How much management?

[adamants]

Mainly for people with at least one employee working for them:
How much management do you need to keep your guy/s working ie. organising them each day, bidding jobs, checking on jobs in progress, pr etc?
I have one other sparky working for me, and i am finding a lot of my time taken up with all the above mentioned jobs, leaving very little time for chargable work for me. I used to have two guys, and it took even more work. I understand that all these things need to be done, but how many staff / hours does your company spend on these tasks, surely each company with one or two guys, doesn't have another guy to organise it do they?
I read a while ago, that you shouldn't start a business in a field you are trained in, because it then forces you to hire people to keep it running, enabling you to build your business, rather than just working in it.
Any help / comments would be great.
We generally run resi service, but are now getting into some new construction (at our full rates, slightly better quality homes etc):-?

 

[ptonsparky]

I have 2 full time field workers and 1 half time office help, plus myself. Half of my hours are chargeable over a years time.

 

[tyha]

its really hard to say. Mainly because we do only commercial and mainly new construction. But I did start this thing with me and 2 others working for me. I bid jobs by myself for about 3 months before that with nothing but me. When I got the first job i spent about 30% of the day bidding, managing, paperwork and the rest in the field. after i hired 2 or 3 others it was mostly all paperwork. when we hit 10 full time employees I hired a part time secretary and a full time estimator. As far as estimators from my exp you need about 1 for every 10 field guys and you should be able bill for around 100k - 120k yearly per man in the field. That completly depends on your market though. I probably didn't give you much help but i so remember those days when it was just me and a guy or 2. You just have to keep your head up BE PREPARED FOR OPPORTUNITIES when they arrive and do whatever you have to do to stay in business. trust me the opportunities will arive but you have to be ready for them.