Hi all,
Hopefully nice to have some lighter discussion here given the current situation. I'm currently employed in industry after working in practice for about 7 years, the last 15 months I've been building up my own portfolio of clients, building brand etc.
I'm now at the point of considering moving to full-time business, since I hate the company I work for (it makes me utterly drained and miserable). My business salary + divs cover around 70% of my household bills but I have savings to dip into that'd see me secure for 12 months (36 with Universal Credit, but I feel guilty to utilise that) on business income & drip fed savings.
Long story short, I'm nervous to make the leap but know time is sparse and it needs to happen someday soon, I'm not sure if I have the capacity to replace income fully without doing a bit of a sh*t job for some clients. So, when did everyone here make the leap? I'd be really interested to hear of any experiences and opinons.
I have a child, home and full-time mum as a wife so income generation falls on my shoulders. Naturally I want to push business as much as possible but need the time.
Thanks!
Replies (36)
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This should be your biggest driver.......... since I hate the company I work for (it makes me utterly drained and miserable).
Could you leave the main job, continue building up your practice and whilst doing so see if there's any sub contract work you could do for a local firm?
Personally, I think ultimately the jump should be when you are either confident or know for sure, that the income you will be receiving will meet the personal costs you have.
A lot of people, for a few years, will have to juggle building up their own business, whilst still receiving income from another, until the point where their own business can sustain the level of income needed to pay your own bills.
I personally, wouldn't want to make the switch and just prey that I get enough work to cover my bills at some point, id want to be sure.
If that means working all hours, then that's what it takes.
If you are applying these sorts of hours to a part time practice whilst only covering a part of your full time earnings then either you are paid a really high salary in your full time role or you are massively undercharging your P/T practice clients.
I was earning gross fees of 20% of my full time salary doing on average 4 hours work a week on private client work (It actually tended to be bursts of activity, 12 hours say April,Jul,Oct, Jan and 15 hours May,Aug,Nov and Feb, the remaining hours then spread across the year) and maybe 2 hours average a week on non billable activities. If you are really clocking in the hours indicated I suspect something is adrift with your business model.
Maybe instead think about growing by buying some fees as an alternative approach, whilst you may consider your current marketing has limited cost it really does have a significant cost, your time.
An alternative is buy in the marketing from A N Other using some of the monies accumulated to date by the business.
I set up out of necessity. I was on long term sick and couldn't hold down a day job. That was 17 years ago.
You can probably get some sub-contract work on the side whilst building up your client base. You might only get £20/hour on it, but its better than nothing and could add (Say) £1k a month for the first year for 1-2 days a week.
I second that. Sub-contracting in another practice also helps to add to your practice experience.
I second that. Sub-contracting in another practice also helps to add to your practice experience.
Definitely!
Gives you other contacts to bounce ideas off too!
I would be very wary of making the jump until the Covid crisis is over. We have the mother of all recessions round the corner and you don't want to find yourself having left secure employment and then half your clients disappear. On the other hand if millions are losing their jobs then a good chunk of them will be starting their own businesses, so your services could be even more in demand. It's difficult to predict what's in store.
Appearances of diversity can be an illusion, so many business activities are nourished by other business activities and the connecting chains can sometimes not be that obvious until they start being impacted by things happening in a different sector that on first sight seems totally unconnected but on closer examination are linked.
For instance there are fairly obvious ones like no live football matches impacts outside catering vans impacts burger suppliers/roll suppliers, impacts wholesalers, impacts farms.
Less obvious, we have two event companies as tenants, they are obviously suffering, but we also have a joiner as a tenant which builds sets for events/films/adverts,at first glance cancellation of events like Edinburgh Festival/Royal Highland Show etc would not be considered to have a major impact on a joiner, but in this case they do, I suspect it they cannot quickly fill order book elsewhere it may be terminal.
We are likely in for the mother of all recessions/more likely a depression, an awful lot of clients will not survive- we are already risk evaluating our tenants and accountants, when they draw breath from all they are being currently required to do, ought to be doing similar with their clients.
My point is choosing the correct time to jump from the ship, when the lifeboat is at the top of a wave or is in a trough.
However sorry to have even bothered you making the point, I will not bother responding further.
Perhaps you should have mentioned the shaky job position in the first instance. But why would you not stay until the ship has sunk if its not that far off then get even what little payout there is, if with your new portfolio you cannot meet all your costs. Having a job you dont like is not all about you when you have a family to consider.
Or just jump! Youve clearly made your mind up. You can always send your wife out to work part time if you cannot pay your bills. That assuming she can find a job with this mother of all recession that is heading out way.
If I was tunnelling in on anything, it was quite frankly your rudeness to DJKL!
You say you are prefer to take charge of your life, yet you are having to ask the question of strangers as to whether or not you should jump.
No successful entrepreneur ever had to ask anyone else if they should go for it. Just get on with it if you believe in yourself.
Just thought I’d chime in here again as an update since there was such negativity - as usual from AW.
I made the leap full time a month after this thread and now c. £100k turnover and employing 2nd staff member so stfu to the doomers.
Gosh, you have definitely showed us by posting this. You have undoubtedly also come out as the better person by not taking any past objections personally.
Oh, hang on. You have provided no proof that what you said is true. You have also resurrected a thread that is nearly a year old to post this, which just comes across as petty.
Way to take the high ground there.
I started 32 years ago when I was made redundant from a practice, was living at home with the parents and had always wanted to run my own business so it was a 'no-brainer' for me!
I started very small, didn't steal clients from my former employer (which I could easily have done but didn't) and also worked on an ad-hoc subcontract basis for a couple of other local firms which worked out very well whilst building up my own practice.
The only advertising I did was local directories etc (as we didn't have the internet then!) and I found really simple and cheap ads worked a treat i.e. in the village journal and the parish news which cost very little and got me plenty of local work as I travelled to clients at that time so didn't want to waste time going further afield than necessary.
Nowadays I work from an office in the centre of town and rarely visit clients unless they are large enough (fee-wise) to warrant it or there is some other reason i.e. lack of mobility etc and the work is still paying the bills and sometimes I even enjoy it!
Good luck!
work out what your commitment is on your own practice. ...say 3 days a week
call the local big firms and offer them 2 days a week to fill up the spare days.
When you get to working 60 hours a week. on both ... pack the subbies job in...
When you get to working 100 hours a week on just your clients- hire an assistant
thats what I did
Good luck
Sorry to dampen your ardour but if you can't make up your own mind how can you advise others? It's not just a question of taking on clients. You have to know what you are doing and feel confident in your ability to advise, not just put a set of accounts together. Take a good look at yourself and ask the question. Can I give clients the confidence that I know what I'm doing and that my advise is sound? If the answer is yes, stop dithering and get on with it.
I was lucky - my employer made the decision for me by retiring and suggesting I went self-employed so I could still work for him P/T as he wound up the business. I kept it P/T while my kids were small but suddenly I was a single mum and needed a F/T income. I grew it slowly with child tax credits filling the gap until there was enough work. I did subcontracting for other accountants too.
Don't under estimate the power of locality unless you are in a city. I'm in a small country town and get so many clients because they want someone local. This means tapping into local advertising/news streams somehow (e.g.facebook boards etc).
Also, you mention how bad you feel about your current employment - it may be dragging you down a lot, and once you are free you can spread your wings and do well. Ignore the doom and gloom merchants, but be flexible. If you are excellent you will take clients from the poor accountants and they are the ones who will crash and burn in a depressed economy. Don't be anything less than excellent.
Good luck!
Starting out is really hard and it takes a long while to make a living. You need a lot of clients.
I found this forum indispensable.
If you go down the full time practice route (and I agree with DJKL that now is the wrong time to hand in your notice), then I suggest that you are a bit more gracious to the regular posters who have used their precious time and expertise to reply to you as you will no doubt be back here needing support.
Yesterday Rishi announced more handouts and one of my longest and most stable clients asked how to close his business. So take your time as it is changing day by day.