Time to Shine | BTalk Australia

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(12min 24) Robert Gerrish, Director of Flying Solo, says there's an increasing interest in starting up your own business. On today's BTalk Australia he tells Phil Dobbie that, for those with a positive attitude, now might be a good time to be going it alone. After all the economic downturn can't last forever. Can it?

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• Transcription

Phil Dobbie: Hello. I'm Phil Dobbie, and welcome to BTalk Australia. Today: is now a good time to be starting your own small business? Well, a lot of people seem to think so.

Yes, it's true. More and more people are starting their own businesses, at least that's an observation from Robert Gerrish. He's the director of Flying Solo, which is Australia's community for solo and micro-business owners. I just love that name, Flying Solo. It invokes that fear factor, because I sure as hell wouldn't want to be in an aircraft that I was flying. So Robert, more and more people are starting out on their own. Is this an observation you have? Or are there some cold, hard statistics to support it?
Robert Gerrish: Hi, Phil. Certainly from our side we've got some cold, hard facts. What we're noticing is not so much facts in. I can't dazzle you with facts of the number of people that have actually started. But what I can tell you is we observe a huge interest in people that are clearly considering starting their own business. And perhaps we might come on to talk about what that might be. I think some of the reasons are probably pretty obvious. But certainly what we're seeing at the moment and we've seen it. We've plotted back, going back to October, so you know it's not that long ago. From October to now, we're about 117 percent up in terms of the traffic coming to our site. Now that is a massive growth at a time when historically things tend to slow down a bit.

Dobbie: Yes, it's Christmas, and that protracted Christmas period through January when people are making every excuse to avoid doing any work at all.
Gerrish: Absolutely. They're all at their beach houses having a good time, or that's the world likes to think. But yes, certainly normally it's quiet. But as I say, we're 117 percent up and we're pretty astonished by that. Other little things we observe: we publish a newsletter that goes out every week to Australian small businesses. Micro businesses. And that's grown by again, in the same period of time by about 1700 people, so we're well over 14,000 now. So we're sort of sitting there scratching our heads a bit thinking, what is going on here? Admittedly we've added, and we're continually adding, facilities and resources to our site to try and increase engagement. But this has really taken us by surprise. And when we look at where people spend their time, as I say, they're doing it in the areas that are clearly starting out areas. We see themes within our forums that are talking about, you know, topics like I'd like to start a home business. How do I do it? Where do I find my perfect client? All these discussions are going on, and they're strongly and clearly about starting a new business. So the time on our site as well --- I don't want to rattle on about ...

Dobbie: No. You're doing a great informational job here for yourself.
Gerrish: I know. All right. I'll shut up on that one.

Dobbie: The time's run out as well.
Gerrish: The time's run out? It's ...

Dobbie: Listen. I want to know about it. I want to. Yes, it's double. I was going to say I know want to know the time spent [on your site].
Gerrish: Yes, okay. It's double. It's now about five minutes on average per person on the site. Now, you know, so that's a lot of people spending a lot of time clearly thinking about starting a business.

Dobbie: You said the reasons are obvious. I mean and they are obvious, aren't they? There's a lot of people who've just lost their job. People who are thinking maybe I should start out on my own. Do you think it's as simple as that?
Gerrish: I wouldn't say it's people that have lost their job. But I think it's people that are certainly sensing a high degree of disharmony. Let's put it that way. So I wouldn't say it's really indicative of people that are out on the street, thinking what am I going to do next? But I do think it's people that are unsettled. And not just necessarily unsettled by the economy or the employer. But I think when there's so much, you know, sort of negativity around the place ... most people forget as employers of a business, if they take their eye off the ball when it comes to being concerned about the happiness and pleasantries, what it's like actually being a member of staff within their business. It's too often the case that businesses just forget about all that touchy-feely stuff. Well, maybe not forget about it, but cut back on things, you know. We won't do that with the staff this year. Times are tough. We'll pull our heads in a bit there. And so really what happens is the people within the business start to get a little bit miffed --- hang on a minute, you know. When business is good things are okay. Now business is a bit tough and suddenly all the nice things get withdrawn a little bit. I think that's where a lot of people who maybe have been harbouring the idea of starting a business for some time get to this point. They think, I've had enough of this. I've had enough of working for a boss like this. I've had enough of working in an industry like this. I want to go off and do my own thing. So what we see in a lot of the discussions on our site is not morose, fed up, concerned, worried people. They are passionate, energetic people that are saying get me out of here. Let me get started in the business. And I honestly think that when you start a business, when you start a small business, your energy level is always pretty high at the beginning. And there's nothing better to grow a business and to attract opportunities than somebody who's clearly passionate and full of energy. So in that respect I would say to people who are thinking about it, I reckon it's a great time to start a business. If you are passionate and if you've got that energy, get out there and do it. You know, I'll tell you what. You'll stand out, because so many businesses are flat and quiet and pulling their heads in and blah, blah, blah. Get out there with some energy, some excitement, and I reckon it's a great time.

Dobbie: Get in there and smile a little. Scare the living daylights out of them, won't it?
Gerrish: Absolutely. I remember a few years ago, probably about ten years ago now, when there was a momentary kind of blip in the property market, you know. If we can remember that far back. And I remember going to see John McGrath, a real estate guy, talking to a group of very forlorn, down-at-heel, real estate agents who dragged themselves to this breakfast presentation. And he stood up at the podium and he said, I love the market when it's like this. He said, because all of you that are out there you're scared stiff. You're not doing anything. You've stopped all your relationship building. You've stopped all of your marketing and promotion. This is a wonderful time to shine. And I thought, good on you. That guy has clearly built a somewhat successful business. And it's that sort of energy that I think that people can bring to the marketplace now. It's a very hard time to do it. Clearly it's a hard time to do it. We know that everything is, or a number of things are, very challenging at the moment. But the world doesn't stop and a small business doesn't stop. Over 70 percent of businesses in Australia are small businesses, and over 70 percent of those are micro businesses. So over a million people are working either by themselves or in a group of one, two or three people, and that's a massive, massive part of our business population. I reckon that is where the growth and the resurgence and the optimism and the energy is going to come from: our end of town. That's what I reckon.

Dobbie: You're saying that the time's not great, but I wonder whether you're right about that. Because when you think about it all these companies have downsized. They've got rid of people. As you say, the world's not stopped. They still need people to do stuff. If you go in there and smile brightly and offer to do something for the right price, then these companies surely are going to outsource because someone's still got to do the work.
Gerrish: Oh, most definitely. And yes, I would not disagree with a word of that. Again, I think we can see that through what I observe. On our site you can see it through what's happening in some of the recruitment-type sites as to the areas of their site perhaps are getting busier: contracted and independent professionals. I do think it's potentially a really good time. And the thing is when we get around this corner, however long this corner might be, those businesses I think that perhaps have taken their eye off the ball a bit with their staff, I think they're going to have a very, very large wakeup call. Because there's a number of people that are sitting in their jobs and they're sitting still. Because maybe they don't quite feel confident enough to make a leap, whether it be into their own business or into other employment. You can bet your life once things turn around a bit they'll be gone quick smart. So, you know, I know this isn't really a conversation about employment. But if I were an employer I'd be watching what I'm doing in terms of keeping my staff happy very, very, very closely. Because it might all be quiet at the moment. But when things turn around you're going to want your best people. And, yeah, it concerns me. I mean, I don't lose too much sleep over staff maybe because I don't have any. But the concept is still there.

Dobbie: No one would work for you anyway, Robert.

Gerrish: Well, they wouldn't.

Dobbie: You smile too much. It puts them off.

Gerrish: Oh. Quite right, too. Quite right.

Dobbie: That might be the problem.

Gerrish: You're quite right.

Dobbie: So just finally, people who are going into establishing their own business right now, I mean enthusiasm is one thing. But do you think people are going in with their eyes wide open? It is a big risk. And what's probably the biggest challenge that people face that they may not be aware of before they start?

Gerrish: Okay. That's a great question. But I would say that the biggest challenge and the biggest reason that we can determine for businesses, small businesses, not working can be put down to one word: overwhelm. I have regular discussions/arguments with people about the failure rates of small business. And I just do not believe, and happily there is some research that has been done by the Productivity Commission that proves this: small businesses do not fail at anything like the rates that some people talk about. Lots of people talk about eight out of ten businesses failing the first two years --- rubbish. They don't at all. But the reason that some businesses do indeed fail is not because of some monumental financial disaster, it's more often because it just gets too hard. What I think a lot of people do is they go into a small business with a skill set --- you know, a knowledge, a skill in some area. But they forget that actually, and particularly in a solo micro business, you've got to do a lot of jobs. A large part of your business growth comes through business development, clearly. And marketing and finance and management. All the areas of a business that you need to be across. It's not enough just to have kind of one skill by itself. So "overwhelm" I think is the single biggest thing. And I think part of that is businesses or individuals not spending enough time at the outset looking forward and thinking okay, where is this business going to go? Where do I actually want this business to be getting to? And what skills do I need to get there? I know a lot of people that are very skilled as practitioners of whatever it is they practice in, that are sitting there twiddling their thumbs without any business. That's because they might be very competent practitioners, but they're not the world's best marketers. Similarly, you know, I observe, as you must do a number of very clever marketers who are diabolically bad at what they actually deliver, but they're good marketers. You've got to have a balance, so eyes wide open on all the hats you need to wear.

Dobbie: All right. Well, thanks so much for your time. And 117 percent up on your visits. People are staying longer and more people are subscribing to your newsletter. Go on. Give me another statistic to finish with.

Gerrish: That's about all I can bear. That's about as good as I've got, I think.

Dobbie: Oh, my goodness.

Gerrish: Yes.

Dobbie: You've run out of statistics. I thought it would never happen.

Gerrish: I have. I'm statistic-free at this point.

Dobbie: All right. That'd be 27 percent less statistics than the last time I spoke to you.

Gerrish: Yes.

Dobbie: Robert, thank you very much for your time. Let's talk again soon.

Gerrish: Thank you, Phil.