Managing Small Businesses

The interviewee’s experience with starting the business

The interviewee claims that it took him a month after he opened the garage before he began to generate revenues. He claims that the garage has no inventory that must be taken into account when calculating profitability. It’s a service-based company that has been running for six years. The proprietor, a licensed mechanical engineer, asserts that his passion for the work was the initial step in starting the company. At that point, he decided to leave his job and began making plans for how to construct the garage. He observed a market in the sector and set out to meet the needs of owners of Volkswagen cars. Since the garage offers services to the vehicle users, little capital was required and hence he secured a loan with his bank. He registered the garage as a legal business and immediately commenced business.

The greatest challenge of running a small business

The greatest challenge of running a small business is fatigue because as the owner, one has to be there all the time making important business decisions (Bridge & O’Neill, 2012). According to the engineer, he has to be at the workshop early morning and closes business in the evening. Managing the employees working in close proximity is challenging because there are high chances of piling up pressure on them and hence losing their motivation to work (Small Business for the 21st Century, 2014).

The advantages of running a small business

Running the small business enables the engineer to put his skills into practice. The service sector is all about the skills that a person possesses, and when operating the small business, the skills are fully applied in the daily business activities. Small businesses come with simple management because there are no complex managerial issues that rock business operations (Stokes, Wilson & Wilson, 2010). According to the engineer, people considering the operation of a small business should be in a position to deliver quality to the customers. Customers in the contemporary markets demand value for their money and hence the business operators should be equal to the task of delivering high-quality end products.

References

Bridge, S., & O’Neill, K. (2012). Understanding enterprise: Entrepreneurship and small business. Palgrave Macmillan.

Author not identified. (2014). Small business for the 21st century . Washington, D.C.: The Saylor Foundation .

Stokes, D., Wilson, N., & Wilson, N. (2010). Small business management and entrepreneurship. Cengage Learning EMEA.