THE NEXT STEP

from Aussie Painting Contractor February 2020

Avoiding Employee Risk

The Next Step The Next Step

As all humans living on this earth, we go through a multitude of ‘steps’ in life. We start out as a baby making silly/cute ‘goo-goo, gaa-gaa’ noises and then after a while being able to communicate in a language that is understandable. From there we grow into children, teenagers and then into adults. We go to school, go to college, get a girl/boyfriend, buy a car, get a job, break-up with the girl/boyfriend, find a new one, buy a house, get married (or not), have kids (or not), get divorced (hopefully not), find another partner and then, retire and gradually grow old (or in some cases, grow old and then retire). So as you can see, we generally go through life taking the exact same steps and in the exact same order.

Many of these ‘steps in life’ can’t be planned; they just happen as they are, part of life, but when it comes to having your own business, you can decide on your own path and the way you want it to take. For this to happen, it is imperative to have something in mind, or something in place for the direction your business should head in as it could determine the success or failure of your business.

percent by the end of the second year and seventy five percent by the fifth. This should come as no surprise when you consider that only a small number of businesses prepare a ‘Business Plan’ before they commence, in fact, only three to five percent of existing small Australian businesses prepare one.

A ‘Business Plan’ will help keep you on track. It is a simple process of making a list of items you need to undertake during the building of your business. It doesn’t matter if you’re content in just working by yourself, or if you want a larger business with many employees, in either case you need to know the ‘steps’ to take to achieve the goal you have in mind.

An important bit of advice though is to do it in an order that is achievable. You can add or swap the list around at any stage as things can change throughout the course of being in business.

Having been in the painting industry myself for over 50 years and self-employed for 37 of those years, I have personally seen many businesses attempt to go too big too fast and after a short period of time, have found themselves in financial trouble. This can easily happen to anyone.

For instance a one-person-operator hiring a lot of staff because they have been inundated with work and then not being able to pay them as cash-flow is slow. Or it could be a new business going out and purchasing new vehicles and equipment, promotional gear for the employees, expensive advertising, private plates, 1800 numbers, etc, etc, and then finding they have over-capitalised and the work has dried up.

No matter what stage you are in business, plan for the future and plan it carefully, and gradually. Make note of the steps you need to take to get there. Don’t purchase things that you can’t really afford; it can wait. The customer is first looking at the quality, professionalism and reputation of you, your work and your business. They are not looking at your expensive equipment or your fancy work vehicle. It can help, but it’s not worth going into great financial debt just for an extra acceptance here and there. So in this case, one of your steps would be; ‘Have ‘x’ amount of dollars in the bank (after all bills are paid) and purchase a spray-gun’. Another step could be; ‘Secure consistent work and employ tradesperson/s’.

Now if you’re a single operator and everything is just cruising along, you may think there’s nothing else to plan. You just ‘keep doing what you’re doing’. What about retirement though? This is a huge step that needs to be thought of 20 years before you hit that magic (scary) year. So this is where you need to take the step at putting money away into a super fund. It doesn’t have to be a lot, just make sure they are regular payments. When you get to my age of 65, you will really appreciate the monetary sacrifice you have made and also know that you won’t have to rely on a Government Pension.

I have now reached my ‘last step’ in business and that is, Retirement. I can now look forward to enjoying the rest of my life with my wife and family and it’s all due to the planning and taking the right steps to get there.