Starting your own business: pros and cons

[bilike]

Hi! Everybody would agree that there are many advantages to run your own business. You have no bosses, no schedules. You work for yourself and are very flexible. Still, not many people start their own business. So I ask you: why? What are the reasons for this? Is it not enough money? Or connections? Or courage?
In Internet you can find numerous guides how to start working for yourself with a lot of pros listed. But let us list those cons which prevent us from being self-employed.:)

[rickygips]

although there are a lot of guides on how you can start a business it is not as easy as that. One thing people are afraid of is taking the risk, it is money that you will lose if the business will not succeed.

[RSTech]

I've owned my own business for just over 5 years now which I work at full time. Although there are a great number of pros, here are some of the cons I've experienced:

1) Getting new customers. This is a real challenge. I know my skills can be applied in many companies however it is very difficult to get your foot in the door. Often times marketing dollars are spent with no return on the investment.

2) Paperwork. Processing the bills, invoices, GST, PST, taxes, customer statements, etc. is time consuming. If you're not doing it yourself you're paying someone to do it. At times this can take up to 20% of my time. That's time that I'm not making money.

3) Vacation. It is hard to get away from the business for any length of time. The customers will still call. After 3 years in business I finally decided to just schedule some vacation time but it is still difficult to take more than 1 week at a time. Long weekends are easy to take however.

4) Long hours. Now this is a funny one. With my job I have always put in long hours, just the nature of my work. That being said, my first year in business I put in less hours but that quickly changed as my business grew. 60 to 80 hours a week was very common. In this recession its not so common anymore, more like 40 hours a week now.

5) Constantly defending your prices. Customers always want to talk your price down. Doesn't matter if you are the cheapest guy in town, they want to pay less. You need to have thick skin to handle all the comments about how much you charge. I'm always being bombarded for freebies and lower rates. This has always been the case for me.

I'm sure I have a few more cons but this is a start.

[HaverCanada]

To have a Job today is more secure than to have a business.

[newincanada]

To have a Job today is more secure than to have a business.

I do not agree with you. I think that to have a business is far more secure. It all depends on you and your decisions. You are in no control of the decisions your boss makes for you and for the company and there is no job security as we saw that with the auto workers and many more people who got laid off recently!

[hockey]

although there are a lot of guides on how you can start a business it is not as easy as that. One thing people are afraid of is taking the risk, it is money that you will lose if the business will not succeed.

True. But I have always admired the people who are willing to give up their mediocre, cozy jobs and start a new and innovative startup. :D

[joberiffic]

Well it is really much better to start your own business, but you should be
ready and pretty much aware on what to do for there are so many things to
consider in starting your own business

[D.abrab]

Is it true that if you start deducting stuff like office space that it gets complicated when you sell your house?

[fdisale]

It is always good to do research before starting a business. Find similar businesses in your locality or online and note down how well they may be performing and you can add your ideas. Ask business owners how they were able to set up their business and pros and cons also, let them know that you are their competition but a curious entrepreneur.

[Frikki]

Well if it were so easy nobody would work for a boss! Even sometimes people prefer to work on somebody just not to take liability and responsibility for himself and others.. and the only way to decline is to be an employee)))
I'm just at a start point but, i've already faced some obstacles that i didn't take to a consideration.