New Enterprise Allowance or New Enterprise Alliance?

Another government, another push for another 10 000 small businesses to be created from the ranks of the long term unemployed.

To me it seems similar to what we already have under the Flexible New Deal, unless I am missing something: it may be a tad better resourced.  But, I am encouraged that Iain Duncan Smith appears to have a real commitment to social justice, at least, he chairs the cabinet committee on it.   Let’s hope that his commitment to social justice rather than newspaper headlines really shapes this New Enterprise Allowance.

So what are the chances of success for the New Enterprise Allowance, and what might be the pitfalls?

To begin with, although I am a big fan of mentoring, I am not convinced that it is the best way to support people with transitions from unemployment to self employment.  The best mentors (as opposed to coaches) have ‘been there, done that, seen the film and got the t-shirt’.  They can offer sage advice and guidance based on practical experience (usually gained over many years in a specific and relevant industry, and importantly should be chosen by the mentee and not assigned to them by a service provider); Mentors should know what it takes and be available to put in the time and commitment necessary.  Let’s also hope that they are properly trained, supported and supervised in the process of mentoring.  And mentoring should not be a mandatory component but an option, we have to recognise that folks learn in different ways and for some the thought of being mentored just does not cut it.

So, if we must have a mentoring programme let us run it well.  Lets take mentoring seriously.  Let’s make sure that we have enough well trained mentors.  Personally I doubt that we will.  More likely we will find an army of middle managers looking to do some CSR, or rebadge existing enterprise advisers as New Enterprise Allowance Mentors.  Plus ça change…probably

I think the enterprise coaching role is, in places where it has not been confused with enterprise evangelism, much more likely to be effective.  Non directive, facilitated conversations that give people space to develop their options and make their own choices provides a sustainable route to more enterprising communities.  Conversations that don’t use ‘benefits’ and ‘enterprise’ as carrots and sticks to manipulate people to meet government targets and trigger payments by ‘results’.  Our industry is riddled with such practice.  We need conversations that respect people and their right to choose.

I suspect that mentors will work with mentees primarily on ‘the business plan’.  I doubt they will have the coaching skills to really work on developing the person rather than their idea.

Will a decision not to start up be valued and rewarded as highly as a decision to start?  I hope so.

Will the New Enterprise Allowance engage ‘the community’ in supporting local people struggling to make the transition to self employment?  No sign of community panels and networks to support the formal delivery structures.  It is not so much a New Enterprise Allowance that we need in our communities as a New Enterprise Alliance….

Will the scheme be designed to encourage the formation of team based start-ups where complimentary skill sets and personalities ensure that all functions in the business are adequately covered?  I doubt it.  It will, if history is our guide, take the shortest, lowest cost, route from benefits to self-employment, not the route that is most likely to result in a sustainable business with the potential to grow.  While we should be looking to maximise return on investment I suspect we will look to minimise investment.  Cost per start-up will be the metric of choice.  And the sooner we get the better.

The New Enterprise Allowance will be for long term unemployed who ‘want’ to start a business.   Finding the people who really WANT to will be an enormous challenge.  Personally I don’t think it is anywhere near enough for someone to want to start a business.  It needs to be something that they HAVE to if they are to have a decent chance of success.

We have approaching 800 000 people who have been unemployed for more than 6 months.  The New Enterprise Allowance hopes to help 10 000 of them to start a business this year, that is just over 4 in every 500.

• But which 4?
• What percentage of the 800 000 will wish to engage with the programme?
• How many will the delivery mechanism engage with at the start of the process?
• How many of those will make it through to trading?
• What positive outcomes will be delivered to those that engage with the programme but decide not to start a business?

This represents a challenge.  To help find the few who really will do the groundwork required and learn what needs to be learned.  It is a challenge both for marketing the scheme and effective psychological contracting between service provider and service user..

And the whole scheme reeks of yet more ‘fast enterprise’.  A couple of mentoring sessions and three half days with a training company and you will be ready to roll.  Well maybe. And maybe not.  Where these sorts of schemes prevail they prioritise the most capable and even then have frightening business failure and loan default rates.  Good business start ups plan and prepare carefully.  They don’t rush it.  There is little point in starting 10 000 new businesses in a year if the survival rates are not good.  And please this time will someone show an interest in survival rates?

Then there is the cash element.  In the transcript of his speech on Conservative Home, IDS is reported as saying:

We will provide business mentoring and a financial package worth up to £2000 to get your business up and running.

Now quite what is meant by ‘a financial package worth up to £2000′ remains to be seen.  Cash grant?  Loan?  Benefits?  But clearly in this transcript it is £2000 in addition to the mentoring provided.

But can anyone explain to me the why the magical figure of £2000?  How about we teach them to access the finance that they need to give their business a well capitalised start?   Whether that is £5 or £5m?  If we are serious about teaching people how to run a small business let’s not cap ambition according to the size of our currently cash strapped treasury pockets.

So at first glance it looks to me like wrong pedagogy, wrong curriculum, wrong ‘financial’ package, wrong pace of change and a failure to embed enterprise culture in the community.  Apart from that all systems are go.  I can already hear the usual suspects sharpening their pencils in anticipation of the invitations to tender.

I hope it is me that is wrong….

What do you think?

Dumb Strategy and State Funding

I am hearing a lot at the moment from people and organisations that face a scary future because at some point in the past they chose (consciously or not) to develop a business model dependent to a very great extent, in some cases entirely, on public funding.

And right now that looks like a dumb strategy, because the development of mission, the pursuit of purpose, is regulated by a bureaucracy that makes political decisions about what to fund and when.  It decides how success will be measured.  In essence they are in control.

They hold the strategic reigns.

10 Reasons Why You Should Never Start a Business…

I have just been reading Steve Pavlina’s post on 10 Reasons Why You Should Never Get a Job.  Although written with, in my opinion, an offensive and patronising tone (people with jobs are morons, bosses are idiots etc) it does raise some interesting points.  Including the one about ‘getting paid while you sleep’ rather than while you work.  Seductive stuff!

But like so much of the self help and entrepreneurship industry it lacks balance and feels manipulative. So, in the interest of balance, here are 10 reasons why you should never start a business.

1  It may lead to debt and misery

The stats on business success are not that pretty.  For everyone like Steve that earns $40 000 a month from their website there are hundreds if not thousands who are trapped in a business that does not make enough money.  They work long hours for little or no money.  You talk to a Venture Capitalist and most of them will tell you the same.  For every 20 businesses or so they invest in the majority never make a return on the investment.  A few will just about break even on the investment.  And, if they are lucky, perhaps one or two will make some serious money.  Serious enough to cover the failed investments in those other businesses.  So what are the odds?  Are you sure you will be one of the lucky ones?

2  It will put strain on your relationships

When you run your own business it nearly always takes time.  A lot of time.  If you have had children and gone through the ‘terrible twos’ then you will understand what I mean when I say a new business is demanding, just like a toddler.  It takes time and energy.  Of course, so does holding down a job, but running your own business is way, way more invasive.   Many successful business people have left behind them a trail of broken marriages and damaged friendships.

3 It is difficult

Don’t believe those that tell you starting a business is easy.  ’Just follow these 10 simple steps to business success’ etc.  Business is hard.  And small business is the hardest of all.  Because often there is only you to get the product right, to deal with customers, to do marketing and sales and to manage the money.  In a small business one mistake can take you down for a very long time.   Big business can afford the odd dodgy product launch.  But for small business it may be the end of the road.  You get sick as an employee and there will probably be a job for you to go back to when you are well.  You get sick when you are the business and that might be curtains….

4 Everyone becomes a mark

Unless you are careful the pressure to sell your business will turn everyone that you meet into a potential sale.  Not so long back I heard a primary school teacher telling one of the charges in her enterprise class that ‘everyone you meet is a potential customer’ and ‘remember you are ALWAYS selling’.

5 You become a mark

Once you have got a business everyone is trying to sell you something.  Mobile phones, office equipment, a sure-fire way to earn money while you sleep – yada, yada…And if they are not trying to sell you something they will portray you as a profit obsessed capitalist taking us all to hell in a handcart, profiting from the poor and ruining the environment.  You had better have thick skin.

6 You may become obsessed with money

Because that is how you ‘keep score’ in business.  It is  not enough to do good work. That work has to be profitable.  And if you have not got deep pockets it has to be profitable quickly.

7 You become a lackey to Government

Contributing to their goals of a sustainable growing economy, rather than a sustainable planet, collecting taxes for them and generally helping them to maintain their economic scorecard

8  You become that evil bovine master

When you start a business you are the daddy.  Or mummy.  You are the idiot.  And the hero.  It all rests on your shoulders…

9 You will have an inbred social life

I have met so many entrepreneurs for whom their business has become their life.  And they are trapped in it.  They can’t stop trading, but nor can they make good money. And if they do make good money then they have no-one or no time to spend it with.  They are literally married to the business.

10 You become a coward

If you are lucky, you find what works and you stick to it.   You don’t take major risks.  You can never walk away.  Just day after day the same old same old feeding the beast.

Now of course my 10 reasons are no closer to the truth than are Steve’s.  And that is the point.  No-one can tell you what the right thing is for you to do.

Not now.  Not ever.

So, the next time a slickly dressed and white-toothed smiler promises you that jobs are for idiots and that you too can make money while you sleep, well my best advice is just to look that particular gift horse in the mouth, very carefully.  Especially when they close their post with a link to your very own ‘Make Money Online’ business.

Crib Sheet for The Entrepreneur’s Workshop

A Crib Sheet

Workshops are fascinating and dangerous places. In the right hands they can produce things of great beauty and real lasting value.  In the wrong hands they can do great damage and wreck lives.

The entrepreneur’s workshop is no different.

True enough; the tools in the entrepreneur’s workshop have no sharp edges, burning fires or high speed drills.

The entrepreneur’s tools are a set of ideas, principles, practices and habits that, applied with care and passion, can produce a wonderful lifestyle.  Learn to use these tools properly and they will serve you well.

Misuse them and the consequences are likely to include debt, damaged relationships and misery.

10 of the most powerful tools in The Entrepreneur’s Workshop:

1. The Truth Detector – How to decide what might work for you
2. Want to or Have to…?
3. The Double Edged Sword
4. Getting Organised – doing what has to be done, and doing it well
5. Entrepreneur Artisan or Artist?
6. Have, Do, Become…
7. Build a Team OR Do it All – the choice is yours
8. The ‘investment ready’ Business Plan
9. Situational Enterprise – the importance of technique and motivation
10. Towards the Total Quality Enterprise – a tool to decide ‘What’s next?’

For more information contact Mike on 07788 747954

Twitter: @mikechitty

Facebook: mikechitty

LinkedIn: mikechitty

The Entrepreneur’s Workshop – A Seminar for Entrepreneurs and Their Advisers

Workshops are fascinating and dangerous places. In the right hands they can produce things of great beauty and real lasting value.  In the wrong hands they can do great damage and wreck lives.

The Entrepreneur’s Workshop is no different.

True enough; the tools have no sharp edges, burning furnaces or high-speed drills.  They are a set of ideas, principles, practices and habits that, applied with care and passion, can produce a wonderful lifestyle.  Learn to use these tools properly and they will serve you well.  Misuse them and the consequences are likely to include debt, damaged relationships and misery.

This 2 hour session introduces 10 of the most powerful tools that the entrepreneur can use to build a business with real lasting value:

1. The Truth Detector – How to decide what might work for you
2. ‘Want to’ or ‘Have to…’?
3. The Double Edged Sword
4. Getting Organised – doing what has to be done, and doing it well
5. Entrepreneur or Artisan?
6. Have, Do, Become…
7. Build a Team OR Do it All – the choice is yours
8. Writing the ‘investment ready’ Business Plan
9. Situational Enterprise – technique and motivation
10. Towards the Total Quality Enterprise – a tool to decide ‘What’s next?’

The Entrepreneur’s Workshop is fast paced, honest and highly practical.  Participants will understand each of the tools and be able to use them to build a better business – or to put their entrepreneurial dreams on hold – at least for now.

Who Would Benefit from a Visit to the Entrepreneur’s Workshop?

I have run The Entrepreneur’s Workshop is fast paced, honest and highly practical introduction to 10 of the most powerful tools for entrepreneurs. in many different settings, from a University post-graduate course on Creative Enterprise to pre-start entrepreneurs on a Local Enterprise Growth Initiative (LEGI) programme. The workshop is relevant and accessible to a wide range of entrepreneurs from pre-start through to experienced business owners.  It has also been well received by a wide range of advisor’s and coaches.

Costs:

If you would like me to run the workshop for a group of entrepreneurs and you provide the venue, refreshments and manage the administration then the cost of the workshop is £750 plus travel and subsistence and VAT.

For more information contact Mike on 07788 747954 or just leave a comment and I will get back to you.

You can see some recommendations of my work here

Entrepreneurship or Rockin’ Da Vote?

There are a number of competitions out there designed to ‘promote enterprise’.   In some of them the key arbiter of success is the ability of the would be entrepreneur to turn out a vote.  Whether it is about getting your pals to turn up at a dinner and vote (old skool) or winning support on the web as in Barclay’s One Small Step Competition this is a puzzling phenomenon.

Prizes are awarded in part on the ‘quality’ of your business idea, as established by judges, and on the number of people who you can persuade to ‘click or tick’.  Kind of Dragon’s Den meets Britain’s Got Talent.  A popularity contest with business plans.

I would rather see bankers, and others with cash to spare, investing in businesses rather than giving prizes through competitions.  Competitions identify winners and losers. We should be identifying ‘investment ready’ and ‘not yet investment ready’ if we are really interested in supporting entrepreneurs.  And what happens if the winner is not yet investment ready?  Or they require investment at a different time or level to the prize?  What if it is not cash that they need?

Competitions work well for the publicists and the marketeers.  But I am not sure who else they really serve.  Let’s put our time and money into proving real support on the journey to investment readiness.

Let’s get back to the work of making informed investment decisions instead of awarding prizes in swirls of publicity.  Of helping entrepreneurs on the long journey toward investment readiness that rarely fits neatly with competition deadlines.   This way more entrepreneurs might get the right level of investment at the right time rather than a few ‘lucky’ prize winners.  I remember hearing one ‘prize winner’ wondering how to spend the £10k she had just won and making some quick and bad investment decisions to fit in with competition timescales.  Her business is no longer trading.  Another asked me whether I thought the cheque made out in his name was for him or for his business?  The last I heard he was splitting it 50:50.

I also believe that the ability of the entrepreneur to raise clicks and votes is a poor indicator of success.  Let’s face it on this basis Paris Hilton is going to give Warren Buffet a beating.  Ashton Kutcher would be a nailed on winner.  Unless of course the other finalist was Steven Fry.  The best connected and most socially networked do not have a monopoly of good ideas.  Nor, in general are they the ones for whom the investment might make the biggest difference.  Such voting mechanisms are surely discriminating unfairly?

As it says on the One Small Step website

‘it’s worth getting supporters on board now, so you’ve got plenty of local backing in time for voting’

And this perpetuates another myth.  That business ideas are in competition with each other.   That we have to choose winners and losers, when the market will do this much more effectively in its own time. In fact we should be looking to help everyone with passion, talent, commitment and a viable business idea.  There is always room for another good idea.  Investors will back propositions that meet their  criteria for risk and reward.  I am not convinced that creating winners and losers in very public competition really helps.

It is not about the competition for first place but about the development of an entrepreneurial ecosystem in which players collaborate and support each other as much, if not more than they compete.  I have seen how competition based on popularity can damage local entrepreneurial ecosystems as the community fragments into ‘camps’.

So, if you are about to sponsor yet another ‘enterprise competition’ please just pause for thought.  Could your money be better used to create a sustainable and enterprising society?

Master Class for Creative Entrepreneurs

Last night I found myself in the very wonderful boardroom at Broadcasting Place in Leeds running a masterclass for students on the MA in Creative Enterprise at Leeds Met.

In essence I told them not to worry about being too focussed (See Norman Perrin’s excellent post on Obliquity).  I introduced them to the ‘baited hook’ strategy, where you cast out lots of juicy baits and see which ones get a bite.  This seems perfect for ‘creatives’ who on the evidence of last night seem incapable of not innovating.  They always have new ideas, skills and visions to bring to market.  My advice….don’t fight it just find a way to get product to market quickly, and if the bites don’t come, then fail cheaply and quickly.  We explored this against a backdrop of ’10 000 hours theory’ that suggests you never have a really tasty bait until you have served your time and really mastered a craft!  You pay your money and you take your chance….

I also did some stuff with them on the importance of building balanced management teams with people who can look after great product, great marketing and sales and wonderful financial management.  A quick dissection of a few businesses in the room showed them to be packed full of creatives – but certainly short, if not completely absent, of real passion for marketing, sales and financial management.  This, to say the least, is a problem.  I hope they recognised that perhaps as well as hanging out with other creatives (who provide validation and yet more ideas) they might need to hang out with a few ‘suits’ in order to get the diversity of passion and skill that their businesses need.  The course tutor said that she could see a look of relief pass across faces when I said that they should not be expected to be great at everything themselves.  That it was OK to build teams, to ask for help.  That someone else should be doing the bits in the business that they hate.  We explored how proper mentoring and coaching could help fill this gaps and that skills could be begged, borrowed and bartered.  The inadequacies of some mentoring programmes designed to help where described by entrepreneurs who had been on the receiving end.  So much mentoring is more about CSR and professional development for the mentor than it is about really helping the entrepreneur.  We also spent much of the evening talking about the merits of ‘kissing frogs’ and seeing which ones turned into to Princes/Princesses!  Don’t just accept the mentor you have been sent.  Go and search for the right one yourself!

The 90 minute masterclass (for me at least) flew by – ending with a riff on the importance of managing your own learning, along with a few insights into how to do this, and keeping yourself on track with your own personal vision for the kind of person you need to be. Staying true to yourself.   Following your muse.

At the end, as has happened several times before when I have done this kind of gig, participants told  me that ‘I really understood the way that artists think and work’.  This reaction initially puzzled me.  I have a degree in Physics and a schooling in enterprise and entrepreneurship.  I did once read Gombrich’s History of Art and I do know what I like….but how could I have developed any real insight into the psyche of the artist?

The truth is of course that artists are people too.  The same ideals of psychology, personal growth, honesty in work, and staying true to a personal vision and values apply whether you are an artists, physicist, engineer or nurse.  The real secret of my work here is connecting with people about their personal visions – and not getting sucked into the nitty gritty of the business.

I’d love to do more of this kind of short masterclass – so if there are any opportunities out there do get in touch!

Entrepreneur – Or Entrepreneurial Seizure?

More often than not ‘entrepreneur’ is used to describe both a passing phase of ‘start up’ and a lasting role of ‘business management and development’.    The two roles overlap to some degree but demand different dispositions and skills.

In the start up phase the entrepreneur is frequently working alone developing a personal vision and finding ways to make it work, in theory.  They are finding investors and developing plans.  They are researching and shaping their still very malleable ideas until finally they have something on paper that ‘works’.  They talk with advisers and potential customers.  But the business is just an idea.  It is not yet a demanding child; a long term commitment.

Sooner rather than later the infant business develops different needs; sales, management (especially financial management) and systems.  The emphasis shifts from the energy and drive of start up to a different vibe of business development.  Energy and drive are still required but so too is discipline and routine.  The business is no longer on paper where numbers can be changed at the stroke of a key.  It is now a real thing where to ‘change a number’ takes real work and often hard cash.  And the business is there, demanding, all day and every day.

Instead of a single person driving a personal vision it now may require teamwork and people management.  The entrepreneur has to morph into a cocktail that includes some or all of; sales, management, bookkeeper, product/service development, operations management and leadership.  A very few make this transition with relish. But for most it proves difficult.

Many entrepreneurs learn to move on with grace.  The passion, skills and energy that help them bring the businesses into life are not well suited to the more methodical and disciplined demands of business development.  Having been responsible for conception they leave the parenting to others.  They bring in professional ‘management’  while they move on.  This IS the entrepreneur.

But for the majority, who are venturing into entrepreneurship for the first time, this early exit to business ownership is not seriously considered.  The business is set up from the start as a vehicle in which the ‘entrepreneur’ can pursue their trade (social media guru, web designer, window cleaner, whatever).  There is no exit.  They have had what Gerber calls the ‘entrepreneurial seizure’.

Gerber recognised that most people who choose to start a business aren’t really ‘entrepreneurs’ as described above. Instead, they are technicians, craftsmen or artisans who have had what he called “an entrepreneurial seizure“. They have become fed-up with their boss, disillusioned by their employer, made redundant, or increasingly have never been employed and decide to start out on their own ‘Enterprise Fairytale’.

This is the entrepreneurial seizure, and critical decisions must now be taken.  Get them right and the transition to ‘entrepreneur’, and ‘business owner’ may be made.  Get them wrong and the entrepreneurial seizure may be prolonged, expensive and painful.  Society may still label you ‘an entrepreneur’ but you will be both boss and labourer, technician, craftsman or artisan.  What once felt like tremendous progress may soon turn into a trap.

If you learn your entrepreneurial skills at one of the worlds leading business schools you will be taught the skills of starting and owning a business.  You will be taught to avoid the entrepreneurial seizure.  If you learn your entrepreneurial skills in more prosaic settings this lesson may not be taught.  Indeed the working assumption may be that helping you into an entrepreneurial seizure  could be as good as it gets.

It might be perfect for you – but it is not really entrepreneurship.

And when the policy makers lament our ability in the UK to start businesses that consistently achieve global scale, I believe it is because we trap so many of our ‘could be’ entrepreneurs in their own entrepreneurial seizures.

A Secret that Few Business Planners Know…

“It was not reason that besieged Troy; it was not reason that sent forth the Saracen from the desert to conquer the world; that inspired the crusades; that instituted the monastic orders; it was not reason that produced the Jesuits; above all, it was not reason that created the French Revolution. Man is only great when he acts from the passions; never irresistible but when he appeals to the imagination.”

Benjamin Disraeli, British Prime Minister and Novelist, 1804-1881

Nor is it reason, logic and a good business plan that helps a business succeed.

So spend less time developing the business plan and more time developing the vision, passion and skills.

It’s passion, energy, commitment and often a lot of luck that makes a business thrive.

With thanks to Andy Maslen for the quote!

Portfolios and Metrics for Enterprise Coaching

• What sort of numbers is it realistic to expect a full-time enterprise coach to deliver?
• What does a healthy coach portfolio look like?
• If I employ 5 coaches to work in  city of 750 000, what sort of results should I expect?

Well here are my thoughts….

The basic unit of coaching is the 121.  Each 121 will usually take between 45 minutes to an hour.  Of course they can take longer – but this is rarely productive.

121s are intense, often emotional and usually challenging.  If they are aren’t, you are not doing it right!  This means that a coach can do on average 3 x 121s in a day.  This should mean that they can deliver well in excess of 600 personal coaching sessions in a year – 650+ is not beyond the realms of possibility.  Of course geography matters – if clients are scattered across Northumberland you will spend more time travelling than if you coach in an urban centre.

I would expect to see a coach working with about 200 unique clients in the course of a year.  Yes, three or so new clients coming onto the portfolio each week!  I would expect to see each coach working with a catchment area of between 15 and 50 000 residents depending on population density and other demographics.

The one hit wonders

A proportion of clients will come once and may not return for months or years, if ever.  We may have helped them enormously.  We may not have helped them at all.   We may never know - although if you are visible and accessible enough and they stay in the area you should be able to get some feedback.  I have known clients who were clear on what they wanted to do after just one session and went and did it.  In fact one client called me after 3 years and said that he had started his business and now wanted to expand – would I like to have a chat!  Others just don’t come back when they recognise that:

1. I am not in the business of giving them money or pulling magic rabbits out of hats
2. They will have to do some work on this – it is not an easy option

The percentage that fall into this category can vary widely usually depending on the kind of marketing used to promote the service.  If the marketing says ‘We can make your dreams come true’, ‘Funding available’, ‘Lunch provided’ or some combination of the above then the number of one hit wonders will be high.  Where marketing is through word of mouth, real clients telling others about what the service is really like and what it has helped them to achieve then they should be much lower.  Effective word of mouth depends on your service being quite literally ‘remarkable’ and you being prepared to actively ask clients for introductions and referrals.  If they are not happy to give you these it is likely that your service is just not good enough.

If the number of one hit wonders creeps much above 25% I would be wondering about whether we had problems with our marketing and reputation - or whether the coach was just not able to connect with the client group.

The Ideal Clients

In some ways the ideal clients are the one hit wonders who just go and do it, start a business, and return years later to look at business expansion.  But these are rare, and often can’t be counted for funding purposes!  The real ideal client engages with us, takes seriously the notion of doing work between meetings and returns for subsequent visits to make further progress.  We can build a strong relationship with them and provide much more support to them in developing their ideas and skills.  We can also start to see a story emerge about our own effectiveness.  We can record the progress the client has made and provide high quality quantitative and qualitative information on our effectiveness to funders.  Such ideal clients will typically require between 3 and 6 121 sessions over the course of anything from several weeks to 6 months or more.  I would hope to see good coaches with some 50%, or 110 plus clients each year.  Of these I would be expecting around 15- 20 clients to actually go ahead and start their business from anything within 4 months of the first 121 up to a few years after the first meeting.  There is much to be said for slow enterprise.  I would certainly expect a good, established coach, working in an effective system, to support anywhere between 15 and 20 or so starts each year.

I would expect upwards of 80% of these new starts to be trading 3 years later.  Survival rates should always be very carefully tracked, and serious consideration given by both the coach and the service as a whole as to how they can be maintained and improved.   Helping clients to start businesses that they have not got either the commitment or skills to manage effectively  or for which there is not a sufficient market to sustain will only help to set back the reputation of the service and the enterprise culture of the community.  However attractive it might be to get another start-up box ticked we should be doing all can to slow our clients down until they really have the very best chance of long term survival.  A much smaller number of really strong startups is worth much more to the long term enterprise culture of the community than a rash of sickly ones.  I only wish funding regimes would recognise this.

Anything significantly less than this would set my alarm bells ringing that all is not right.  The problem might be with the coach, with the enterprise coaching system (including marketing and administration), or with the enterprise culture in the community.  The coach cannot do this on their own.  There needs to be a substantial network of pro-enterprise individuals who can provide additional support and provide an effective counter the negative messages about enterprise that often pervade communities.

While the other 85 perhaps don’t start a business I would expect each of them to have been significantly assisted by the coaching process to clarify goals and learn how to be much more enterprising in their pursuit.  These outcomes are valuable and should be recorded and wherever possible paid for (or at least reported to) by the appropriate funder.

The Demanding Clients

So this leaves us with perhaps 25% of our clients, 40 or so in the course of nay one year, who are really demanding.  They need more than half a dozen 121 sessions.  Perhaps they are starting from a long way back and need many 121s over a period of years before they start to make substantial changes – or decide to stick with the status quo.  They may need referring to specialist service providers before our coaches can do much more with them.  Perhaps they just like to spend time with coaches, fooling themselves and others that they are really working for a better future.  Demanding clients may just need a higher level of support – live with it – or they may be a sign that actually a coach is promoting dependence, happy to keep working with clients who won’t make progress because they can just count the sessions.

The actual dynamics of a coach’s portfolio will vary depending on the geography, psychology and enterprise culture of the community they serve as well as their own experience and longevity on the patch.  It may take a couple of years to achieve a stable portfolio of the type I have outlined here.

It will also depend on the type of marketing support they receive.  Often well intentioned marketing activities can produce floods of clients that need to be seen, but who turn out to be one hit wonders of the worst kind.  I am a big advocate of expecting enterprise coaches to develop their own referrals through word of mouth from existing clients, perhaps augmented with a little bit bit of judicious PR.  Expensive advertising campaigns may attract punters to one off events and workshops but are much less effective at actually finding people who really want to work effectively and intensively with enterprise coaches.

The Role of the Manager in Supporting Enterprise Coaches

Call me a traditionalist but I think that the manager has a key role in both supporting the coach to develop an effective portfolio.  Each coach should be seen ideally every week, certainly fortnightly to review the portfolio and the progress that is being made by specific clients.  Ratios of one hit wonders to ideal clients to demanding clients should be tracked for clues about the performance of the coach and the system that they are operating in.  Where specific clients are providing cause for concern (insufficient progress is being made, specialist services are requires that are beyond the boundaries of the coaching service, client behaviours are causing concern for example) explicit strategies should be developed for managing them effectively.  At least three or four times a year the manager should observe the coach at work, accompanying them on 121s and providing them with feedback and coaching support.

Closing Remarks

Getting an enterprise coaching service to work really well takes years rather than months.  Coaches have to become known, trusted and skilled.  Marketing strategies have to be honed.  The numbers I have mentioned here are achievable but not in all situations and never instantly.  They have to be built towards with intelligence, insight and dedication.  Sadly, funding regimes often encourage us to take the expensive and unproductive short cuts of putting adverts on buses, building flashy websites and holding conferences and expos with dragons, apprentices, millionaires and free lunches just to get punters through the door.

But it is not any punters that we need. It is those who believe, because of our reputation and our track record, that we can help them to use enterprise to transform their lives for the better.