Hiring a business manager...

[cruxwireweb]

Hi-

I've got more work than I can do, and I'd much rather hire someone to do the businessy stuff and do the fun stuff - the coding - myself.

So this makes me consider a business manager of some sort. Not full-time, this would just be a few hours a week to take care of routine tasks and help me make some biz decisions.

Has anyone done this? Any advice?

Thank you in advance - this would be a big step for me, and I'd rather do it with your advice!

Kim

[Ted S]

It sounds like you're mixing two roles, a office / business manager who runs operational issues and a decision maker. Depending on what you want someone to help decide you will quickly leave the realm of basic employee, a little help, and need someone much more invested in your business.

Hiring on a truly part time basis is difficult... who wants to work just a few hours, who is qualified that can. So let's break it down a bit... what types of activities do you see them doing?

[Sagewing]

If you had a business manager, what would that person manage? It sounds to me like you are essentially a freelancer - you enjoy coding but not the business end of things. So, really you aren't trying to plan, build, or a business. Being a freelancer is a way of 'doing business' but it's not really a business in traditional terms as much as it's a single person doing work for money.

So, if you had a business manager what would that person ideally do for you?

[cruxwireweb]

Sorry it took me so long to respond, and thank you very much for your input. You both kind of said the same thing - what do I want this person to do? And that's a very good question. I can't answer it, so figuring that out is the perfect place to start.

[Sagewing]

On your website you say that you are 'proudly a sole proprietorship'. Are you sure you really want to engage someone to help you grow out the business? I see a lot of freelancers who keep struggling with their businesses because they forget that they don't want to grow a business - instead they just want to be a freelancer.

If you want to move up in the freelancing world rather than actually growing a business (very different things) then you need to concentrate on raising your rates/revenue more than anything else.