What, to you, is the definition of financial success, and do you need to be an entrepreneur to attain it?

Some might define financial success as making a steady and reliable income, having a secure retirement fund, and living a comfortable lifestyle with the ability to indulge in luxuries such as a new car or an overseas holiday every now and then.

To answer the second part of the question, you certainly do not need to start a business to be financially successful. As many of you would be able to attest to, there certainly are benefits to being an employee for someone else’s company.

1. Salary

As an employee, you are guaranteed a base salary regardless of how the company performs. Your boss might not make good money all year round but, thanks to your stipulated contract, you should still get paid.

While there are cases of startups or non-profits where employees have to take a pay cut, these are exceptions rather than the rule.

2. Benefits

Employees receive perks such as EPF and Socso contributions by their employer, free medical and/or life insurance, paid holidays and medical leave, and perhaps even paid training.

For a boss to attend training courses, he or she would usually have to come up with the money themselves. They often have to look after their own EPF contributions and insurance premiums, too.

3. Travel

Depending on your line of work, you might get to travel out of state or even overseas, all expenses paid. Meanwhile, many entrepreneurs are so busy working to sustain their businesses, they might not even have time to bring their families on a short vacation.

4. Freedom to resign

As an employee, you get to quit whenever you want. Some people might view this as not having job security, but this comes with an upside: if you don’t enjoy your work, you can easily tender your resignation.

On the other hand, it is difficult for any entrepreneur to give up his or her business. A boss might have to find replacements, or set in place an exit plan such as a merger, selling the company, or closing it down completely.

For new companies, there’s the loss of startup capital; and, for organisations with many employees, the impact on families to consider.

So why be a boss?

An entrepreneur worries about everything that happens in the company – poor sales and cash flow, employee resignations, competition, government regulations, and so on. But here are two things a boss gets to enjoy that an employee doesn’t:

1. Flexibility

Basically, you call the shots. Entrepreneurs decide on the type of business they want to run, the kind of customers they’d like to serve, the products or services they’d like to sell, and the people they’d like to work with to make these things happen.

Being a boss means you get to design a business that suits your lifestyle, allowing you freedom and flexibility to run the organisation in a way that suits you best.

2. The sky’s the limit

If your business is successful, you stand to gain the most, financially speaking. There’s really no limit to how much you can make, regardless of whether your business is based in Malaysia or you have international dealings that bring in profit in different currencies.

You could end up building the next mega corporation much like how Jeff Bezos created Amazon! This might be an extreme example, but you get the idea.

In the end, whether you go down the route of owning your own company or climbing the corporate ladder, you have to persevere, work hard and smart, and keep improving. That’s the only way to see income increase, year after year.

This article first appeared in kclau.com. KC Lau’s first book ‘Top Money Tips for Malaysians’ has sold thousands of copies. He launched the Money Automation System, the first online personal finance course specifically designed for Malaysians, and co-founded many other online financial courses including the Bursa Method, Property Method, Founder Method and REIT Method.