Last Updated on July 24, 2019 by New-Startups Team
If you work in the electrical industry, there’s no doubt you know the ins and outs of the job perfectly. You could probably do it with your eyes shut. However, one thing you may not have thought about is going it alone.
As an industry that’s needed in all walks of life, setting up your own electrical business could be the key to achieving the long sort after ‘American Dream’ of self-employment.
If this is something that’s been in the back of your mind for a while, but you weren’t sure what to do to take those first steps, you’ll find a handy guide on how to do so below.
Why take the plunge?
Around 10.1% of those that are working in the United States are self-employed, so let’s take look at why you should take the big jump and go down the road of self-employment.
Firstly, as mentioned, it gives you the chance to become your own boss, and with this comes a whole list of perks. These range from choosing your own hours and selecting who you work with to what jobs you decide to take and where you’ll work – certain places around the world, such as Australia, have a skills shortages and electricians fall into this.
In fact, in a list of the top 20 types of self-employment, a handyman service was included, which could include an electrical service.
Self-employment certainly isn’t a breeze, and you won’t have a great big business from the get-go. With all of this in mind, read on to discover what you need to start your own business in the electrical world.
Things you need
The first thing you’ll need to think about is why you’re doing it. Is it to free up time, make more money, or to become your own boss? While this may seem irrelevant, if you have a goal that’s motivating you, it’ll drive you more when it comes to making a success of going solo.
Now that that’s covered, the next six points are the more business-orientated factors.
Qualifications
First of all, you’ll need all the right training and qualifications. This may mean you’ll need to get more advanced qualifications to accompany your experience, and you can learn how to get an online masters degree in electrical engineering.
You’ll also have to ensure that any certificates you have are always up to date, while ensuring you learn about new additions to the industry to give clients the best service.
Resources
Now, this is the serious part, finding the capital to help you get your feet off the ground. Starting a new business can be expensive, which means you’ll require a large sum of cash. Of course, it may not be as much if you’re not opening up a bricks and mortar operation, but you’ll still need transport and materials.
You’ll already know how much all the tools cost that you’ll need, plus the cost of a vehicle, which could be anywhere from $5,000 to $35,000, so you know that it won’t be cheap. Then there’s the cost of getting your name out there through marketing. All of this needs to be taken into consideration, or you could end up out of pocket for no reason. If you can’t raise the cash yourself, or find a third party you know, there are several places designed for business loans.
A Business Plan
If you’re trying to get money to help you launch your business, you’ll need a clear-cut plan of what you’re going to do and how you’re going to achieve it. Without one of these, you probably won’t secure a loan, even from a close friend or family member. However, this isn’t the only purpose of a business plan. Having a fully developed plan will help to give you structure and goals, while also helping you define how you’ll achieve long and short term objectives within the business.
Tax and accounts
If you’ve never had to deal with these sorts of things in the past, this could sneak up on you when you least expect it.
Therefore, it’s important to keep on top of everything you spend, no matter how big or small to ensure you can account for it. It’ll probably come in handy to hire an accountant to make sure everything is running as it should, which will also help to take some of the pressure off your shoulders when it comes to the business as a whole.
This is something to look into once the business is up and running, but be sure to keep all of your expenditures registered from the get-go.
Regulations
These exist without us even being aware. So, before you move on to your business, make sure you’ve checked out all potential regulations. The last thing you want is to get caught working somewhere when it turns out you can’t.
Insurance
Finally, this is important. You wouldn’t have had to deal with insurance before, especially if you’ve always been employed. However, when you’re working by yourself, make sure you have insurance because if something happens to you, you won’t be able to work, which could be devastating for you and your loved ones.
Make sure all of your equipment is fully insured too, because you don’t want your major equipment to break, such as your vehicles, preventing you from getting to specific jobs, resulting in you losing out on valuable income.
As you can see, starting a business takes a lot of hard work, even after you’ve trained and got all the right certificates and qualifications.
If you feel as though you’re a little out of your depth still, you could embark on another course, such as one that teaches you how to start a small business, which could help you out in the early stages. However, with these tips, you should be able to get all the groundwork in place before starting your business and beginning that journey into the world of full-time self-employment.