Franchise Ownership - Donning Many Hats

Written by Daniel Cargille Sunday, 10 April 2011 12:02

You may be passionate about your business but having a strong passion and desire for success is only a portion of what it takes to drive a business through launch and on into successful operation. Every business requires that the owner (you) wear a great many hats to ensure that everyone is done and done properly.

You may be passionate about your business but having a strong passion and desire for success is only a portion of what it takes to drive a business through launch and on into successful operation. Every business requires that the owner (you) wear a great many hats to ensure that everyone is done and done properly.

When you launch a new business or franchise you're not likely to have a lot of people to help you run the show right off the bat. Before you can get people training and in position you've got to manage a lot of things on your own. This is on top of managing the normal day to day operations of the business itself. Here are just a few of the hats you'll need to wear in order to keep your business running:

Tax Collection - Planning on selling goods on the retail level? If you sell goods that require a sales and use tax then you'll have to collect those taxes from every customer and submit taxes on a monthly basis to your state. Likewise, you will be expected to handle collecting local and state income tax from your employees.

Managerial Duties - As the boss you have to handle a great deal of duties including the managerial and HR stuff. Hiring, termination, coaching training, performance reviews, benefits paperwork, mediation, etc.

Marketing - while a corporate franchise gets some of its marketing from the corporation as they do nationwide marketing, you still need to come up with a marketing strategy that you can implement to build brand visibility on a local level. Without marketing you can't expect to grow your business.

Accounting - It's all a numbers game and if you're not savvy on keeping track of finances, expenses, P&L statements, utilities and profit you'll need to have someone handle that information for you. Not only will they keep your regular finances in check but they can help deal with all the taxes associated with running a business.

Bill collector - If you offer a pay-later type of business then you'll need to keep track of all the invoices that are outstanding. If customers don't pay or they're late then it's up to you to keep relationships strong and chase down your income. It's important to know what you can and cannot do when collecting.

Administrative Clerk - It would be beneficial to have an administrative staff or assistant that can handle the light stuff but the reality is that you'll likely be doing a lot of this - at least at first. That means fielding phone calls, service issues, answering emails, dealing with mail, cutting checks, etc.

There are even more hats to wear including web design, market research, product selection, graphic design for brochures and mailers, copywriting - It's a "manage-yourself-or-hire-someone" world when you open a franchise. In the end you'll need to recognize that if you can't hire someone your success will hinge on your ability to do these things on your own.