Going it alone

Are you fed up with working for other people and always had a dream to run your own business? Don’t let the current financial crisis stop you – small businesses are the backbone of the UK economy and without them it would collapse.

There are already approximately 1,013,000 self-employed women (7.6% of all women in employment) and 2,706,000 self-employed men (17.4% of men in employment) in the UK, according to a 2006 report called Women’s Business Ownership: Recent Research and Policy Developments by Professor Sara Carter from the University of Stirling. “Businesses that are wholly or majority female-owned account for between 12.3 to 16.5% of the UK business stock,” states the report.

Around 602,000 (14%) of small businesses in the UK are wholly owned by women, according to the BERR (The Department for Business Enterprise & Regulatory Reform) Annual Small Business Survey February 2007/08. And 24% of small to medium businesses were co-owned by men and women.

Lots of facts and figures of this type can be found on the Prowess website. Prowess is a UK association of organisations and individuals who support women to start and grow businesses.

Biting the bullet

Starting up on your own can be a daunting prospect, and unless you have a partner earning a decent salary to keep an income coming in, it can be a very risky business.

However, it can also be an empowering and rewarding experience, if done properly. You need a product or service that will sell, a willingness to work hard, finance to make sure you are not left high and dry, a realistic business plan, a marketing strategy that will pull in more business on a regular basis, and the determination to succeed.

There are free services available across the country to help you set up on your own, such as Business Link, a business advice and support service which runs courses throughout the UK and can also be accessed online.

The Federation for Small Businesses (FSB) costs a minimal amount of money to join, but offers invaluable help in networking events and lobbies the government on behalf of the UK’s small businesses.

Your local Chamber of Commerce is also worth joining for networking opportunities and to meet other people in your area who run their own companies.

Talk to RC

Starting a business is a huge subject and one that we will cover extensively on The Risk Collective. We will have advice from the experts as well as ideas and inspiration to keep you going.

We would love to hear from you if you have recently started up on your own, or are thinking of jumping into the deep end soon. Email sue@riskcollective.com and tell us what you are up to. And if we like what you are doing, we may run a feature on your new business too – giving you some free publicity to help get you going!

More facts and figures

54% of women start a business so they can choose what hours they work, compared to only 35% of men. (Women & Men Business Owners in the United Kingdom)

21% of women state family commitments as a reason for becoming self-employed compared to only 2% of men (A Strategic Framework for Women’s Enterprise, Small Business Service, 2003)

80% of women compared with 17% of men are responsible for looking after the children or arranging childcare facilities. (The barriers start to fall – Barclays 2000)

A full time nursery place for a child under two typically costs over £7000 per year. (Childcare Costs Survey, Daycare Trust, Jan 2005)

Both male and female businesses require on average around £20,000 in start-up money. Female entrepreneurs will, on average, put in £10,106 of their own money at this stage, while men will put in around £13,500. This leaves an initial start-up funding gap for male owned businesses of £6,500 and a gap of £9,894 for female-owned businesses. (Achieving the Vision, Female Entrepreneurship British Chambers of Commerce, July 2004)
Source: Prowess

Tags: Careers & education, Escape from the comfort zone, Women in business