The Promise of Entrepreneurship… is bigger always better?

We are made to believe that when it comes to business success, bigger is always better. In our super-sized, consumption-oriented culture, not even small business is exempt from the pressure to grow for growth’s sake. We fixate on top-line revenue growth and increasing numbers of employees and locations. We pepper entrepreneurs with questions such as, ‘What are your plans for expansion? What’s next? How many cities will you go to?’ instead of asking what their goals are or why they started their business in the first place. When talk about growth we focus on speed, not sustainability. When we talk about success we focus on size, not satisfaction.

So much so that entrepreneurs doubt their own success and skill if they aren’t pursuing the largest form of their business possible. We’ve talked with countless business owners who run profitable ventures, make a good living, enjoy what they do every day, and have significant impact in their industry—but who also hesitate to call themselves successful. Why? Because their companies could be bigger, or they decided not to open several more locations, or they don’t have the largest market share—even though these are not the things that they want.

We believe that it doesn’t have to be this way. There is an alternative that is both rewarding and attainable—it just requires rethinking things a bit…

Another gem from ChangeThis.com by Adelaide Lancaster

3% of women-owned businesses make $1million or more a year; so why are you in your Mother of a Business?

As featured on the Ruby Connection

A little while ago, I came across this… according to recent statistics in the Wall Street Journal from the Center for Women’s Business Research in the U.S., there is only 3% of women-owned businesses with a revenue of $1million or more in The Million-Dollar Club… (and I bet that percentage is a whole lot smaller again if being the only breadwinner for the family is also taken into account).

Only 3%, is that all I hear you say?

Given that 7-figures is the turnover my Mother of a Business was doing at time of its Sale, that put me in the category of the 3%…are you kidding? How can it be that with all the businesses started by women, only 3% manage to reach 7-figures?

Why are Businesses being built if not to serve your Lifestyle, as opposed to the other way around?

Couple that with some of the more disturbing statistics from our very own Ruby Connection “Westpac Women’s Financial Health Report, September 2011”:

  • Nearly half (49%) of women agreed they felt disadvantaged in terms of the amount of superannuation they were able to save as a result of having to cut back or stop work. This view was even more likely held by Gen Y (63%) and Gen X (63%).
  • After having children, 64% of women reported that it had significantly affected their ability to work continuously and impacted substantially on their working career cycle

We’re not in a very good place are we? Well, the majority of us that is.

Business gives you Lifestyle to be the Mother you long to be. No question.
In fact, it’s not just about the mothering, it’s ultimately about Lifestyle and the ability to earn what you must earn, plus a whole lot more.

Come on, join the club too…
If the notion of a 7-figure business scares you right now, you may be thinking that it must mean a whole lot of work that will take you away from your family even more? WRONG! You couldn’t be further from the truth, provided you structure properly and of course, “Start with the End in Mind”.

Just financing the family holiday is not enough of an “End” to justify all the blood, sweat and tears you will invest in your business, not to mention money…

Ladies, we’ve got some serious Business Building and Professional Development work to do…To discuss any of this further and, most importantly, to do something about it, feel free to contact me.

Ho Ho Ho! the beauty of being a solo Business Owner at Christmas…

Bit of fun…

Being a one person ltd company:

  • I can have a Christmas party for all employees (me);
  • invite my wife or partner (but not both!)
  • spend and get tax relief on it.
  • there is no taxable benefit in kind as I stayed with the rules
  • If I had tried to spend out any other way then I could easily be paying a marginal FBT.
  • So I can take the partner out for a nice meal knowing that the tax man is effectively funding our meal (and they don’t need to know that either).
  • I feel good, partner feels good. Success.

Going out with a Boom Boom…PrimeTimers

The following recent article raises the question of Boomer spending, once they start spending post-workforce, and what that timeframe might look like. I’m sure it’s fairly typical of the held view in the market also. Only one thing missing is….

No mention of Boomer (or as I like to affectionately refer to them – PrimeTimers) Business Owners. What about those who are still toiling away in their own businesses, and are looking to EXIT over the same period. The Business Sale Tsunami is about to hit us allegedly. So what happens when the value they thought the business was worth is not what the market is willing to pay? Or if the business has not kept up with advances, in requiring an online presence for example, what then? What price? And then where does that leave their pseudo “Super”…

Business Owners beware… if you’re not preparing NOW for the SELL of your lifetime, then you may not end up in as good a place as you had expected, and dreamed of…

They might be still toiling but when they finally pull the plug, this generation will spend up big, writes Nicole Pedersen-McKinnon for TheAge.com.au.

Baby, the boomers are back! After having their retirement plans clobbered by the worst global downturn since the Great Depression, really the Great Recession, they are on the cusp of finally realising the life-after-work dream.

A staggering 46 per cent of boomers who are still toiling are doing so because of the credit crack-up, a study we conducted for the latest issue of our sister publication, Financial Review Smart Investor, has found.

But 31 per cent now expect to retire in the next five years, with almost another third in the five years after that. Their average age will be 64. To get to that point in this investment climate, though, they’ve had to make sacrifices beyond just delaying retirement. Twenty-eight per cent were forced to sell investments, probably at the worst time, and 18 per cent had to pull back on their lifestyle.

This is the first generation to retire with superannuation, which became compulsory in 1992, but that was too late and, thanks to the financial crisis, now far too little. A massive 78 per cent of boomers make additional contributions to redress their retirement funding shortfalls. So where will their money ultimately come from?

Read on

And don’t forget, there are also PrimeTimers who may also end up getting into Seniorpreneurship!
What I mean by that is, regardless of what Baby Boomers may have done in the past, they still want to continue to contribute. They don’t want to retire yet and nor do they want to work as they once did. So why not buy a smaller business, even online, and play to their hearts content.

Good idea?

Change? It’s Only Just Begun!

You’re probably familiar with eBay and PayPal. They’re businesses that have transformed and challenged traditional retailing because they enable individuals to trade online, bypassing normal supply chains. We’re now on the edge of another wave of transformational change of how business and work are done.

Robert Gottliebsen at Business Spectator recently interviewed Matt Barrie from which connects workers with businesses on a global basis. Businesses post jobs that workers bid for. Payment occurs online when jobs are finished. It’s mainly small business people doing work for small business people. But it brings the power of ‘big’ to the little businessperson’s business. The interview is here:

At that link we last covered zaarly and uber which also empower self-employed people to do big things. I know of many other transformational business service models. It’s the replication of a trend we’re seeing in IT, for example, where contracting is rising. Forget about industrial relations, human resource management and jobs for life! This is about stock exchanges for jobs, fast moving, with people making their own choices.

Government isn’t coping. This is reflected in comments from Peter Strong of the Council of Small Business Australia. He referred to the recent budget as a ‘big business budget’ in a TV interview. This big business view is probably why the administration of paid parental leave, for example, is looking so complex for small business people and why a Commonwealth Bank survey found small business drowning in red tape.

Government will fail when it tries to force its administrative convenience onto this global business realignment. So watch out politicians! An analysis of voting trends amongst self-employed people showed a strong willingness to swing their votes.

http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/45026.html

Very, very interesting indeed… a sign of things to come… just wonder how the government will view it/legislate for or against it??? Time will tell.

From Ken Phillips (Exec. Dir.) and the team at Independent Contractors of Australia

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