15.4. Personal Skills

The fourth category of skills is what I call Personal Skills. If one wants to succeed in a business endeavor, one must have the personal skills to do so. And so the remainder of this chapter is devoted to these important skills.

I realized the importance of personal skills by looking back at my own life. When I first came to the United States as a foreign student in 1986, my personal belongings consisted of a suitcase and a camera bag. At first my father was supporting me and paying for my studies since I did not have a work visa. By the time I became a graduate student and started working on my master’s degree, I was supporting myself by working as a graduate teaching assistant (GTA) at my university. I continued doing so while working on my PhD. The pay was very low and by the time I completed my studies and started my photography business in 1997, I was broke. On top of that I was also seriously in debt, drove a beater of a car, and had few valuable belongings except for my cameras.