I have maybe technically been a business owner since 2020. But now I'm realizing that I simply bought out a self-employed person and I have thought and functioned much like a self-employed individual for the first couple years.

For the last couple I've been trying to think like a business owner, but I have no experience other than being thrown into the fire with it. Do y'all have any recommendations for how to get better at this? Books, mentorship, network, specific training - whatever you'd recommend. How to be a better boss, how to manage company finances, plan a year, plan for the future, etc. etc.

Any recommendations you have would be appreciated.

How confident are you in your accounting? If you want a financial plan, you must start with a solid foundation.

Unless you've got a load of cash sitting around - I would focus on getting a real honest, accurate look at free cash flow generation of the business.

That should give you an idea of the pain points and where to focus. If it's a margin issue, look at pricing/marketing...if it's a working capital issue, look at collections/payment terms/purchasing habits/inventory, if it's an overhead issue, focus on revenue/volume growth.

I think once you know where you want to focus - then the other questions you asked get a lot easier to chart a path.

Not at all.

I have a CPA that I pay a lot to that is great about answering any question I have whenever I need it. But I just track expenses in Quickbooks and send it to him at the end of the year. I feel like he does a good job with what the business and I personally wind up paying in taxes.

But Quickbooks balance sheet is wrong, what is says we have in the bank is never right. I know I list certain transactions improperly and I don't know how to run basic reports to see what recurring expenses are, recurring income, projected income, etc.

I actually had a live training session with a guy I found on Fiverr last week who walked me through some of the stuff and got some of the stuff fixed for me (some things that were categorized wrong). Maybe I need to keep doing that.

These are all good things I need to improve on, similar to Husky Boy's accounting thought.

But I actually do have a load of cash sitting around. We are doing really well this year - this month we brought in more than I've ever taken home personally in one year. That's partially what is motivating me to tighten up things: the fact that I don't want this to be a flash in the pan - I want to take what we're doing well and use it to strengthen and grow for the future.

Something else to consider is how buttoned up your liability transfer/indemnity is on whatever products/services you offer. If you can't pass along the liability, you need to make sure you are insured for it.

Terms & Conditions, Service agreements etc .... all super boring but as our internal counsel likes to tell us...It's not a big deal until it's a big f****** deal.

Hard to know what is working and what is not working, where you stand at any point in time, and what to tweak to do things better if your accounting records are not in good shape. That is where I would start. Either get the knowledge to do it (reasonably accurately) yourself (that will take a pretty decent amount of time) or pay an accountant or skilled bookkeeper to do so for you. Having someone to do it for you will be more immediate but will be more costly, but you have to measure that cost versus being in the dark as to your situation and where best to make changes. What you are doing or not doing is likely costing you more money than paying someone to get your accounting cleaned up.

Books I am going through:
Traction
Entreleadership

Pay Yourself First opened my eyes about cashflow in a true business

You'll probably get some better advice if we have a little more info about your company. What type of business is it, how many employees, etc?


One book I always recommend is Simple Numbers, Straight Talk, Big Profits by Greg Crabtree. It's got some VERY solid fundamentals about the books. It won't make you an expert, but can take you from confused to competent REALLY fast.


Someone else mentioned Traction by Gino Wickman. It's the basic playbook for running EOS (the Entrepreneurial Operating System). It takes the best of sound business practices and does a very good job of packaging it into a holistic system and process. I've been running EOS for about six years. I'm pretty active in the EOS community and I know quite a bit about the system. Would be glad to answer questions about it.

Worth mentioning that the target market for EOS is 10-250 employees and $2-$50MM. It can work for companies bigger or smaller than that, but if you're a really small company it could give you some good ideas but fully running the system probably won't be practical.


I recommend both of those books to a lot of people. I'd probably have some other recommendations if I had a better feel for your specific challenges.


You also mentioned peer groups. Joining a peer group was probably the best decision I ever made for my development as an entrepreneur. I'm in Vistage. EO is another one that is very popular. When it comes to this kind of thing I HIGHLY recommend finding a group that has some structure. Networking is great but I think being part of a structured program is 100x more effective than winging it.

Second vote for considering reading traction. I might also recommend the E-Myth.

I'm on my 8th business I've started. I've sold 2. One was temporarily successful and 4 didn't go anywhere. One I'm
in now. None have gotten bigger than $5 million of revenue.

I'd love to help more but really need some info on where you are now. Revenue? Any employees (part or full time)? How many customers? Are you pulling any money out? What are your goals (grow, hire more people, etc)?

I listed to simple numbers strait talk mentioned above based on a recommendation from this board.

That book is now the first book I recommend to anyone that owns their own business.

We used Traction in my business, and I thought it was overall quite good and helpful.

I had just ordered Traction a few days before posting this, glad to know I have something right.

We use EOS and it's been helpful, but nothing really ground breaking imo. It's helpful in that it brings structure to your meetings and gets everyone rowing in the same direction. Once we got that dialed in, everything else seems a bit repetitive.

How else are y'all getting value out of it?

MavsAg said:

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We use EOS and it's been helpful, but nothing really ground breaking imo. It's helpful in that it brings structure to your meetings and gets everyone rowing in the same direction. Once we got that dialed in, everything else seems a bit repetitive.

How else are y'all getting value out of it?

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Been meaning to respond to this.

1. Totally agree that it's not groundbreaking. Everything in the system can be found in other solid business books. To me a big part of the value is that it's flexible, and pretty all encompassing. Since I've been running on EOS, I haven't ever come across a good idea that won't fit into the system. So rather than coming to my team with some "new idea" we can tie it back to one of the EOS tools.

2. I feel like it helps us a lot with recruiting and onboarding. The system itself is the answer to a lot of common questions. How will I be evaluated, how will I prioritize, how will we work together, etc. Early in the interview process we give people a copy of What the Heck is EOS and tell them "this is how we roll." Some people really like it, for others it's not their style.

3. Overall the common language and simplicity of it all helps us go faster. I'm big on systems and this one works well for us.


Also worth noting that we work with one of the best implementers there is and she's a good fit for me and my company. I think if I did it on my own I'd mess it up and wouldn't get much out of it.

jagvocate said:

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Pay Yourself First opened my eyes about cashflow in a true business

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Do you mean "Profit First"? If so, then yes. I highly recommend this book to every self-employed person I know.


https://www.amazon.com/Profit-First-Transform-Cash-Eating-Money-Making-ebook/dp/B01HCGYTH4

Pay your taxes.