Looking for advice, "too much work"

Hi everyone, I am rapidly approaching a major decision. Although not a direct PLC question, it is geared for the other contractors out there.

I currently have one customer that has asked that I spend as much time at his operation as possible indefinately, I am working there 6-10hour days on contract. As a result, I have had to turn down several smaller jobs. There are several local mills that also want me to do maintenance, repairs, and automation projects. And a friend of mine from Alberta just called me let me know that anothere mill wants me to come up and do a complete survey of all of the hydraulics and pneumatics, this is way in the door to thier organization that would probably lead to more work.

Do I just shut up and work the full time job on contract, or do I try to hire someone or contract another Tech to do the smaller jobs and in doing so increase my market presence and try to juggle all of it at once? My overhead is very low, so I probably would be able to get a pretty good person to help.


If anyone that has run thier own business want to give some advice please do so.

Thanks,

Willpower

Well , I would take the second course of action - however , can you ever trust anyone to take the same care or have the same devotion as you do ? Remember that many people are strictly 9-5 , come five they are on their bikes and home , and where does that leave you .
If you can find someone who really has an interest , then you may well have to pay a bit more . In truth , you may only increase the headache for the same profits ,
but you are not self employed just for the money are you !!?

Thanks for the input FFred, this is just it, how do you find someone with the same drive as me, I thought of going to the Tech schools here and finding someone, thenyou know he has the will to learn, and I could employ them on the weekends, when they dont have school.

As long as I could show them what to do, and they will do it, it wouold work. But finding someone will be hard.

This is no simple answer.

1. Raise rate until you have the business you can handle. Save the excess for the bad times when the saw mill industry slows down.

2. Hire a person. That is a BIG step. There is a lot of administrative costs involved with hiring the first person. These admin costs will keep you from the field. In good times you have to find a way from keeping your employees form making your accounts their accounts and leaving. In bad times you a shed the least productive employee.

3. Keep the best accounts and recommend to the other accounts someone else with skills that match their needs.

Unless you want to become a manager rather than a doer I would stay away from option two although it may have the most potential. If you want to stay a one man show the options 1 and 3 are the best. In both of these cases you will still be narrowing your customer base which could be bad when the economy gets soft.

I like option 1 for its simplicity and making the time you do work worth it.

Thanks for the input Peter, I do not like the idea of letting all my other business go as that puts all of my fish in one basket, I dont mind doing the management part, I have done it before, my wife helps with the books anyways, so administrationis kind of taken care of. What if I looked for someone to take on as an apprentice/future partner? Let me mull the rest of what you said in my head for a while.

I dropped everything to take care of two large customers. I was doing as much as everyone else in the area combined. Biggest customer (2/3 of my work) decided to hire and do in house, OUCH! Number two customer, decides to do 50% in-house, OUCH.

So, I loose 5/6 of my business, in a down area/down economy. The end result a year later wasn't quite that bad, but still haven't recovered.

Multiple small incomes will always be better then one big one.

My big customer usually had 6-10 projects going on at once. I could generally get paid at 20% completion, 60%, and 100%. I saw money coming every week or two.

Small customer is extremely slow paying, I'm still waiting to be paid for December, when he gets back from Mexico. Even offered 12% discount if he would pay within a couple of weeks. tems are pay on receipt of bill, like that reallly happens.

Way back when I was hired help, getting paid weekly was great. Getting paid every two weeks was okay, but not great. Then, getting switched from rwo weeks to rwice a month doesn't sound like much of a change, but was disaster. I did some projects at CAT, and many of there guys get paid ONCE a month, some do okay, it ruins others.

When you are self employed, creditors don't believe that you might not get paid every month.

Bottom Line - Have as many checks coming as often as possible, even if that means several little customers VS one big one eating all your time.

When it comes time to pay the bills, it really helps. I have done "exclusive" for single customers many times. I would have liked to been juggling 2, or 3, or 4 projects, but any current Mr. Big usualy won't like it. It is difficult to be an independent. If you can get an arrangement for a quasi-partner, or some part-timers, that probably would be best.

I have seldom ever turned down work, but it will happen in 10 days, when Mr. Big says jump, and still owes me for two or three months, demanding exclusive use of my time. Sorry, not this time.

No matter what you decide, it will probably be wrong, or you will think it was.

Best Wishes, I hope it works out.

We could post a poll, asking the group for a definitive answer, but probably the best choice will be long meditation, a little (lot) of prayer, and ultimately a coin toss.

best regards.....casey

You need to answer one fundamental question. Do you want to create a career for yourself, or do you want to create a business? Once that question is answered the rest become mere details of strategy.

The "right" answer to that is known only to you. There are benefits and pitfalls to both paths, and the needs and desires of your family should have as much bearing on the answer as your own needs and desires.

Don't rush into anything, and remember that either decision can be reversed at some future date.

Think of the worst that could happen with either choice. Then ask yourself if you can live with that outcome. This is a great technique for making decisions.

Thanks everyone for the input, please keep it coming. Whats best for my family? Well, to have a secure and profitable business. This has been the plan for many years, and it looks like we are starting to get to that point now.

I am leaning towards finding someone who wants to learn and maybe a good partner with the same ideas as mine.

Tom , I like your worse case scenario, I am going to look at it that way.

Thanks all,

Will

warning! ... philosophy ahead ...

Greetings Will,

Whats best for my family? Well, to have a secure and profitable business.

Click to expand...

no offense, but I'd suggest that you rethink that one ... many lives have been ruined by that particular approach ... most wives, and all kids, would NOT agree with this choice of priorities ...

as for your basic question ... look ahead into the future ... one year ... two years ... five years ... ten years ... where do you want to be at each of those points in time? ... what type of work do you want to be doing then? ... how much money will you need to be making? ... how much quality-time will you want to have available to spend with your family? ... once you have a set of goals established, then start looking at ways to “make it happen” ... each step along the way should be carefully examined with the following question in mind: “will a step in this particular direction move me closer to my goal – or further away from it?” ... keep going back to that list of goals and reevaluating your progress – or lack thereof ...

basic idea: if you don’t know where you want to go in life, how will you know how to get there? ... and equally important, how will you know when you’ve arrived? ...

I wish you every success ...

I tried hooking up with another independant field tech; we would call each other in on larger jobs. Kinda works. We have somewhat different, but overlapping skill sets. IE. I may not be able to send him on a certain job, and, vice-versa.

We spent several months working for a BIG GUY, I would NOT recommend it.

I agree with Peter - raise your rates. Especially for the Big Guy; you can't afford to only be in one place. You will lose your other customers and he WILL let you go.

A main concern (and I speak from experience) is what happens if you can't work do to injury or illness. Your 'partner' won't want to carry you while you lay in Intensive Care for 3 weeks- nor you him. Maybe contract out?

So....I don't know. If you find out, let us know.

Rod (The CNC dude)

agree

Hi Will
I agree with Rod and Peter raise your rates until you start losing more business than you want to. Then come down a little and this will put you at the top of what the market will bear. I`ve been self employed for over 30 years 12 of those years was a partnership. There was never a cross word spoken, but about 15 years ago we went our separate ways. I would not vote for a partnership some work out most don`t. Like yours alot of our business was sawmills not plc and controls, but wiring and mechanical. The problems are the same when it comes to good help. If you can find someone pay him what he`s worth and charge at least 50% more for his labor. Work for the companies that will let you make a fair profit let the other ones knit-pick someone else. You make your money when you buy something not when you sell it. Sell what you can make a profit on and don`t fool with rest if you don`t have to. Every now and then you`ll buy something right and be able to mark it up 2% that`s cost * 2. Never was good at MATH. Make hay while the sun is shinning, because after 50 your work habits will most likely change.
Good Luck

Will...

If you have any kind of "people skills" (quite unlike myself) and you "know" your competitors... maybe you can workout a deal with one of your smaller, capable competitors to "share-the-load".

This is risky as hell but, two guys with integrity (I assume you have integrity) can work something out.

It would be simply a case of you "throwing work to your friend" and your "friend" throwing work to you. In good times, both of you might be overloaded, either by private trade or shared trade. As times get thin then each of you would simply hold what you have.

If you could find a real "friend" in the trade, then it could be a "Win-Win" for the both of you. It really means developing a personal relationship with the other guy (no kissing... pleeeease.).

But again, I say, this can be risky as hell!

Of course... there is this REALLY BIG potential booger standing in the wings... how good are you? Are you so much better than your competitors that they want to be like you? Or are they better than you? Are they so much better that you wouldn't want any of them to be able to get their hands onto your accounts?

Only YOU know the honest answers to those questions. If you KNOW you are better, then I say take the risk.

BTW, don't pick a "friend" that is too inadequate. Pick a "friend" where you both feed off of each other.

It just might be the case that some of your competitors are running into the same situation... they might be looking at you as not being "too inadequate".

If you do this... do the right thing and play fair... even if you get burned a time or two... give it a chance.

Very risky... however, potentially, a wind-fall!

Arrangements like this have worked in the past... very well! Look at Ben & Jerry!

(380)

Terry has a point

I agree with the previous posters...... many small jobs
versus one big one.... many smaller accounts vs. one
big one.

Growth after the project completion is a concern

There are too many of us in this business that someone can
call.... good suppliers mostly.

One thing I try to remind myself is that doing a good job
for someone simply gets you a chance to do another job
for them. Politics and accounting notwithstanding, when
you live 'job-to-job', you always have to look beyond the
one you're working on.

Partnerships between suppliers are a good thing, so long as
everybody has shared risk and shared reward. THIS is the
tricky part, but, if you have someone you trust to work
with on some project, then you'll likely be able to build
a relationship that works in both directions.

Good luck....you've got a problem that I bet lots of folk
would like to have....

I have been on my own for over six years now, and even considered once to hire someone to help me out. But after running the numbers, I decided against it, because it would have been too much of a hassle with very little return. Look at it like this: To get someone that you can send to a job site alone for a week at a time (which means he'll be experienced and skilled), you'll have to pay some pretty decent wages and benefits. By the time I pay the entire burden cost, and then the taxes on the profit that I make from his labor, I wouldn't have been left with enough to make it worth it.

On the other hand, if you just need someone to help you out on a job and is under your direct supervision, then it might be worth it. But you might have a problem with some customers if you try to send him out on his own for the same rate that you would normally charge.

And as a general note to others that might consider going on their own: Don't expect to get paid on a regular basis. When I made the leap, I had three months of living expenses saved up, and I have been able to maintain that spread. I never get paid in under 30 days, but on the other hand I have never been stiffed either. But I would never want to be in the position where I would even give a hint to the customer that I might be stretched for money.

Hi again everyone, to update, I had another call from a customer I havn't done any work for in some time. They were bought out and would like to know if I want to service thier fleet locally as well as in two other cities.

I am taking this as a sign that says, "hire Techs" for whatever it may be worth in the long run, I am not going to turn this kind of business away any longer. Thanks everyone for the insight, I appreciate it, and its what makes these forums so valuable.

Willpower
www.scsfp.com