used to maneuver a company’s ability to gain competitive advantage by complementing itself against the strengths of others; it is simply the art of maximizing outcomes while minimizing efforts.

Two fundamental requirements for successful leveraging:

1. Entrepreneurs must have full understanding of the critical success factors (CSF’s) in their business value chain. The requirement here is to comprehensively audit all the interlocking value adding activities and prioritize them according to their level of importance. In systems thinking, it is said that for every big goal/vision one hopes to achieve, there is usually two or three key pillars that influence its success i.e. not everything matters. When adopting leveraging as a strategic option, a primary focus is placed on being proactive only on the crucial 20% elements that attributes to 80% of the outcomes. The fundamental belief here is that if the 20% are done right then automatically remaining 80% will align themselves in tandem.
2. Entrepreneurs must find a way to activate the psychological principle of reciprocity e. devise options on how to create win-win situations in all your engagements with stakeholders. Leveraging can only be executed efficiently by building competencies and tapping into extra capabilities currently not present in a firm’s resource pool. It calls for securing external strengths to pacify existing internal limitations of a business. Without a logical reciprocity in offering no one will commit their time, energy, human capital or even money to support your firm’s strategic intent or business model.

Without the ability to be resourceful, your only option available is to “buy” every external support accorded to your business and that can be very expensive in the long run. For any modern business to thrive efficiently, it must find multiple ways to successfully tap and leverage onto other like-minded partners. “Coopetition” is one of the best strategies to grow efficiently. If you are thinking of starting or running a business, master this skill. Be open minded, imaginative, proactive, persistent and always willing to optimize on using that which is in front of you to get that which isn’t currently available.