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Suggest who benefitsWe’re Not Failing Because We’re Idiots
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Suggest questionThis week, in episode 234, Paul Downs tells Lena McGuire that, because his business has not picked up, he has had to lay off two employees. Paul explains how he chose which employees to let go, including to what extent he considered who has just had a kid and who just put a down payment on a house. We also talk about whether Paul should start experimenting with different ways to attract business or whether he should continue to do what’s worked in the past and try to ride it out. And then there’s this: Paul has managed to do what so many owners strive to do, which is to take himself out of the day-to-day operation of his business. But what does that mean when there’s very little business coming in? How should he be spending his time now? Plus: Lena and Paul respond to a small business subreddit post (https://www.reddit.com/r/smallbusiness/comments/1ik4tcm/i_left_6_figs_to_start_my_own_startup/) from a business owner who quit a comfortable job to pursue the idea he just couldn’t get out of his head. Now, he vacillates between thinking his business is going to be huge and thinking he’s made the dumbest mistake of his life, and he wants to know if anyone else has experienced that kind of doubt. I think we know the answer to that one.
About 21 Hats
The proponents of employee stock ownership plans can make them sound like the greatest thing ever. A business owner can take a big chunk of money off the table—or even all of it—while still getting to run the business. And there are some pretty great tax breaks. Oh, and it will also solve income inequality in America. On the other hand, if ESOPs are so smart, why are there so few of them?
Jim Kalb of Triad Components Group in San Diego and Jeff Taylor of Crafts Technology in Chicago have both implemented ESOPs. Jay Goltz of the Goltz Group in Chicago has reached his 60s without a succession plan, and he’s considering his options. In this 21 Hats Conversation, you get to listen in on a street-smart discussion of the pluses and minuses of ESOPs from the business owner’s point of view.