The passion of entrepreneurs is focused on the product or service that they know and love. But now that you have this role of CEO, you must understand the impact you will have if you don’t lead, or if you lead with the wrong perspectives. Many companies with great ideas struggle because no one is leading them. Your actions will affect every aspect of the company, which makes your leadership skills that much more important. Even though your passion may be focused elsewhere, if you don’t recognize your new reality as CEO, it will make progress difficult.

There will be plenty of times that you debate with yourself (and others) if you are qualified to run the company. Whether you’re eager for the position or pushed unwillingly to it, you must be the CEO during the entrepreneurial launch stage of your company. Being the CEO of an established company is hard enough, but being the CEO of a developing business is the ultimate baptism by fire. In most cases, you have to do it all without formal training. It takes most leaders their entire career to develop the skills of a good CEO. Too bad- you must learn those skills in a fraction of that time. As an entrepreneur, you’re on the accelerated course. You have no choice but to lead and to lead well.