Struggling Entreprenuer

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For entrepreneurs (especially solopreneurs), the thought of increasing the labor power of your business during its growth is to hire or staff with your spouse, family or friends. If you are contemplating this in the short term because it is the easy and “obvious” thing to do, perhaps you had better contemplate if the role is the right fit for the individual.

A word of caution (speaking from my own and others’ experience)…

Just because it is the simple and easy road to take, it may not be the least costly. In fact, in choosing the wrong individual with the staff role in your business — especially with the customer service and/or tech support responsibilities and duties — it may be a detriment to the business that may cost you immediate income and money, as well as customers, and even a damaged business relationship.

As you will hear in this audio episode of The Struggling Entrepreneur podcast series, the results can be significant and can impact your business. This episode goes into several cases-in-point (a couple of which are my own “lessons learned” from my experience — and one of them when I myself was the customer).

How can you tell if the individual’s personality and behavior may not fit the role you need in your staff position for your business?

There are detailed explanations of several tests (which are really “instruments” for measuring) which you can easily have the individual(s) complete.

(1) The DISC model. For details, you can go to the podcast on iTunes(R) called Manager Tools. They discuss all four of the profiles in detail, and you can see how to get this instrument.

(2) The other is the CUSTOMER (R) PROGRAM’s personality traits and behavior profiles from Integrity Systems, Inc.  You should know how to communicate and manage these types of individuals in the role which they will have. They are the:

-  Talker

-  Doer

-  Controller, and the

-  Supporter.

Once you have the personality and behavior profiles measured, you can then see if there could be potential problems in fitting the individual with the duties and responsibilities of the staff role.

Also, you should have an idea of the TYPE of relationship you will want with the individual. This could be that of an EMPLOYEE, or CONTRACTOR, or INTERN or PARTNER.

With a good, solid and “airtight” contract or agreement (which we recommend should be drawn up by your legal counsel who specializes in small business and entrepreneurship), you will then have the proper “exit strategy and commitment” if the individual wishes to leave your business environment of your firm–either because it is “not fun any more” or if it ends up being the wrong fit, or if there is a probability of conflict and problems up ahead. Also, be advised that you yourself should be able to terminate the relationship if the fit is not good for your firm.

In this audio episode, you will hear about our recommendation to hire outside via personal or solid references, where the individual can show and prove the abilities needed for the position and responsibilities from past, outstanding performance. Even a virtual assistant with specialized skills can avoid the problem of the “wrong fit.”

As Paul Colligan (of www.paulcolligan.com) stated when he was searching for talented individuals to hire:  “I don’t want you learning on my time and on my dime. I want to see what you have done. Show me which outstanding service you have provided in the past to others in the role that you would provide for me.”  (quoted from a public, live Paul Colligan webinar, 2010)

It is up to you whether or not you should hire your spouse or family members or close friends when your business is growing. In some cases, this works out wonderfully (if the individual and role are a good fit).

However, a word of caution resulting from our experience…

Hiring or Staffing the individual just because of the relationship may set your business back and damage personal and business relationships.

Copyright (C) 2012, Matrix Solutions Corporation. All rights reserved.

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In an earlier episode of The Struggling Entrepreneur, we talked about the different organizations that assist aspiring entrepreneurs at the local level to launch their businesses–mainly the City and County levels.

However, there are other organizations with names very similar–but their mission, coverage of clients and funding are different.

In this audio interview, we speak to Joe Lam, the Associate Director of another organization called the Small Business Development Center — which is a federally funded group that is implemented at the State level to help entrepreneurs with programs and resources.

Joe On Lam is a Senior Certified Business Advisor based in Austin, Texas, for the Small Business Development Center (or SBDC). As you will hear in this audio episode, we investigate what the SBDC is, and how it is different than other entrepreneur-resource assistance organizations.  We also see how Joe On Lam’s group provides benefits to the Texas entrepreneurs to help them become successful–both during startup, as well as in growth stages.

What seems to be significant is the ROI for the services delivered by the SBDC. As Joe mentioned during the interview, for each dollar spent, there is a return of over six dollars that is delivered back to the local economy. This specific Texas SBDC region describes this in their annual report from a published study.

 As Joe Lam stated in our discussion, the mission of the SBDC is not to duplicate what other organizations are doing to provide services to the entrepreneurs in starting or launching their business. They also have a critical mission to help the entrepreneurs that have existing businesses and to provide support so that they can continue their success and maintain profitability.

The SBDC model is based on a partnership with the regional Universities to link sponsors and other resources to the entrepreneur. In addition to Texas State University (the Austin area of coverage), the University of Texas at San Antonio is another partner in the regional area.

 The recommendation is for entrepreneurs to visit the SBDC office and see what type of assistance and resources are available to them. As we said in this audio episode, since these Centers are funded with tax dollars,  we have paid for them as an existing asset in our entrepreneur toolbox.

Copyright (c) 2012, Matrix Solutions Corporation and the Small Business Development Center.  All rights reserved.

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Small business owners have been flooded by a wealth of new titles, as different types of entrepreneurs are gaining specific meanings for their environment or their qualifications.

In the past, we have seen the following:

- Solo-preneur

- Necessity-preneur

- stage-two entrepreneur

and so forth, as there are many specifics growing every year.And now, as the conflicts where the military (in the form of the volunteer armed forces)  in the Middle East are winding down and the requirement for the citizen-soldier deployments are decreasing, we see the surge of the individual Armed Forces veteran that wants to start a wholly-owned business.

Welcome the VETREPRENEUR.

And this type of entrepreneur now has a myriad of resources, complete in some cases with a support structure. Of these, the most notable are a separate magazine for the Vetrepreneur.

For the background of this magazine, here are the links to see:

- the overview of Vetrepreneur Magazine;

- the cover of Vetrepreneur Magazine;

There are even new organizations to support the Vetrepreneur– some of them agencies of different levels of government, some non-profit, and some commercial.

Case-in-point: here is a web page for the association known as NaVOBA:

There are many other resources for the Vetrepreneur that include funding, networking, hiring, growing the business and assistance with aspiring entrepreneurs. Here is the link for the details from the panel discussion of Vetrepreneur resources from the Texas Veterans Commission 2012 Summit in Austin, Texas:

http://bit.ly/xAeae3

In addition, campaigns for awareness and action are also supporting the Vetrepreneur. Specifically, the “BUY VETERAN” slogan and recommendation is spearheading the campaign to encourage customers to buy their goods and services from Veteran-owned small businesses. This campaign is targeting federal, state and local governments and having them focus on awarding contracts to Vetrepreneurs who are submitting bids.

In one of the Veterans Commission conferences, I saw that the bumper stickers are now available that recommend “Buy Veteran.”

This campaign has a web site at www.buyveteran.com.

The statistics estimate that over 2 million veterans will be returning to civilian life starting this year. Of those, it is estimated that over 24 per cent will be veterans who will want to start their own small business and become the VETREPRENEURS.

We shall move deeper into this topic, as we plan to have interviews with aspiring and successful Vetrepreneurs in the near future — as well as dialogue with the organizations that will provide resources for the success of these small business owners.

Copyright (c) 2012, Matrix Solutions Corporation. All rights reserved.

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