Being the President / Owner of a company. Lets Talk

I am sure there are some of you out there. I am one. I have been one for many years. It is not that I don't like working for someone it is that I like the challenge of making something from nothing. I have started and sold several companies over the years. It is a huge challenge that is also hugely rewarding.

But it means:

You pay everyone else first. AKA Making payroll ever 2 weeks.

The "buck" stops at your desk.

There is no such thing as overtime.

"Vacation" is not in your dictionary.

Tax's. . .. . .

Insurance. . .. .

Everyone seems to have their hand out.

All this is just par for the course the real thing I hate is evaluating people. You have to be judgmental and at the sametime you are deemed an A-hole if you are judgmental. I am lucky I am working with "friends". But then again as a business owner there is part of me that has to look at the bottom line and decide what some one is worth.

There is the other issue of people that think they are worth X amount. Sometimes they are corect. Sometimes they are out to lunch. It is always a problem when there is a disagrement when dealing with this.

Things I like to do as "The Boss"? Rewarding employees. Believe it or not, I like handing out money when the company has it. Kids get a better Christmass or families get to go on better vacations. As the owner, it is the rewarding part of the job. Making people happy. I also like it when I can make something work for an employee. Many times it is something as simple as a nonstandard schedule because of school hours or daycare.

The biggest thing I appreciate is honesty. Even if someone makes a mistakes. I can deal with it (I have made my share) getting to me with the truth as soon as possible is always the best thing and I really appreciate it. Most often it can be fixed or mitigated with little or no issue. Lying about something or not owning your mistakes makes or possibly the worst thing is hiding a problem makes me crazy.

On the other hand, sometimes as the Boss, you feel like you are the outsider at the company party. The employees go out together and you are not invited or you are expected to pay when you do go along. Going "Dutch" seems to not be the thing when the company owner is there.

What is the one thing I wish employees would understand better? It is that I am the brand I sell. Yes it is personal! It is my reputation that is on the line.

Anyway, just me rambling on here. I would be interested to here from others.

From an employee's view point; you get it.

The "never off the clock" thing is one of the primary hurdles that is keeping me from working for myself.

Duke wrote: The "never off the clock" thing is one of the primary hurdles that is keeping me from working for myself.

I really like what I do so I look at it as I am never on the clock. I am getting paid for what I like to do. Ok Ya I am rationalizing things here

Duke wrote: The "never off the clock" thing is one of the primary hurdles that is keeping me from working for myself.

This. Maybe I'm just lazy.

Actually, I've always said the only way I'd own my own company was if I could make all the money I needed to by myself without being responsible for employees. Pair that with doing something I care about and it wouldn't be bad, but that's a pretty niche market.

dean1484 wrote:

Duke wrote: The "never off the clock" thing is one of the primary hurdles that is keeping me from working for myself.

I really like what I do so I look at it as I am never on the clock. I am getting paid for what I like to do. Ok Ya I am rationalizing things here

I like what I do too, a lot, but I also like going home in the evening and playing video games with my wife and tinkering around the house on weekends.

I've never held a job, but I've never not worked. I formally started my first company at 17 years old reselling electronics bought surplus. It gradually grew into a 22 employee 3-store computer chain and I was working 70 hour weeks 7 days a week and hating it. I bailed, let my partner have it, and went to work by myself for a few years and that was fine but a little lonely. 15 years or so of the electronics and my dad was getting older and tired of running his business - landlord of an office building. So I wound down the electronics business and started working in the family business and after a number of years of that two of my brothers and I bought it from our parents. We're finally at the point where we can work the hours we want.

For a long time people would say "you get to choose your own hours" and I would say "yeah, all of them." But eventually if you do things right you can take time off.

We don't have any employees but us. That's the way I like it. Contractors handle services in the building; if their employees don't show up it's the owner of that company that gets to scrub the toilets. Yes that costs more but my "free" time is valuable. I'm not interested in 70 hour work weeks any more.

I want to start my own company and be my own boss. There are only 2 things that are holding me back: 1) I like the stability and growth of a corporation (i.e. healthcare, 401k, annual raises and bonuses), and 2) I have no freaking clue what I'd do. The first one I can get over. The second I need to figure out.

It is funny, the thing that attracts me to it (besides doing things my way) is the free time that it would allow me. And I know that I'd be working 80-100 hour weeks, but with my current commute I'm still busy with work about 60 hours a week--if I'm working at home or for myself, I can escape for an hour at lunch to go play hockey, or move a load of laundry. And then the big thing--vacations. I've seen this with my FIL and my 2 uncles, who work together (1 uncle owned the operation, then sold it to another company--they both still work for that larger company). They go on a lot more vacations. Yeah, they've got their phone to their ear in the fishing boat, but they're still fishing. Yeah, they still work for 1-3 hours in the morning, but who cares? They're on vacation 6 weeks a year!

And, probably most important, they were there for all of their kids events. Sure, after they brought their kid home from practice and had dinner, they were back to work for another 2-4 hours. But they didn't miss their games. I've got no problem playing janitor and bookkeeper as well as salesman and technician and everything else. I'm probably underestimating it and not realizing that my imagined 7-11AM, 12:30-5:30 PM, 8-10PM 6 day a week schedule is probably low on the hours, but I still want to do it.

I understand it took them a long time to get to that point, and not every type of business offers that flexibility (if you're a plumber, good luck doing that remotely).

I guess I could find a lot of this with a remote work location and flex hours, but I'd still just like to be my own boss. No body telling me to rewrite something 7 times, only to return to my 2nd iteration of it when my boss re-wrote it (honestly happened twice now).

In reply to mtn:

Free time? What is that? :)

Being the boss just means that instead of having one boss now every client is the boss.

I will agree that if I do my job right I can lock the door at 5:00 and go home and play games with the kids. However there are also those weekends that you put n an extra 20 or 30 hours to make a deadline. Then there are days like today that I am thinking of leaving at lunch and going to the junk yard just to walk around and clear my head. So like anything with the plusses come the negatives.

Duke wrote: The "never off the clock" thing is one of the primary hurdles that is keeping me from working for myself.

Yep, I'm currently about to interview at a place that gives "unlimited" vacation time as long as you are keeping up with your work.

z31maniac wrote:

Duke wrote: The "never off the clock" thing is one of the primary hurdles that is keeping me from working for myself.

Yep, I'm currently about to interview at a place that gives "unlimited" vacation time as long as you are keeping up with your work.

Where do i sign up!!!

In reply to mtn:

Seems like the ability to work on your own time, including fitting some useful, but not obstructive, hours on vacation depends on what you are doing.

Dollraves (who is recently back) has a job that she can do at any computer- so she has lived in Europe for a while now. That kind of job means you can do stuff during the day, fill in some family time, and maybe some last min things during the day.

But being a self employed plumber- well, you can't do that remotely.

So what work can be done remotely and still have your customers happy?

(If it matters, I've been part of a BIG company for almost 25 years, never have worked on my own)

My dad has been the president of his own group of companies for nearly 30 years. I grew up with no vacations, no health insurance, and a dada who was always at home "working". He's had some success over the years, but it was never good. His best money was when he was an independent consultant to a county in PA. His worst money was any number of failed retirement home deals he tried to put together.

All my life he's been a moment away from "the big score".

It's tiring.

I want to own my own company and lead a team. I really want to do it, but the memories of growing up with a dad who tired it and generally achieved less success than he would have as a mid level accountant... It's just.. I can't put my kids through that.

Fueled by Caffeine wrote: My dad has been the president of his own group of companies for nearly 30 years. I grew up with no vacations, no health insurance, and a dada who was always at home "working". He's had some success over the years, but it was never good. His best money was when he was an independent consultant to a county in PA. His worst money was any number of failed retirement home deals he tried to put together. All my life he's been a moment away from "the big score". It's tiring. I want to own my own company and lead a team. I really want to do it, but the memories of growing up with a dad who tired it and generally achieved less success than he would have as a mid level accountant... It's just.. I can't put my kids through that.

Do you think he was trying for a "get rich quick" type of scheme?

My idea of owning a company would be to own one, build it and its reputation, then sell it.

I personally know a few business owners who are lucky enough to have self-reliant employees that can make money for the business, themselves, and the owner without the owner needing to do much.

Now, granted the owners of these companies stay active as moral support, and one of them in particular actually said that he'd take "unpaid vacation" so his employees didn't think he just gonna ride on their hard work.

They've made it work, and I'd say both work around 30-50 hours depending on the week. Since their professions are as installer they spend a lot of time on the road.

I too wish I could find a job that I could do remotely on computer where I had an office, but I had full freedom to work away from the office.

I used to own my own company, and now I work for a small one that does business globally. We do a ton with a VERY small group of people.

As to your own boss, most people have zero idea what means. Their view is that you are rolling in money and spend your time on the golf course or hitting on the waitress at the local club. Nothing could be further from the truth. As you outlined, you spend almost all of your time working, or thinking about working, and everyone seems to get paid but you. You constantly worry about meeting payroll and taxes, are you going to need to transfer money, have you budgeted your time to do all you need to do, do you have enough people to cover who is sick this week, and on and on.

Some days I miss it, others I don't.

In reply to mtn:

no. My dad was very successful in real estate finance for years. He tried it on his own and it didn't work. Then moved to health care analysis and specialized deal making for large organizations. It worked OK. Now he owns an insurance broker that covers doctors who have a hard time getting malpractice insurance through the tip top channels. All excellent ideas. All just poorly timed and badly implemented.

I wouldn't do it the same as my dad, If I was to open a company.. I'd concentrate on something that most people don't want to do but can be easily outsourced.. or something with a subscription model. Alas.. I think I'm beyond that in my career.

Everyone seems to have their hand out.

That is a big one for me.

I personally believe that everyone should have to start a company so that they know where a paycheck comes from. The mentality that the boss is "Rich" and does not have to work drives me nuts. For example...statutory holidays; we all like them right? The reality is that holiday pay is no different than me reaching into my pocket and paying 10k so that my guys can have a day off.

If I had one piece of advice to give people thinking about starting a business, it is that you have no idea of what your real expenses and overhead are going to be.

The other piece is that you rapidly need to get to the point where you are constantly working ON the business rather than IN the business. Someone has to be driving, and you cant be the pit crew and the driver if you want to win.

I asked our welding guy what it would take to improve the department; better management. He claims we have poor management as they are always jumping from one order to another rush order.

I claim it's our industry and it's hard to manage chaos. When a refinery calls on Friday for $20,000 of hoses for Monday you have to take it. Most times you can't turn down 50%GP business when they give you $1,500,000 a year.

That problem is hard to get the shop to understand.

I started a company about 7-years ago. It was an odd hodgepodge of providing computer/network/technology repair & services, and buying/selling stuff(antiques, junk, car parts, bikes/parts, record albums, etc.).

The antiques & junk was never very profitable, but I had nearly zero invested(I scavenged or bought cheap) and had plenty of room for it. Most of my customers were trying to follow the "American Pickers" craze, and after a few years they all pretty much gave up on it.

The computer/tech work was pretty consistent and profitable. However, after several years of doing it - often times taking up most of my "free time" after my day-job - I was completely burnt out. I most likely could have taken it full-time, but then there's the unpredictability/instability that comes along with it. I still do an occasional job for a few select people when I'm in town, but sometime even that is enough to give me that sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach.

Although, if I hadn't ended up with my current career it's quite likely I would have continued to grow my business, particularly the tech aspect. Honestly though, I'm not the right kind of person to be hiring/firing others, and I recognize that.

I owned my own business and have run business for lots of other people. I plan to start another in 2018 and have been putting together clients and tooling and service offerings for six months or so. I worry about no insurance (again, but now I am married and have kids) but I have this well planned out and contracts lined up and I'm REALLY looking forward to being responsible for everything again, but not beholden to anyone but my family and my customer.

Im not a business owner but i work for a small family owned business and one of the best things about it and the reason i still work here is they do alot of what you mentioned.

If i need some time off for something my kids are doing i get it. I make them pretty good money and dont screw things up so we have a good relationship, ive been offered better money by a larger business but the treatment wouldnt be the same.

Self employed since I was 28. 56 now. Some mornings I just want to lock myself in the shop and light it on fire.

Then I think about my childhood friend Ed, who went to work for the unionized railroad when he was 18, spent his entire working career there, retired a few years ago with a good pension, and lives in the house he won in a berkeleying lottery.

Then I start striking matches and tossing them into that bucket of gasoline.

Sounds about right. At this point I've so internalized the "buck stops here" and "always on the clock" mindset, that when I went to the hairdresser's last week I found myself plunging their toilet. Wasn't my mess, wasn't my shop... but it's a one-woman business, and calling the plumber wasn't the right call: She needed to be shown how to unclog her own toilet.

I actually told her "welcome to owning your own business" when she took her turn.

Margie

On the employee end, my favorite job was working at a bike shop with 4 employees. Myself. 2 other guys, and the owner. The owner was the son of the man who founded the company. I could work a flexible schedule. get as many or as few hours as I needed, and was in no way hovered over or micromanaged. It was glorious. Not to mention, paying wholesale for top of the line bike parts was friggin sweet!

But, there wasnt a lot of growth potential, and, eventually, I wanted to move out of my parents house. Reality bites. So, off I went to work for the man.

Turns out, the man was just another small business owner. This other guy was a total tool. ADHD poster child, with unrealistic expectations, who didnt know jack about how is company actually worked. He made wild assumptions, had no respect for people, or the knowledge they possessed, and really made it obvious that he wanted to get the last word more than he wanted the company to succeed...his ego was too big to fit in the same room as him.

So, now I really work for the man. 10k employees, offices in 40 states, plus Canada. Doing work that I find mildy rewarding, but comes with the same soullessness that you come to expect from working in corporatesville. But, 401k, bonuses, defined career path, and a real PTO accrual program isn't so bad.

In the end, its just a job. Its something that I dont hate doing, and I get paid a reasonable wage. Pro-ball players and rock stars get up in the morning and go to fun. The rest of us get up and go to work.