Self employment

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arnettda

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I have been self employed for roughly 12 years, profitable years but my business consumes a lot of me. I have two employees and one is retiring. I spend the majority of my time running my business but am still in the field. I Found out about a full time day maintenance job that is appealing to me. I have been working on ways to run my business with less stress and more success the last couple of months but have a ways to go. My options are to apply for the job (I do not want to make up my mind after I may get the job) or give myself more time to develop and teach myself new ways. Looking for advice from people who have been in the same situation and what they have done.
Thank You!
 
Looking forward to reading the responses on this thread. Great question.

I've been in a similar situation for about ten years now. I've built the business up to a point where I'm making a comfortable living, and am able to support a small, talented crew. but find myself having similar issues as the OP. I've pulled the trigger on a few applications, and even had offers on some of them. Everytime i back out because i've put so much into the business and don't want to let the guys, or our very loyal customers down. I'm also hesitant to not be my own boss.

Bottom line... i've chosen to stay self employed because i believe the benefits of having something of my own out weigh the benefits of the steady, way less stress salary position. Obviously that's a personal choice, not a fact.

Would like to hear from someone who went ahead with the salary job.

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I'm not going to help much other than I've been there and am now faced with retirement. The same problems with letting employees and customers 'go' is there. I'd feel better if one of the employees would step up but that isn't happening.

Hiring office help that can do the billing and day to day paperwork helps considerably at your stage. In the end though, its another person to let go.
 
After leaving the union and working for the man, I've been on my own for near 15 years. Some months, you're making balloon payments on the pickup (after getting 350,000 miles on the old one), and some months are lean and mean, but there's just no way I could go back. That said, I have no employees, just a bookkeeper and accountant that I pay to do the hard part. I hate paperwork.
 
I see it all the time. Your problem is because you didn't plan for your successor and started grooming him or her years ago to take your place. Many small business owners like yours don't want their children involved, "want them to have a better life" so they pass up the opportunity to pass the business on. Another problem is that they need to be in control, micro-manage everything so they won't hand over the reigns to people they can delegate responsibility to.

I spend the majority of my time running my business but am still in the field.
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So really, you don't have a company, you have a job.

If you look at a lot of successful companies, the owner is out playing golf while his son or daughter runs the company.

-Hal
 
hbiss said:
I see it all the time. Your problem is because you didn't plan for your successor and started grooming him or her years ago to take your place. Many small business owners like yours don't want their children involved, "want them to have a better life" so they pass up the opportunity to pass the business on. Another problem is that they need to be in control, micro-manage everything so they won't hand over the reigns to people they can delegate responsibility to.



So really, you don't have a company, you have a job.

If you look at a lot of successful companies, the owner is out playing golf while his son or daughter runs the company.

-Hal
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So learning to run by business correctly would be a good idea.
 
around the 20 year mark was burned out

so took a position {installation and repairs on car wash equipment},was only 30 hours per week so I was still able to keep my business running, 40 hours most weeks


and only took the best jobs

after 12 years position finally fizzled out but by then all my jobs were best jobs

and I loved the electrician business again
 
I've been on my own now for over 25 years and looking back I wouldn't have it any other way. I chose, up front, to be a one man show. I didn't want any employees because I had been one for too many years and knew what I wanted and expected as an employee. I was not able to provide salaries and benefits to others when I started out and did not want any of the headaches associated with employees.

That said, I don't believe I'm qualified to answer your question about relieving your stress. All I can say is that having your own business is a far greater achievement than working for someone else. I hope you get some good advice from others. Good luck.
 
goldstar said:
I didn't want any employees because I had been one for too many years and knew what I wanted and expected as an employee. I was not able to provide salaries and benefits to others when I started out and did not want any of the headaches associated with employees.
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Being a one-man band has its advantages, but the biggest disadvantage is there is only one of you so you are income limited. Plus I'm getting old and tired of crawling around in attics and crawl spaces. That said, I keep on hiring people who turn out to be duds and I have to get rid of them. The last one caused a total of $3000 damage to two service trucks in several incidents including backing one service truck into another service truck.

I've got plenty of work and could probably do quite well financially if I could only find some decent service truck electricians. Construction jobs are easy to staff, service trucks are not.
 
hbiss said:
I see it all the time. Your problem is because you didn't plan for your successor and started grooming him or her years ago to take your place. Many small business owners like yours don't want their children involved, "want them to have a better life" so they pass up the opportunity to pass the business on. Another problem is that they need to be in control, micro-manage everything so they won't hand over the reigns to people they can delegate responsibility to.



So really, you don't have a company, you have a job.

If you look at a lot of successful companies, the owner is out playing golf while his son or daughter runs the company.

-Hal
Click to expand...
Well it depends on what there is for a successor to take over. A lot of smaller construction oriented companies there isn't much to take over and the potential successor isn't going to spend $$ to buy things they don't feel they need and would rather start their own new business operation. This especially true for smaller shop that maybe operated from owners home, and maybe the owner was the primary supervisor as well as main records keeper, or maybe his spouse is involved in recordskeeping. If you have a shop/office at it's own location and an established workforce including office staff that is a little different story, there is more there to take over, but also consider it is a bigger investment for whoever is taking over. But if they were participating in managing it they may be fine, the journyman that was only involved with installs will not have as good of a chance of managing such an organization out of the gate and is a riskier investment for him (whether he knows it or not).
 
in my 60's, yr 20 (this time around) , no real exit plan, and let's be honest.... wtf is hiring has beens? ~RJ~
 
There are people that run a small business (any business not just electrical contracting) that if they aren't there (at least a majority of the time) will not operate well if at all.

There are others that call themselves self employed but only because they maybe started out as the kind of business I mentioned above and built it to something much larger. Sure that person may still be the primary business owner, but has a staff that can operate on a normal basis even when that owner is absent whether, for the day or for several weeks at a time.
 
Stay the Course

Stay the Course

I can absolutely understand wanting to go back to working for someone else. Much of the worry and hard ache will be off of your shoulders. But once you go back, then you'll remember why you went into business for yourself. In an Electrician Group on Facebook recently...one guy went on and on about why he quit and walked off the job. Usually it comes down to nobody respecting you and you not getting paid what your worth. Everyone was praising the guy for walking off the job. The truth is...he either needs to suck it up or go into business for himself. There isn't anything in between.

I would offer 2 suggestions:

(1) Hire a manager. This is someone that comes in and replaces you. This should take you completely out of the equation, and you can focus on sales.

(2) Double down. Build an empire you can sell. Read the book Millionaire Fastlane. It's a great read. In it I learned that I should focus on building up my business to the point that I can sell it for 2-3x its annual revenue. Basically, if you focus on building a brandable business that makes $500-750k a year, then you can sell it for 2-3x that and retire. You can then retire and live off of the interest or investments.

That's my plan anyways. Best of luck to you!
 
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