Deciding whether to start a business is exciting. The first question you must ask yourself is WHY you want to start a business? Here are some common reasons that motivate people to start their own business.
Why is it important to ask your the big WHY? This is because your big WHY will keep you going when things don’t go your way.
We share with you a story of a mother raising a child with a medical condition that requires ongoing hospital treatments. She decided to work for herself so that she could do what she loves and continue to care for her child. Caring for and meeting her child’s medical care is the main motive to start her business. She provides services to clients.
Start a business can give you flexibility with your working hours
Flexible working hours help the mother a lot. She manages her time around her child’s school errands, holidays, endless hospital appointments and ongoing hospital treatments and her clients’ assignments. She can catch up with her work at night at home or sitting next to her child’s hospital bed or anywhere as long as she has a smartphone or a laptop.
She agrees with her client the assignment completion time in advance. She would then complete the assignment within the agreed deadline and deliver. She always delivers her work on time.
No one boss your around
This is the best part. She does not have anyone to boss her around. She is her own boss.
Stress-free
No one pressure the mother to finish her work before she can take leave to care for her child or make her feel bad that when she has to take an emergency leave to care for her child.
She is stress free.
Freedom to run your business the way you see fit
Being your own boss gives you the freedom to run your business the way you see fit your vision. The six honest serving-men can serve your business well.
“I Keep Six Honest Serving Men …”
I keep six honest serving-men
(They taught me all I knew);
Their names are What and Why and When
And How and Where and Who.
I send them over land and sea,
I send them east and west;
But after they have worked for me,
I give them all a rest.
I let them rest from nine till five,
For I am busy then,
As well as breakfast, lunch, and tea,
For they are hungry men.
But different folk have different views;
I know a person small—
She keeps ten million serving-men,
Who get no rest at all!
She sends’em abroad on her own affairs,
From the second she opens her eyes—
One million Hows, two million Wheres,
And seven million Whys!”
― Rudyard Kipling,
For example:
- How do you price your products or services?
- Where your business is to base when starting up? maybe at home initially and later move to an office.
- What are your target customers and market?
- Why avoid working with a certain type of people? For example, very fussy people and hard to please type of people would drain your energy out fast. You are better off working with positive-minded people.
- When to hire people in and expand your business?
- Who do you want to collaborate with in your business?
Start a business give you financial independence
Of course, we are all in business to make money. However, the mother with a child mentioned earlier, she makes money but money in itself is not her main motivator. Her big WHY is her main motivator. She uses her business is to give her the flexibility to support her child’s needs.
For this reason, she does not accept every assignment comes her way. She only accepts assignments that she is confident she can deliver the work on time. For those assignments that she thinks she cannot help she would pass them on to other reliable associates that deliver the high-quality work.
Security
You secure your own future. In the sense that you create your solid business now to support you till you are ready to retire. Comparing to working for other people, you face the risk of being sacked or made redundant.
Starting a business motivate you to gain new skills
You would undoubtedly learn new skills in starting a business. Say you are a quantity surveyor, you have required professional skill and training for your quantity surveying course, training and work experience. You provide quantity surveying services to your clients. A great start to your business.
Create your own business website
You may also consider having a website to promote your quantity surveying services and provide the basic information to your potential customers. If you know how to set up a website then great news for you. If you don’t, not to worry, you can learn to set up one. It is very easy.
Most domain names and hosting providers provide one-stop service to enable you to create your business website swiftly. For example, You can buy a domain name of your choice and buy an affordable hosting package. Usually, the hosting package comes with a website builder software that allows creating your own business website.
A few of companies that provide such services are listed below
- Fasthosts
- Heart Internet
- Go Daddy
- Wix.com
Design your own company logo
You can design your own logo using “canva” app. It is free and they have lots of free logo templates to get you started. Even if you do not have design skill, you can just choose a free template you like, change the wording to your company name and you are good to go.
Get to work with other professionals when you start a business
You can handle your own company legal affairs if you are familiar with the Companies Act. Otherwise, we strongly recommend seeking professional advise and help. You can seek advice from an accountant deciding whether to start a business using a limited company or a sole proprietorship and what are the pros and cons.
If you are intending to set up a limited company, you may make the application yourself to Companies House, or use the service of a company formation accountant or a solicitor to help you.
Thereafter, you would require an accountant to help you with your company accounts, corporation tax returns and confirmation statement filings with Companies House and HM Revenue and Customs.
The benefits of having an accountant to help you are that you save time in terms of creating your accounting system and data recording system for your business that serve the legal filings needs and also for your business management purposes.
Tough time don’t last
You risk being made redundant or let go when the economy is no good. The same goes with running a business, you would risk making a loss too. A good example here would be this COVID pandemic, some businesses are severely impacted by the government legislation to control the spread of the virus, i.e. businesses that serve the tourism industry like the restaurants, airlines, hotels and so on.
On top of that the fear of being infected with the virus and the chances of surviving it can also make you reluctant to make a business transaction especially if you business involved face to face dealing.
Your big WHY would keep you going in this situation. There is a saying “there is a will, there is a way.” The government offer financial support including loans to businesses severely impacted by the pandemic.
Besides, there are also many free online courses available to businesses on how to create a website, use social media to attract customers and to sell online.
We hope that sharing our insights in deciding whether to start a business will help you to find your big WHY and move forward.
