Pots of Gold

Stefan Ciecierski - Director and owner Nakama Global

We are a spoilt lot in recruitment sometimes! It seems to me that most established recruiters in times of stress will at some point talk about setting up their own business, either as a reaction to something they don’t like in their current job or when they see someone else apparently having done exactly that and then make a lot of money selling their business. I guess living in a time when so many people in the internet world seem to make so much by doing so little other than being in the right place at the right time with a basic idea, and at the same time the idea of becoming a celebrity overnight and having all that goes with that is driving the media so fast, it’s not really surprising that in our industry consultants and managers often think they can find fame and fortune doing it for them selves.

Setting up your own recruitment business is not very difficult really as long as you don’t mind a bit of hardship for a few months and you have a good pipeline of business. However, it is not always the best way to either make money or find job satisfaction. Being the owner carries with it a lot more stress and a lot less security than building up your personal equity with your employer who will not want to lose you if you are contributing well.

Clearly recruitment is a great place for some entrepreneurs to make a lot of money after a comparatively short time and change their lives. That’s not the case for everyone though, in fact I think it’s only the case for a very few. The big question you have to ask yourself if you feel you might benefit from running your own show is this,” Are the skills I will need to create something worth selling better invested with my employer or will I gain more from investing them in my own business”. To create something to sell you will need to build a substantial body of people and business that a purchaser would be happy to buy on the basis that post acquisition it will make more money than the cost of the deal, with or without you. That means, winning business, hiring staff, motivating them, organising them and creating a vision and reason for being that is compelling and long term. All that is exactly what a successful manager in a recruitment business has to do anyway, but with the considerable security and resources of an employer.

So, how do you make the decision to go it alone or not? The answer is simple if it’s based on a desire to make money. Do your own thing if you think you can make more value out of your skills than you can earn doing it for your employer, and also if you think you cannot just handle, but thrive in your own business.

If it goes well you could make a great deal, pay some bills and have to worry less about the future. However, most people will still need to work post deal! It’s not uncommon for the successful payoff to have been preceded by years of low income and reduced benefits as the entrepreneur gears the business up for a potential sale, and don’t forget the tax, that is going up not down at the moment, you could find yourself giving up half of what you made!

On that miserable note you should also consider whom you go into business with. It is not uncommon to find partners who start something together disagreeing about not only what each of them does but also when to sell and how much for. It can happen that the lifestyle of the company owner can be seductive and the freedoms that go with independence can become a hindrance to the gung ho that was at one time going to drive you to riches.

All in all, those big payoffs are few and far between and don’t come without much stress and often don’t come at all! So, the answer s to making the best you can from your opportunities are always based on being very best you can be for as long as you can, having a dose of luck and being true to yourself. You can become as wealthy and happy in someone else’s business as well as you can in your own. Good luck!