Long hours, a shortfall in business management skills and missing growth opportunities are among the many issues affecting owner operators in a new survey.
Research carried out for Prospa by YouGov Galaxy, discovered that 49% of SME owners work six or seven days a week on their business, while 76% of owners ‘are struggling with one or more areas of business management’. Just as crucially, 38% of respondents state ‘they’re missing out on opportunities to grow their business’.
Clearly something has gone wrong here. No owner dreams of starting up an unsustainable and unprofitable business built on the bricks of overwork, skills gaps, and fleeting chances.
| Are you really on the right track?
Many of these issues above are symptomatic of what happens when owners lose sight of the original big picture. Reminding yourself of your original business, financial and personal goals, and asking what is important to you right now, where are you heading with your business, and how can others help you get there is a start. If you need a nudge, help is out there.
‘Take something like the [Business Owner Programme (BOP)]’ says Michaela Vodanovich, Regional Lead and Business Coach for The Icehouse.
‘What [BOP] does is keep you focused on the important stuff in your business. It keeps you thinking about getting out of the operational day-to-day activity and start thinking about how I can actually do things today that will make my business sustainable and more profitable over time.’
Building a sustainable business to build a workable lifestyle comes up a lot on [BOP]. To do that, owners need to pay themselves properly, and this small thing is a big problem for owner-operators in particular.
| Pay yourself what you're worth
‘Owners constantly discount themselves because they are putting their staff in front of themselves. If you’re not earning a decent wage, then why be in business? The majority of owners could go out there and get a really good job and get paid very well, without the stress.,’ says Michaela.
Accounting firm Xero agrees, explaining that many business owners pay themselves just enough to cover basic household living expenses. ‘The rest of the cash is left in the business where it acts as a float to cover against a lull in revenue or unexpected business expense. If cash reserves build up in the business, an owner might take out extra ‘bonus’ payments.’
Owner-operators rarely have the time and mental capacity to put a wider lens over the business. Programmes such as OOP give owners the tools, support, and accountability to develop the skills they need to drive progress and there’s an extra layer of advantages that come from being part of a programme that exposes business owners to other owners going through the same issues.
| Owner operator control
The effectiveness of the Business Owner Programme starts when the owner realises that they won’t get a better result unless they change. This means doing the work, focusing on the stuff that is really important and not letting the business suck you in. It’s only then that owners begin to carve out the opportunities that lead to a better life because they have got control of their business and the business is no longer controlling them.
‘I call it a third, a third a third,’ says Michaela. ‘One-third is the learning through the workshops and coaching, another third comes from learning from other business owners, concentrating on what’s important and utilising the community and networking opportunities they get from the programme, while the final third is by learning through implementation. Basically, to actually start doing stuff – otherwise they are not going to see change.’
Create a sustainable and profitable business through the Business Owner Programme.
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