Build a business like an engineer.

I am an engineer. But I did not start as a businessman. I started as a young man with a laptop and a head full of ideas.

I came to Canada to study. I did not know many people. The winters were cold and long. Some nights I felt very far from home.

I studied software engineering at Sheridan College, in Oakville, Ontario. I finished in 2014.

Engineering changed the way I see the world. It taught me one simple truth. You do not guess. You build. You test it. It breaks. You fix it. You build it again. You repeat this until it works.

Then one day a thought came to me. A business is also a system. A business can be built the same way. So I stopped building only software. I started building businesses. And I built them like an engineer.

These are the three things I learned. I want you to feel them, because I felt every one.

One. Do not wait for the perfect plan. Start. Then fix it.

I remember my first project after college. I had no plan. I had very little money. I only had a problem I wanted to solve.

I was scared. I thought, who am I to build this? What if it fails? What if people laugh at me?

But I started anyway. The first version was bad. Very bad. I did not even want to show it to anyone.

So I fixed it. I made version two. It was a little better. Then version three. Then version four.

That is when I learned the secret.

You do not need to be ready. You only need to begin.

The people who wait for the perfect moment are still waiting today. The people who start, even when they are afraid, are the ones who get good.

Two. The idea is easy. Not quitting is the hard part.

In engineering we have a word. Debugging. It means you find the broken thing and fix it. Then you find the next broken thing. And the next. Again and again.

Building a business felt the same. But much harder.

I remember sitting alone at my desk, late at night. The house was quiet. Everyone was asleep. I looked at my screen and nothing was working.

Many months went by with no result. I had very little money. I asked myself, why am I still doing this? Maybe I am not good enough. Maybe I should stop and get a normal job.

I felt that many times. The fear. The doubt. The tiredness.

But I did not quit. I woke up the next day, and I fixed one more thing. Then one more. That is the only reason any of it ever worked.

So I do not invest in ideas. Everyone has an idea. Ideas are easy.

I invest in the person who keeps going when it is hard. The person who does not quit.

Three. Do not build a job. Build a machine.

For a long time, I was the business. If I worked, money came in. If I stopped, everything stopped. I could not rest. I could not take a day off. I was tired all the time.

One day I understood something. This was not freedom. I had only built myself a very hard job.

So I did what an engineer does. I built systems. I built products. Things that keep working when I am not there.

I remember the first time it happened. I was away from my computer, with people I love. And the business kept running without me. Money came in while I was not working.

I felt something I had not felt in years. I felt free. Not rich. Free. Free to choose how I spend my time.

That freedom is the reason I can sit with you now.

So here is the one thing I want you to do. Pitch me your idea.

Maybe you are a student with a small idea. Maybe you are a freelancer who wants to build something bigger. Maybe you run a company and want to grow into a new market. It does not matter who you are. Show me what you are building.

If I believe in it, I will invest my own money in it.

If it is not ready yet, I will work with you and help you build it. Like an engineer. Step by step.

And I will be honest with you. I will tell you what is good. I will tell you what is broken. I will tell you the first thing to fix. No empty words. No false promises. Real answers from someone who has built real things.

Why I really do this.

For a long time, I was alone. I had ideas, but I had no one to show them to. No one who had done it before. No one to tell me if I was on the right path. I learned everything the slow way, by failing, again and again.

Many nights I wished for one thing. I wished there was someone on the other side of the table. Someone who had walked the road before me. Someone who would look at my idea, look at me, and say, I believe in you. Keep going.

No one was there. So I had to become that person myself.

And now, after all these years, I am finally on the other side of the table.

This is my real reason. It is not only about money. Money is good, but money was never the deepest thing. The deepest thing is this.

I do not want you to feel as alone as I did.

So bring me your idea. The one you think about when you cannot sleep. The one you are a little scared to say out loud.

We will look at it together, like engineers. We will see what works. We will fix what does not.

You will not be alone with it anymore.

Pitch me your idea.

Reynaldo EnriquezSoftware engineer & entrepreneur · Founder, Advanced Global Research (USA)