If Only They’d Had That 6 Years Ago
June 16, 2009 at 9:41 am
Sabrina Dent wrote a good post recently about things she’s learned since working freelance. Her last point was about time. In my experience, when you get your head around the importance of time and its impact on your business, it’s a turning point for you in terms of how much money you will make.
When I started my business I had the wrong perception of time.
I saw time as an infinite resource. “I love what I do. I love being self employed” was my way of thinking. It didn’t matter to me if I worked very late at night. Bank holiday weekends were viewed as a great opportunity to catch up. I even invented a word that resonated with how positive and upbeat I was feeling – “Bizzy”. Bizzy applies to the kind of week where you know at the start of it that you’re going to attempt to cram about three weeks work into it, but it’s got a positive vibe to it. It’s not a moany word, it’s an upbeat one with energy to it: bizzy. After 6 months my partner asked me to stop being bizzy and to ‘look at’ the time I was spending working. After 18 months my partner made me promise to turn over a new leaf for the coming year and stop working crazy hours and make more time for him. This was my wake-up call; I knew that I had to make a change.
The reason start-up owners work deep into the night and weekends and bank holidays too is because they are battling against time.
I think everybody works long hours in the first year because there are just so many things to do and so little hours in the day! Identifying your partners and getting your systems working gobbles up so much time. When you’re first starting out in business, and you need to get some printing done, you have to get quotes from a number of printers and work out who you’re going to give the business to. At financial year end, you’ve got to find a good accountant. This involves meeting one or two and deciding who you like. Establishing your network of suppliers takes time.
I used to spend long hours on hold to my broadband provider, my mobile provider, hosting companies, payment processing companies… I spent ages chasing Bank of Ireland who had hit me with charges on credit cards that I just didn’t have. I got very angry with utility companies not billing me for months, then hitting me with a very large bill that needed to be paid within 28 days. Money was so tight those days that I just didn’t have an extra €100 to cover unexpected electricity bills. I didn’t have a car. So travelling to meetings by bus ate up more precious time.
There are lots of annoying things that get in the way of trying to do the business.
When you spend your day on the phone to tech support, meeting men in suits who you view as a necessary eveil, etc. it’s hardly surprising that it’s not until the wee small hours that the real work gets done.
But that doesn’t have to be the case. Not any more. Especially not if you live in Limerick.
Introducing Greenhouse Incubator
It’s an incubation space for start-ups to nurture their idea for 6 months – unaffected by all the time-consuming stuff that goes along with starting a new business. Time to spend on your business, not on securing office space, getting your head around the IP registration process, etc.
It’s open for online applications now. If you have a business idea and you’d like to put yourself forward to get minded by those who know, while you develop that idea, then you should apply to be a part of the first batch now.
What do you have to do? Complete the online application – don’t worry, they do not want a business plan or projections for the next 15 years – and if your idea is good enough, you might be invited to come in and pitch your idea in the first week in July.
What then? The best pitches will be offered a place in the space in Limerick. It’s centrally located on O’Connell Street. Now that is central – O’Connell Street and Sarsfield House are the only addresses this Dub knows! You get to work in alongside other entrepreneurs like yourself, all with the same goal of developing your business and not having to worry about the ancillary things like:
- Legal (registering IP
- Maintaining an office
- Marketing & PR
- Finance
What’s the catch? There is no catch. The team behind Greenhouse Incubator do not charge you for this. They take a piece of equity (2 – 10%) from your business. You could look at it like this – at the moment 10% of nothing is nothing, so what have you got to lose? Or you could look at it like this – if they’re bought in to your success they will do everything in their power to help you succeed. (I like that one!)
What a team you’ll have behind you. Greenhouse Incubator is the brainchild of Evert Bopp, an experienced technology entrepreneur. He’s assembled a Board of heavy hitters made up of:
- Pat Phelan, the King of Telecoms
- Richard O’Donnell, software entrepreneur
- Kevin Thompstone, ex CEO of Shannon Development
These guys are just the kind of people you want behind you. Think of the contacts! The introductions. The wisdom.
There has been a lot written about people starting their own businesses of late. In these current economic times, they are to be applauded. But I’ve written before about how these tough times are bringing out the best in people. Evert Bopp and his team are to be applauded for taking the bureaucracy out of start-up support and bringing a good news out of Limerick that doesn’t involve rugby.
Tags: Greenhouse Incubator, Start Up, Start Your Own Business Ireland
