When to start taking employees on board ?

The answer to the above question is completly dependent on the Type of business. In my case, the company is just a specialized distribution unit (The manufacturing company does everything as per my design and delivers it to me). I have been doing all work by myself, from office cleaning to CEO meetings, but i just have started relaizing that in about 2 months time i should have 1/2 employees. I have to convert all the contract technicians to Permanent technicians.

Based on the input from many business owners, they suggest to start employing someone when we exactly know what the new employee is going to be doing for the next 5 months, if we do not know that, it might not be the right time to get an employee. This decission is very important as the costs start exponentially increasing when permanent employee gets on board, their travel allowances, their holidays, their salary, their welfare fund, their personal development. So carefull thought is necessary before emplyoment decission is taken. Also the business becomes answerable to the government, if there is any issues with the employee.

Few other business owners suggest that, when the business owner feels that he cannot handle all by himself or feels he is doing lots of things, then start recruiting, but since "feeling" is perspective based idea, i would not go with this option.

With me i will wait untill i know what the new employee will be doing for 5 months. The contract employee are costing higher but i will have to continue the same for a while.

First generation enterprenuers - After 2.5 months

After a bit of gap i am back on track to write blogs.

We have a general feeling that the first 3 months in any business would be the hardest, atleast i was thinking that after 3 months of struggle it should start getting easier, but it is turning opposite.

For the first 2 months, the only contacts you have are the people you know and friends contact. No special marketing just word of mouth. By the end of 2 months, your contacts base is empty. During the 3 month there might be a maximum of one lead because of your previous contact. By the end of 3rd month, no contacts, no orders, meaning its time to do external marketing or time to spend time and money, on Marketing your product.

I am on the verge of completing my 2nd month of business and my contact list is already empty, i have started with Direct Marketing.

My score rate for proper profit making orders is 0 currently. Huge amount of stress is building up as this is stage where money out is fast and Money in is NIL.

Any comments please suggest.

The Struggle - The Experience

I am still in the same state as far as the orders are concerned, but i have made few contacts which i believe are very good contacts. I also got a chance to get to the government level seniors, great experience, i am happy to have convinced them to provide 50% subsidy to farmers if they put my water treatment unit, now i have to catch farmers who would buy my unit. I used to think it is easy to get contacts, but it is not easy. We might know many people, but contacts would not turn into possible messenger for our business, lots of hard work and repeated follow up seems to be very required. I can now see why many do not continue to do business, its the initial struggle, when we talk about business we do know there will be struggle, we cannot imagine the extent of struggle we might have to go through, when seen practically there are 1000's of factors which forces you to feel, its tough and gets you depressed, few people who have failed also give discouraging comments, equiping ourselves to handle these, is a key factor for an Enterprenuer.

With me, i am now in a state where i feel there is lots of long term opportunities, but short term lots of pain to suffer. Pain is very emotionally related and sometimes can be financially related, for now i am not under financial trouble, thanks to my U.K employers for 4.5 years. Pain can be Like a customer would give you an appointment for 10A.M and makes you wait for 5 hrs as if he is doing a favour and meet you at 3:00P.M. and speak to you as if you made him wait ha ha ha. I have made one possible customer just because of waiting for hours, he is supposed to be very arrogant to many people, but he was very silent and soft when speaking to me, may be bcos he made me wait. I hope he would give some leads, lets see.

Fear of not getting orders sometimes pushes me down, but i have read many business articles where Business people wait for years to get their orders. Also my Dad and mom are very encouragind and they give me examples of perseverance. Also few very good friends, keep on encouraging me, i am blessed to have such people around me. I am confident of getting big orders in 2-3 months, or may be 6-8 months, whatever it may be, all i am going to put is Hard work, extreme hard work, everyone believes there is always returns for hard work. I too believe in it, lets see what hard work means ha ha ha.

There is a saying "To meet the GOD, you might have to first meet GOD's messenger", similarly to meet the actual official who can authorise some purchase, we might have to speak to 10 people on the way, even the security to the door would ask 100's of questions. I had same sort of experience in one of the insititutes, Oh My God, each of these people want your Bio-Data ha ha ha...Not sure how many of these i might have to go through untill customers contact me for orders.

Great new exciting world of Business. Lots of learning and lots of sturggle seems to be very necessary.

Perseverence - Lesson

Last week was travelling week, i visited 6 different places in 4 days. It was really difficult task, it became even more difficult when i could not manage to confirm a single order at the end. The lesson which i have learnt is "i was approaching the wrong people". They were people who have heard of Water treatment but know nothing about that. There was one case when i was worried about not wearing a formal shirt to meet the client, it turned out that the client was a farmer who did not even wear a shirt/tshirt on ha ha. This sector seems to be very unorganised. After all the struggle, i was a bit upset, so spoke to few friends. Now i can see what perseverance means. Today i am starting the day with lots of hope and i have decided not to give up however long it takes. I spoke to one my friend who is in Granite Industry, he was saying it took 3 years to get his first order, that sorted me out.

When investment keeps on going and you do not see anything coming back to you, it is easy to loose hope, but it is all definetly exciting and different when compared to siting in the same place for hours doing same task again and again and always wanting to do something differnt and exciting.

My First Order

Its been 14 days since i am here in Bangalore. Everyday has been very tiring. I have finished off the registration work. Did multiple trips to Salem to get trained in Water treatment systems. For now the biggest problem in see here is HEALTH. Its easy to get your health spoilt when you travel. The other problem i am facing now is Internet and Phone line connections. These things looks like very easy but if you are doing it all yourself it can be very daunting. I have got my first Reverse osmosis unit order, i feel really happy to have received my first order but not able to enjoy it because of few health problems. My advice to anyone starting a business is

1) However busy you are, keep you health. It is very difficult to enjoy your success in Business if the health does not permit you.

2) Perseverence is a key point, i have been in "Swades" or "Desam" style environment, each day can be very difficult physically in a hot weather. Keep up your motivation. Hopefully i can keep up with it.

3) Note each and every Rupee you spend, even say Rs10 on Business, note it. Small amount mounts to a huge value.

4) I have spent 50% of my investment already...though i did not spend it on anything concrete.

My life's D day - Moving out of London

There are not many Days in Life which is sometimes most looked forward and sometimes
not expected. Both may or may not have have component which can defenitly change the way you live forever. In 2 days i will face my life changing day. I am moving out of London for good after 4 years 2 months. When you get used to a place, have lots of close friends it is very difficult to move. I have been going around london taking picture of places where i had to face tough times of my life and places where i was at my careers peak(So far). This day may lead me to a very bright future, i hope so or it may lead me back to London not hoping though and less likely. Anyway this day is Star marked in my lifes Diary. I will miss 40, Lime street, London and the Broadgate where i worked for the past 3 years, work friends, great college friends. Wow what a life i had, i can imagine the great office night outs, give office tours, an independent life with no support from anyone. All the good times now comes in front of me, its a tough decession i make for my future. Those of you who a looking to take risk like this, i am the example. Statistics shows Working in the London's Square mile is one of fond of places to work for 3/4 of worlds population, i think i belong the other 1/4 population and working in Investment has recently been in the top wanted, is it a big thing to loose, i don't think so, may be there is a bigger future for me...who knows ?

I would ink 2 days so far in my life as D day's

1) Day I left to London, without job and not good at all financially.
2) Day I would be leaving to Bangalore (2 days 2 go), with a bigger dream for me and hopefully for our society.

Changes leading you away from Comfort zone:

Whenever we decide to start a new career in a completly different field / place, there are so many factors which affects emotionally.

1) Going out of comfort zone.
When i left India first time (4 years ago) i missed my family, my friends, missed all funny parties/ dances i used to attend, bike rides / shalimar pub. I felt i am never going to get all those back in my life. But to my surprise i got everything back, i had even more greater fun with office mates, parties which were even more funny, saw great places and great experiences from different cultures, spoke to parents even more often, trips to India every six months. Therefore i believe any passion oriented change in life is the path for more gains and more happiness in life, may be we might have to face short term pains.

2) Not getting discouraged

Most people in the world are risk averse, any sound of risk would take them back. Such friends would give comments, that can be discouraging, take these as positive signs. Remember average person always fears changes.

3) Self motivated

I am trying to be as much self motivated as possible by writing such blogs, which helps me now and may be one day for others.

4) Proper planning

Planning enough, so that the change does not seem that big a risk. If enough planning is done, the huge risk as perceived by others would seem not that big a risk from your perspective.

5) Being independent

There are many cases that 100's of people would say they will help you, but be independent. E.G someone agree to finance your business, they might not, when time comes therefore have atleast 3 backup for suh cases.