Production assistant/fitter required in Hampshire

[Kevin Flowers]

Warren
can’t help you on the employee front but i think a problem that both you & Mo Gills both have is that you are looking for someone who is as capable as yourselves. The problem with this is that if they are that capable they are either working for themselves or chances are will consider it very soon after coming to work for you.

just my thoughts

Kev

[Chris Wool]

think you are about right Kev but there are people out there that will not go self employed, they currently work for large sign company’s.

[Kevin Flowers]

Chris
you are probably right but the ones who leave the safety of the big companies where they see little of the finance side, walk into smaller companies get to see money coming in from jobs but don’t see the running costs & pound signs light up before their eyes. Then they think its something they could do, normally with your customers who are looking to save a few quid but that said there are some who are content to work for someone

Kev

[Martin Pearson]

Kev, I don’t have a lot of experience with staff as only ever had 2 or 3 people working for me but as Chris says not everyone wants to run their own business. There are still plenty of people who would rather work for someone else because they either don’t want to work for themselves or don’t think they would be able to.
I would have thought that if someone already had the sort of experience Warren is looking for & they haven’t already started there own business then there is a good chance they won’t. Course the problem is that when you take someone on you will never know till it’s to late :lol1:

[Warren Beard]

Agree with what you say but I need help and not sure where to start, asked in another thread but got no response so thought I would start here. I am very aware of training up my future opposition but that could be anybody and as Martin said you will always find out too late 🙄

I’ll be contacting the job centre next as not sure where else to look for people needing work! Where did you find your employees and how do you know they won’t leave and how ood are they?

[Gary Birch]

Warren
I am not really sure whether this is relevant but if it is a young person you are looking for it may be worth contacting your local Connexions office. That’s where I have advertised previously with mixed results. Like anything in life there is an element of luck in finding the right person.

http://www.cylex-uk.co.uk/company/conne … 95899.html

Cheers & Good luck

Gary

[Mark Latchford]

When you take someone on you should always get them to sign a confidentiallity agreement stopping them from approaching any of your clients or divulging your clients to a future employer when they leave or you terminate there employment. If I remember rightly also that if you terminate there contract they are not allowed to startup on there own within a certain distance. It used to be a 10mile radius. It does take some of the worry out of taking new staff on.

[Mo Gillis-Coates]

Guys, so negative….. if someone who comes and works for me and after a few months can get himself together a 6 figure sum to go and start his own business, then bloody good luck to him, he wont take my customers away, they come to me and my business.

I am the business and that’s not something you can run away with.. It’s taken me a good few years to get this to where it is, and not because I could fit a few sticky bit of vinyl to cars. Lets be honest most monkeys can do that, it’s hardly an art form.

To get my business to where it is took more than practical ability, it took ingenuity, passion, long work hours, hard graft, sales ability, entrepreneurship, assertiveness, aggression and the ability to convince people to invest in me…..

So your saying that I have an employee for a year or so and suddenly as if by magic he can do all that? yeah ok, if he could learn all that in a few years, I bloody give him the money to start his own business…

You fellas hate it when someone devalues your work by doing a cheap job, please don’t devalue my abilities in business by telling me some nugget can come in and do what I do after a few months!

[Warren Beard]

quote Mo Gillis-Coates:

Guys, so negative….. if someone who comes and works for me and after a few months can get himself together a 6 figure sum to go and start his own business, then bloody good luck to him, he wont take my customers away, they come to me and my business.

I am the business and that’s not something you can run away with.. It’s taken me a good few years to get this to where it is, and not because I could fit a few sticky bit of vinyl to cars. Lets be honest most monkeys can do that, it’s hardly an art form.

To get my business to where it is took more than practical ability, it took ingenuity, passion, long work hours, hard graft, sales ability, entrepreneurship, assertiveness, aggression and the ability to convince people to invest in me…..

So your saying that I have an employee for a year or so and suddenly as if by magic he can do all that? yeah ok, if he could learn all that in a few years, I bloody give him the money to start his own business…

You fellas hate it when someone devalues your work by doing a cheap job, please don’t devalue my abilities in business by telling me some nugget can come in and do what I do after a few months!

agree Mo, personally I’m finding it very hard to just find a decent person who could be cable of learning the job, I’m getting so desperate I think I’m going to have to take an apprentice and teach them as I can’t find anybody at all who has any sort of experience.

Good luck

[Mo Gillis-Coates]

quote Warren Beard:

quote Mo Gillis-Coates:

Guys, so negative….. if someone who comes and works for me and after a few months can get himself together a 6 figure sum to go and start his own business, then bloody good luck to him, he wont take my customers away, they come to me and my business.

I am the business and that’s not something you can run away with.. It’s taken me a good few years to get this to where it is, and not because I could fit a few sticky bit of vinyl to cars. Lets be honest most monkeys can do that, it’s hardly an art form.

To get my business to where it is took more than practical ability, it took ingenuity, passion, long work hours, hard graft, sales ability, entrepreneurship, assertiveness, aggression and the ability to convince people to invest in me…..

So your saying that I have an employee for a year or so and suddenly as if by magic he can do all that? yeah ok, if he could learn all that in a few years, I bloody give him the money to start his own business…

You fellas hate it when someone devalues your work by doing a cheap job, please don’t devalue my abilities in business by telling me some nugget can come in and do what I do after a few months!

agree Mo, personally I’m finding it very hard to just find a decent person who could be cable of learning the job, I’m getting so desperate I think I’m going to have to take an apprentice and teach them as I can’t find anybody at all who has any sort of experience.

Good luck

Same here warren, I can double my turnover, I just need to speed up production, I’m afraid I dont have time to train someone, I just tried that for 2 months and it’s cost me a fortune…. we work things on daily output, and when you are paying someone £75 a day and they are only outputting twice that on gross your screwed. I have to leave my pc and phone to train, as soon as I do that, I start missing jobs, even with 2 other office staff…. I need to find someone who can do the job, that’s why I’m paying such good money.. Have a few CV’s in front of me, just need to find the right person.

If they are good enough I don’t mind paying the bonus, profit share to keep them keen and stay the course…

[Kevin Flowers]

Mo
its not a case of being negative or telling you that some nugget can come in and take your business. You are looking for someone who can do a majority of what you can do so you ain’t just looking for some muppet who just wants to clock is 40 hours. So stating that we are saying anyone can do our jobs is wrong, most members on these boards are running their own companies and are in the same situation in that customers come to them because of them. However we all stand a chance to loose customers to employee’s when we allow them to create relationship with them, they then have the chance to exploit this if they choose to start up on their own.
As to requiring £6000 we know that its just not the case now days, i started with a secondhand £400 Mimaki cutter and progressed probably the same as you and that was back when there was only a few companies offering trade print. I have not employed anyone whilst running the sign company but did employ 3 staff when i run my garage have experienced an employee getting to friendly with a fleet customer and the customer instigating him going solo to look after their fleet. Now days i have a select set of people who i work with but plan my work load so that i can deal with a majority of it on my own.

My comments were meant as a warning from my past experience and not as a negative shot at anyone or any company.

[Martin Pearson]

As Kev said I don’t think anyone was having a go at you or any other member Mo. Just pointing out something that can happen in any industry.

What you also have to remember is that not all of us are as versatile as you are so some of us could be at far more risk of losing work if an employee left & set up down the road.
I for one am not very good when it comes to the business side & wouldn’t make a salesman given all the time in the world. Unfortunately my strength lies in the bit that any monkey could do 😳

I’m probably not really suited to working for myself but didn’t know that before I started. If I had known then what I know now I might well have stuck to working for someone else as a lot of other people seem happy to do.

[Lorraine Clinch]

quote Martin:

As Kev said I don’t think anyone was having a go at you or any other member Mo. Just pointing out something that can happen in any industry.

What you also have to remember is that not all of us are as versatile as you are so some of us could be at far more risk of losing work if an employee left & set up down the road.
I for one am not very good when it comes to the business side & wouldn’t make a salesman given all the time in the world. Unfortunately my strength lies in the bit that any monkey could do 😳

I’m probably not really suited to working for myself but didn’t know that before I started. If I had known then what I know now I might well have stuck to working for someone else as a lot of other people seem happy to do.

Agree with your thoughts Martin, I probably should have remained a trained career nurse, rather than becoming a self-employed skivvy for the tax and VAT men.
As to job fulfilment, maybe my children should give their views on how much I was involved in their young lives. Oops, sorry, I diversify.

[Phill Fenton]

Calm down calm down, the solution is staring us all in the face :police:

Here we have a couple of jaded industry hacks, with all the experience and insider know how, that can no longer be arsed to run their own companies :worry: …

…and on the other side of the fence, two young, dynamic, thrusting entrepreneurs that can’t find anyone of a suitable calibre to fill their highly paid "apprentice" roles without risk of stealing their customers 😕

I put it to you ladies and gentlemen, that the solution is for Martin and Lorraine to go and work for Warren and Mo….. Everyone wins :bow:

(Lorraine – check with Warren and Mo first to make sure they’ll give you 22 weeks holiday each year )

[Lorraine Clinch]

:lol1: :lol1: :lol1: :lol1:

It had occurred to me that Warren and Mo ought to join forces, lol!

[Mo Gillis-Coates]

Nice one phil…… Just wanted to mention a very good read here for anyone who runs thier own business, regardless of type… "The E Method"

Basically (although being very american biased) it explains how every business needs three vital components to work really efficiently..

The Technician:
this is the person who has worked for someone else and thinks "I can do that" and of he trots to run his own business, a practical person, in our industry someone whos the monty at making signs, which probably most of you guys are, personally I’m not that brilliant at it, thats why I employ a technician.

The Manager:
This person can organise, project manage, keep records, track orders, bank money and generally run the company. This person in most normal circumstances, has no desire to be a tech, thats far too inventive for him (or her) they would rather be doing books, or accounting. (I cant do this either so I employ one)

The Entrepreneur:
This is the creative and marketing person (sound familiar) he (or she) has millions of great ideas every day and runs around making more up as they go along. Rarely does this person put anything in to action, they just create a frenzy and then hand it over to tha manager to sort, organise and delegate, then the technitian completes. This person doesn’t even want to think about books and order and keeping records, that’s far far too boring for him… But boy can he inject some life and new business in to the company. (this is me)

If you can wear all three hats, then I am awestruck by your brilliance, for that is a feat that is beyond a miracle ( I’m sure there may be many that can) Even if you can then doing all three at the same time can never happen which is where a lot of sole traders or self employed people stumble. How many times have we heard about hourly rates based on what you can sell, produce and manage?

You think of some of the top blue chip companies and their leaders, Virgin, The Body Shop, Apple, Microsoft and on…. I know for a fact that Dickie Branson cant organise squat, he has ADHD, BUT he has good techs and managers, read his book and you will see.

It’s a great read guys and well worth a few night reading before bedtime. If anyone has read it please let me know. I know all you techs out there could perform even better if you had the right backup. And yes, the mrs does qualify as one of the three if she fits the bill! lol

BigMo

[Martin Pearson]

Mo, there’s no mention of sales people there so who wears that hat??

Not sure how this works for small businesses either, as a sole trader I couldn’t afford to employ someone just as a manager, I would need someone who was able to produce the work as well as I couldn’t physically produce enough work on my own to pay 2 wages.

[Mo Gillis-Coates]

quote Martin:

Mo, there’s no mention of sales people there so who wears that hat??

Not sure how this works for small businesses either, as a sole trader I couldn’t afford to employ someone just as a manager, I would need someone who was able to produce the work as well as I couldn’t physically produce enough work on my own to pay 2 wages.

Hi Martin, well if you did employ a manager, wouldn’t that leave you more time for production? I guess you really need to read the book to get the full picture as for sales? Sure I put down that the entrepreneur brings in the new business??????*to quote myself "But boy can he inject some life and new business in to the company"

But please don’t miss interpret this. I’m not saying you will fail if you don’t. However, I was exactly like you as a sole trader in a similar position, and that’s normal to think like that, I’m just guessing here but your a tech right martin? It depends what you are looking for.. are you happy and earning enou, well established, regular income? then your doing just fine, success is about doing exactly what you want and being happy and comfortable doing it. BUT…. if its not working out for you, then you need to change it, and that’s exactly what I did..

Problem:
Im making a small living of say 20k a year on my own, small jobs but regular. 20k is not enough for me to live on "comfortably" so im thinking if im earning 20k a year how the hell can I afford to pay someone £15k a year to step in and do production?

Solution:
I think… ah nuts, I’ll take someone on anyway, what the hell? what happens? I get away from production and now all i have to worry about is running the business and selling (plus design etc), what happens then? Well my day was split before 30% business 30% sales and 40% production. Iv’e just gained 40% of my time to put in to sales (very simple equation but probably a little more complex in reality)… So my sales go up by 40%? nope, they double almost over night. I’m not missing inquiries or getting back to people late, I’m almost covering everything, but not all… so in reality paying someone to do the production hasn’t reduced my income it’s increased it by almost £10k a year….

Whats my next step? MANAGER! bingo another 30% to devote to sales. Yes design work has to increase so time is pinched here and there… so naturally you can see the next progression cant you?

Its one of those situations Martin, you either stay safe or you take a risk. I’m a risk taker by nature, it hasn’t always worked out for me, I paid someone over 8k worth of salary only to find out that they didn’t know anything about what they said they knew… Doh! I had to fire them and step back in to pick up the pieces…

So in summary, if you happy as you are, then don’t try and fix it. If your not then get on and do something about it, worse still if you failing and you dont do something about it then your a complete mug (not saying that’s you Martin) and probably not cut out for business.

To quote a genius: "Albert Einstein" … the definition of madness is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting the outcome to be different!

[Martin Pearson]

Guess I would have to read the book Mo.

No I wouldn’t say I was a tech by what you have said there, mind you I wouldn’t say I was either of the other 2 you have mentioned so where does that leave me 😳

Spent 20 years in the Royal Navy but never been tempted to start one of my own :lol1: :lol1: Apart from that I spent 6 months as a tool store assistant while I was waiting for my entry date to the RN & before that did a paper round & milk round while I was at school.

I haven’t knowingly come across a sales person who was good at design, I assumed the the tech did the design work as well as the manufacture & installation. I assumed your Entrepreneur was creative in a different way.

I did actually mention in this thread that I probably wasn’t cut out for business myself but that’s probably a completely different story.

[Mo Gillis-Coates]

Hi Martin, no you are a tech, basically a practical person who’s good at making stuff. Entrepreneurs are always (or usually) the creative ones so naturally they do design and sales and advertising.

This is what I’m saying, horses for courses, if you have people in direct roles and they can concentrate on just that, everything seems to run better..

Aleggedly