A few years back I was infatuated with everything that Gary Vaynerchuk had to say. I was “hustling” and working my “5-9” and using the F-Word in every conversation (okay, I’m still working on that one). I’ve since given up my GaryVee fan-boy status, but I retained some very important teachings from him. The most memorable of which came from a video that he shared called “A Note To My 50 Year Old Self”

You can check out the video here: https://youtu.be/X7gcisj6KXA

In the video, Gary suggests that not only are your 40s, 50s and 60s good times to start something new, but in fact they may be the BEST times to start something new. His rationale is based on a few things:

• You’ve made a lot of mistakes, which means you’ve learned a lot.
• The market accepts your victories no matter your age.
• We all develop at different paces and times.
• The technology that we have allows us to succeed much faster than we have in the past.

As I spend time with my 40-70 year old clients, I can SEE and FEEL their fear that it may be “too late” for them and that opportunity has passed them by. That’s when I remind them of this:

• At age 23, Tina Fey was working at a YMCA.
• At age 23, Oprah was fired from her first reporting job.
• At age 24, Stephen King was working as a janitor and living in a trailer.
• At age 27, Vincent Van Gogh failed as a missionary and decided to go to art school.
• At age 28, J.K. Rowling was a suicidal single parent living on welfare.
• At age 30, Harrison Ford was a carpenter.
• At age 30, Martha Stewart was a stockbroker.
• At age 37, Ang Lee was a stay-at-home-dad working odd jobs.
• At age 39, Julia Child released her first cookbook and got her own cooking show at age 51.
• Vera Wang failed to make the Olympic figure skating team, didn’t get the Editor-in-Chief position at Vogue, and designed her first dress at age 40.
• Stan Lee didn’t release his first big comic book until he was 40.
• Alan Rickman gave up his graphic design career to pursue acting at age 42.
• Samuel L. Jackson didn’t get his first movie role until he was 46.
• Morgan Freeman landed his first MAJOR movie role at age 52

That’s all well and good, you may be thinking. But, can older entrepreneurs really compete with their younger counterparts? Even if they have the passion, do they have the ideas? If they have the time, do they have the energy? Yes and yes. In fact, there are several reasons to believe that older entrepreneurs hold most of the cards.

Experience and Business Skills

This is the obvious one, right? I mean at 40 plus years old we’ve made more mistakes that we can count and if we’ve done it right, we’ve also learned from those mistakes. This experience helps us to make decisions more quickly and accurately; it allows us to fast forward to action.

Instead of being preoccupied with all of the reasons that you can’t make it at this age, make a list of all of the business skills that you currently have. This is the place to focus. Instead of looking at all of the areas that you lack, you can look at the areas where you have the greatest skill sets and then capitalize on those strengths rather than obsessing about your weaknesses. This strengths-based methodology is an ACCELERATOR for success.

What are your greatest skills, knowledge and abilities? How can you put them to work FOR you?

Business and Personal Connections

I spent my childhood as the son of an Air Force officer moving from base to base when my Dad got a promotion or was sent to a new training program. It never bothered me to move so much, we even moved right before my senior year, but something that I never really learned how to do was KEEP FRIENDS. I was fantastic at making them…I had to be, but when it came to developing relationships, I just didn’t know how to do it.

Little did I know that the connections that I had made throughout the years of moving from place to place would become some of my greatest assets. The husband of one of my high school friends is now a client and I have partnered on business projects with two more of my elementary school classmates. Of course, the power of connections doesn’t just come from childhood. The older I get, the more business and personal connections I have and the more easily I am able to leverage those connections into fruitful engagements.

Now, after living for 20 years in the same place, I am able to use that same leverage to create amazing opportunities for others and myself locally. The connections are my most valuable assets as a small business owner.

Empathy and Perspective

Younger entrepreneurs have many positive attributes. Many of them are highly intelligent, driven and innovative. However, one word that I rarely hear in the context of younger founders is “empathetic.” As the often-quick tempered and robotic comments from Facebook CEO, Marc Zuckerberg and Snapchat CEO, Evan Spiegel show, maturity sometimes develops later than the ability to code.

Older entrepreneurs have had a lifetime to learn how to get along with other people. We have more than likely raised families, often navigated the corporate jungle and spent time travelling the world. Like all people, we have our selfish streak. But, we have learned how to put ourselves in other people’s shoes.

Resilience and Work Ethic

This is the biggie. As older people, we have learned to bounce back faster from adversity and we know how to put our heads down and noses to the grindstone in order to get shit done. This ability allows us to progress faster because we are not constantly in “review” mode. Resilience enables us to develop mechanisms for protection against experiences, which could be overwhelming; it helps us to maintain balance in our lives during difficult or stressful periods of time, and can also protect us from the development of some mental health difficulties and issues.