Early Retirees Thinking of Starting a Small Business Aren’t Often a Match Made in Heaven

http://accoEarly retirees thinking of leaving the workforce and starting their own small business need to think twice because it isn’t often a match made in heaven.

Many people thinking of accepting a redundancy package or accepting retirement from a job they have worked in for any number of years really fancy the idea of working for themselves. 

The thought of having more free time and control over their life is really appealing. This is hardly surprising when you consider that some people have worked in the same job and often for the same employer, for the past twenty-odd years. They have devoted a large percentage of their life to increasing the profits of the businesses they have worked so diligently for and are now considering using these skills in a small business of their own. 

The sad news is that few of these loyal souls rarely make it in a small business of their own. The reasons behind these statistics are varied but it can basically come down to one thing alone. The single cause behind most of these small business failures comes down to ‘having the right business mindset’.

So what is the ‘right’ business mindset?

A small business person, or for that matter, any person in business for themselves, thinks quite differently to someone who has worked for someone else. A person who is working for themselves tends to see offers and opportunities, where a person who has been working for someone else and has had very little input to new business opportunities, doesn’t notice or take advantage of these possibilities. Quite frankly, they simply don’t see them.

A small business person see’s potential in a product or service, where someone who has never had need to, isn’t even aware that the potential might, or could, exist. 

A small business person tends to have a mindset that is constantly fitting ‘jig-saw’ pieces together. Once those pieces have found a place, they are then mentally examined to see if money can be made from the fitting together of these pieces. If money can be made because a market is suspected to be there, then the cost to profit thinking ratio kicks in. If this is thought to have an initially good profit margin then the cost to profit factors are closely examined.

Many mid-level managers and above tend to think that because they have had managerial responsibility to one degree or another, that this equips them for owning and running their own small business. This is so far from reality and is a sad fact behind why the statistics for small business failures are so high in the first three years.