THIS IS MY 31ST POST ON UNDERSTANDING MONEY TOOLS
On my last blog we briefly discussed jobs in relation to
industries. Let’s talk about employment in today’s market place or creating
your own work situation.
Everyone will tell you it’s a tough work environment. Some
areas of the country are fairing much better than others. In the last blog we
talked about the boom in the oil business and the need for workers in areas
like western North Dakota, Wyoming and parts of Colorado. I now reside in the Phoenix area and
our job market is relatively poor and low paying. We are service economy to the “snow birds”, conventions and
people on vacations who enjoy our winter warmth and golf courses. These are low
paying jobs. We do have some high
tech companies like Intel and Motorola, however for the most part we are a
service economy. When jobs are posted for hotels or companies they actually get
thousands of responses from people wanting those jobs.
No matter what age you are, or if you are trying to be
employed by a company or starting your own endeavor you need a good resume of
your background experience. There
are many professional sites for writing a resume, and consultants to assist
you. As a recommendation here, if
you are young with very little experience try to come up with things you have
done and relate that to “transferable skills”. Community service is good. If you are an older person, don’t extend your resume back
too many years, as age discrimination will come into play, even though it isn’t
supposed to.
Get some personal business cards made. There are sites where
you can have these made for free.
At a minimum include your name, city, state, email address, and phone
number. Then, if you have a skill include that, e.g. website consulting, retail
management, etc. For security
reasons its best not to include your home street address.
A majority of people in the US live within 50-100 miles of
water from Maine down to Florida, the Gulf Coast and then California up to the
Canada Border. Go where the population and density is.
To find work you need to add value, and you need population
in most cases. Employers interview with the understanding they expect employees
to stay with them for several years.
Employee benefits can account for 35% or more money up and beyond the
salary. Training an employee and orientating that person to the work
environment is expensive. Unless you can definitely show that you can add value
to the company, and quickly, you probably won’t be hired. Investigate the
company you are interviewing with and identify weak areas where you can add
value.
If you start your own company, you need to take on various
tasks like accounting, reporting to the city and state, and health insurance
can be very expensive. If you add
employees you need to adhere to laws including them in benefits and retirement
plans.
As you get older in age companies won’t look at you, unless
you’ve hit “homeruns” in your previous job experience and you are extremely
important to a particular situation.
Okay, that leaves creating your own work environment. Here you need to
come up with an idea or product that people really need and/or want. There are
fewer dollars out there so people have less discretionary income and will be
choosey. They have the money, you
hopefully have the product or services.
You need to get the person with money to think that what you have is
worth giving up their dollars for. Too many people think it is easy, and it is
not. I was taught once that most people are not totally against buying an idea
or product but are in that 40-48% range against, and you need to show them
enough features and benefits to have them cross over into 51% in your
favor. Then, and only then, have
you made the sale.
In today’s worldwide economy one of the problems is that
there are so many products and ideas coming in from all over the world and
electronically that it is difficult to get attention and then focus on the
market. Almost everyone I talk
with these days has the problem of wanting/needing more customers, and
customers mean a sale or money.
If you come up with a great idea or product don’t forget
about international patent rights and trade marks. Protect yourself as much as possible although many companies
can copy an idea with only small changes and get around protections in
place. Best to take a market where
the “big boys” don’t want to play because the market is not large enough to
warrant them entering and they leave you alone.
Starting a company can be quite easy. Don’t forget you only need three essential
things, 1) a great idea or product 2) money or financing and 3) people, even if
it is just you, or perhaps employees and management.
Some high tech service jobs now can be leveraged on a time
basis outsourcing work to Asians and Eastern Indians. These people are very tech savvy and many do an outstanding
job for $3-4/hour. This works
great for you if you can find the work here that will pay you $50-75/hour. You
do the final reviews and revisions. You could double, triple or more your
production per hour.
Some ideas can sell quickly, but you better get out
fast. The “pet rock” hit a craze,
the hoola-hoop years back and others. In our retail businesses we had bought
some exotic leather bracelets with stones….trendy, some Hollywood people wore
them and a high end department store sold them. It was hot, then cold so
quickly we never sold out. I even
told the fellow making these to get in, make some money and get out. We
couldn’t get them all sold fast enough.
At the moment, I’m entertaining the idea of getting involved
with a long time friend who has put together a product that could be well
received in assisted living and nursing homes. Again, here is a well thought
out idea in one of the recommended industries (aging people/health care) and serves
a need. He is in the prototype
stage and working with a manufacture in China for lower costs of
production. He has well thought
out how he wants to distribute sales and keep it tightly controlled. Great idea.
Surrounding the health care industry there will be
opportunities with our veterans returning from overseas in Iraq and
Afghanistan. Some of our vets will need to be taken care of in special home
care. With proper city zoning
homes can be converted to take care of special health needs. A person will need certifications to do
this, and then apply for government programs. These programs can pay very well, and on a continuing basis.
How about building a small business or retail store and then
selling? Private companies used to
sell for about 3 times pre-tax earnings, however since the banking crisis and
today’s borrowing abilities limited this has hurt selling into the market
place. A well known business broker evaluated our retail stores and said that
unless the business is a bar or restaurant, small retail businesses are very
difficult to sell. The reason bars
still sell is the ego. Owners like to be seen in their establishments, and for
some reason people think they can take a bar or restaurant and do better than
the current owner.
I hope the above information and ideas are a help to you.
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