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The nuclear plant in the second floor apartment
Tuesday, April 1st, 2008OK, now I really got your attention 
What’s this nuclear plant in a second floor apartment? Am I going crazy or maybe it’s a good moment to call SRI (the Romanian “brother” of the more famous CIA)? Or maybe I need some medication (you know, those nice things we are offered daily in the spam we can’t live without.
No, I am not mad and I didn’t fall in the April Fools Day trap either, I am just presenting an idea I got today while going home with a taxi. This nuclear plant in an apartment stands for any weird business idea we might have that is very hard to be put to work.
One of the first things you need to ask yourselves when thinking about a business is: “Can I really manage this?”. I had a friend who wanted to start a kindergarten in a 5 rooms apartment with a very very small yard. She said she’s so passionate when it comes to kids, that it just didn’t matter. And since I have the talent of ruining other people’s dreams I was able to shatter this in few well asked questions:
- you know you need: a dorm, a large bathroom, a sport hall and a kitchen (at least), these are the rules in my country;
- you know you have to hire teachers, janitors, a nurse at least;
- you know you need more space in the yard;
- you know you won’t be able to make some money from the few kids unless you ask for some huge prices no one will pay;
- you know no one would bring their kinds in this dump.
She was a bit mad at me for no letting her dream, but she eventually agreed that I do know what I am talking about (I should after spending my high-school years learning to be a kindergarten teacher).
I also have my dreams: I would love creating furniture or having a custom car painting firm. No, I don’t have experience in either of them, but I am sure my passion and hard work might help me. And who cares I am a woman. But I cannot do any of these. I don’t have the space needed, I cannot even use my vacuum cleaner without making my neighbrours angry. So my business ideas remain in the “daydream” stage. I know I’d made some awesome donuts too, but there’s no place for such heavy cooking.
So, to end this hectic article: we need to know if our business plan is really viable. If we can afford the space, if the business plan is guaranteeing us some future earnings at least. If this is something we can do and not as utopic as my nuclear plant in the apartment.
Sometimes we fail to notice the most obvious things.
Do you hate working? Start your own firm!
Wednesday, March 12th, 2008
It was yesterday. I was looking again at some new blogs and scanning through the content. I don’t read, I skim (until I find something worthy of my time and then I am getting more inclined to actualy read). There was a project with an article that would encourage the readers to start their own business, if they really hated working.
What I could understand from that article was something like “Do you hate working? Start your own firm!”.
I couldn’t agree less with this statement and I consider this in the end to be a BAD REASON to start a firm. Why have I started my own firm?
- because I wanted to work more. Yeah, I was feeling like I am not reaching my true potential there and knew I can do more (more…)
You’d like to hire me as a specialist and pay me as the janitor
Tuesday, March 11th, 2008Some days ago I was approached by a friend of mine who’s also got an advertising firm. We had some small projects together and I was offered a job as a web developer in his company. I do have my own small firm, but in the end some more money won’t hurt. Right?
So we met to discuss the conditions of my ‘employment’ and of course the price I am willing to work for. As you can imagine, after 6 years of doing this web design thing, having my own 24 sites and tens of others created for my clients, plus many clients at my door to work with them, my money request wasn’t too small.
I am already a specialist in this field and he knew that. This is the reason I was approached since he knew my portfolio and he needed my services. Still, when we started chatting he realized he cannot afford “hiring” me. He was willing to pay a way lower price for me to work on the firm and I wasn’t willing to work for pennies anymore.
3 years ago I worked for a design firm. I had only 3 years of experience, I was still a so-so designer. My own network was still small (6-7 sites instead of 24 as I own now) and of course my wage couldn’t be too big). Still, in all these years my experience grew exponentialy, I have worked on so many sites it just makes me sick and you can imagine now I know my value on the market.
Here are some small conclusions I drew, maybe they’ll help others too:
1. KNOW your value and be realistic. Don’t ask for a huge salary when you know you are less experienced, don’t sell your skin for less than it’s worth though.
Start your own business NOW .. the things they didn’t tell you
Friday, March 7th, 2008I think this kind of motivational article is always good. There are many good things into getting on your own and stop working on that 9 to 5 program. There is money to be made and happiness to be found. I like such articles. It makes people understand that a bit of a risk is OK. And that they can do MORE than just working “for the man”.
What I totally dislike is the fact most such articles just brag about the positives and don’t tell their readers about the possible problems they might run into.
Working on your own might be the best thing that happens to you or the thing that ruins your life forever. Let’s set the record straight and try to see through the “fancy talk”.
Here are the things THEY DIDN’T TELL YOU:
You won’t make it without a lot of work
Tuesday, February 26th, 2008
I recall 1 year ago, when I first started working on my own web design firm, my first thought was: “Oh, my God, I am gonna be my own boss”.
I worked some years ago for someone else in the position I have now (web designer) and it served me as a great experience too. After I left there, all the information I gained served me so well when starting my own small firm.
One of the most important things I learnt was that YOU WON’T MAKE IT WITHOUT A LOT OF WORK. My boss was the same age as I was, a young and classy woman. She wasn’t that desperate to make the business work since she had quite a relaxed financial situation. She never too her job seriously, thinking that being the boss means only telling others what to do.
When I started my own design firm I was afraid. I know she still hasn’t got a good business plan, she doesn’t earn as much as needed to be in a profit and she could file on bankruptcy at any time with that firm since it’s a “dead baby from birth”.
What made her fail? What makes a business fail in the end?
1. You cannot run a business just on weekends
Or when you feel like working. There were days she wouldn’t show up at work, days she would rest or have fun. I could totally relate to this: it’s better to have fun at 25 than work your mind off. Still, relaxation doesn’t make a business strong. So, you cannot take too many days off or have a relaxed program. It would show.
2. Weekends? What are they? Ah, I get it, 2 more days of work in a week.
One thing I have learnt for sure in this year is that the weekend is also a good time to work. When you have just started and the business is slowly picking up, there are not too many weekends to relax on. In 2007 I had 2 weekends off: both times I was in Germany with my boy friend, so I couldn’t work. All the other 50 ones I spent relaxing for 2-3 hours and working for 10 at least in a day.
3. “Nine to five” is a cute expression, don’t make your schedule on this though.
Yeah, 8 hours of work, weekends off. The typical working schedule. We hate it when we are employees, love it when we have a business and would even cut more hours from it. Sure we can do this, if we don’t want to make that business work in this century.
When you are on your own firm there is no more such a lax schedule. The working day can be 15/20 hours sometimes, if needed, the weekends can amass up to 30 hours of work again. There is no time for happy life, at least for some months.
As a conclusion: the main error in my ex-boss style of work was to not put that extra effort. We cannot keep on this crazy working schedule for too long. No one likes working for 80 hours a week and not having a minute of rest. It’s not a plan for a long time, it’s a plan for kickstarting a business, for securing those first clients and being ready for the first employees.
A good business cannot be run in a 2 hours / week schedule either. At least for the first months a new business man cannot afford too many weekends or vacations. It’s a risk you are willing to take. Your business won’t grow unless you work in an “unhuman” manner for a while. That nice 9-5 job is a past thing now: work a lot on the first months/years and then you can harvest the awesome results.
Need I say that in 1 year’s activity my small firm had few times more earnings that the firm I used to work on? I have worked for thousands of hours already, but yes, the future sounds pretty nice in my case.
