Rethinking the Mindset of a Business Owner

A business owner mindset isn’t exclusive to those chasing tech-startup dreams. Being an entrepreneur can happen in any industry. Discussing his journey to becoming a business owner was EJ Williams, who joined David and Matthew Shields on Like It’s Your Job.

Williams, an electrical engineer, has an interesting story. He’s worked for Tesla and a Mark Cuban startup. However, he didn’t find satisfaction in those roles, because he wanted to be a business owner. His initial ideal of entrepreneurship was tech and Silicon Valley. “That start-up is a long shot with a low likelihood of success. The middle ground is being a small business owner offering something somebody needs.”

For the past three years, he’s been learning the business of a Jiffy Lube franchise at Indiana Car Care. It wasn’t necessarily where he thought he’d find what was missing, but he expressed that life is about opportunity, and this was one to take.

The conversation included William’s favorite quote from Matthew McConaughey, “Persist, pivot, or concede—it’s up to you,” Williams said, “You have to keep asking yourself this with high-level decisions and small tasks.”

Those three options are a good framework for his life as a small business owner. He didn’t always know it was OK to want more. “If you’re the business owner type, it’s OK that you want to look at everything and not be satisfied in one role.”

Williams credits where he is now to his own perseverance but also his mentors. “I learned a lot listening to them and taking their advice. Now, I try to find mentees, because sharing knowledge is the best way to learn.”

Follow us on social media for the latest updates in B2B!

Twitter – @MarketScale
Facebook – facebook.com/marketscale
LinkedIn – linkedin.com/company/marketscale

Follow us on social media for the latest updates in B2B!

Image

Latest

AI Infrastructure
Simplifying AI Infrastructure: From Data Center to Deployment (Part 1)
May 19, 2026

In this episode of the Flawless Execution podcast, Jeff Hudgins, VP of Global Services at UNICOM Engineering, breaks down the real-world challenges of deploying AI infrastructure at scale. As AI moves from one-off builds to repeatable global deployments, OEMs, ISVs, and enterprises face increasing complexity across design, integration, cooling, logistics, and installation. Jeff discusses how…

Read More
AI
AI-Enabled Engineering Is Changing the Rules for Talent, Skills and Workforce Readiness (Episode Two)
May 19, 2026

AI’s next workforce challenge is not adoption; it is trust, governance and role redesign. Recent PwC research found that most U.S. executives expected AI agents to drastically transform existing roles, even as fewer than half of companies using agents had fundamentally rethought their operating models or redesigned processes around them. For enterprise technology leaders, the…

Read More
AI
AI-Enabled Engineering Is Changing the Rules for Talent, Skills and Workforce Readiness (Episode One)
May 19, 2026

As AI moves from experimentation into daily enterprise workflows, companies are confronting a harder question than whether to adopt new tools: how to redesign work around them. The shift is already changing what employers need from technical talent, from task-based coding skills to systems thinking, judgment and the ability to guide AI-enabled platforms. According to…

Read More
TGR Foundation
Tiger Woods’ TGR Foundation Is Reimagining Educational Access Through STEAM, AI, and Community Partnerships
May 19, 2026

As schools across the United States continue grappling with post-pandemic learning loss, declining student engagement, and shrinking emergency funding, nonprofit organizations are increasingly stepping in to fill critical gaps. Recent national studies on literacy recovery, student engagement, and career-connected learning show that educators are facing significant post-pandemic challenges in keeping students connected to pathways that…

Read More