Are you ready for your encore?

The traditional idea of retirement is increasingly becoming an old notion—either because people need to keep working as a financial necessity or because they still want to work. Instead of retiring, many people are looking to do something on their own terms, and do work that really matters.

The term “encore career” is being used to describe a new career later in life—one that is focused not just on making a living but on making a difference. Encore.org—a San Francisco non-profit that helps people pursue “second acts for the greater good”—defines encore careers as jobs that combine personal meaning, continued income and social impact in the second half of life. And according to the organization, the idea is catching on. As many as 9 million people ages 44 to 70 are already in encore careers, with 31 million more interested in the idea but not sure how to make the transition.

For many, the encore career most appealing is starting a business. In 2012, nearly one quarter of all new businesses were started by people ages 55 to 64. According to the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, business creation by older Americans grew more than 60% between 1996 and 2012.

So if you are interested in starting your own business as an encore career, where do you begin?

1. Follow your passion! Your business will only succeed if you love what you do. As Steve Jobs says, “The only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do.”

2. Know yourself well. Assess your strengths and weaknesses to determine if you have what it takes. Do you have some of the traits common to successful entrepreneurs? What are your existing skills? Older entrepreneurs have an advantage — at this point you probably have a good sense of what you love to do and what you can do well. Now, instead of doing that work for an employer, you can do it for yourself.

3. Get out there to connect and learn. There is so much to learn from others in the field. Read, take classes, join small business groups of like-minded people, find organizations focused on the issues you are passionate about, as well as organizations focused on senior entrepreneurs. Starting a business can be a risky endeavor but much less so when you have relevant skills, a sense of the marketplace, and an understanding of what others have tried already and what has succeeded or failed.

4. Don’t do it alone. Starting a new business can be a significant undertaking. You need a strong network to help you navigate through the rough patches and mentors who will share sound guidance. It is important to surround yourself with supportive and insightful people. As someone with life and career experience, there is a good chance you have a strong network of contacts already — people you can turn to as a support system and people who might eventually be customers or clients.

5. Use all the business tools you can find. There are many non-profit organizations and government agencies committed to helping people start their own small businesses. In San Francisco, the Office of Small Business is a great resource and there is a San Francisco Business Portal for finding all the licenses and permits you’ll need. Check out our website for more resources.

6. Money, money, money. There are many small and home-based businesses that can be launched without much start-up capital. No matter your size, knowing the resources you have and projecting what you may be able to earn is critical. How much do you need to make each month to cover expenses and make a profit? What are your start-up costs and how will you fund your transition? There are many ways to fund your business, with crowdfunding platforms becoming an increasingly popular strategy.

7. Make a plan! Your plan doesn’t need to be lengthy but it’s helpful to give some thought to marketing, money and management before you begin. A business plan can force you to clarify your idea, understand the external conditions that might affect your business, and set realistic goals with benchmarks to track your progress. Doing the research, talking to people and creating realistic financial projections will give you confidence to get your business started and keep it going. Renaissance Entrepreneurship Center offers a 12-week Business Planning Class to help you through the process.

Above all, what’s most important is to get out there and keep learning. Starting a small business is tough but it can be so rewarding both for the people you serve and the person you become. You are never too old to learn something new and make a difference.

Small Businesses Giving Back

Since small businesses are so well connected with their communities, they are in a position to do a lot of good! Giving back doesn’t have to mean a large financial outlay or donating hours and hours of your time. By connecting how you give (and to whom) with your interests, skills, services or products, you can contribute in a meaningful way and have a large impact.

Here are some ways that you can contribute – and some San Francisco Bay Area business owners who are doing just that!

Mentor other small business owners

There is a strong possibility that your success is due in part to the people that helped you along the way. You, too, can help others be successful. Do you have business expertise that could be valuable to someone either inside or outside your industry? Heidi Gibson, owner of The American Grilled Cheese Kitchen has made mentorship a priority. She offers internships to new food entrepreneurs and volunteers her time to help small business entrepreneurs in Renaissance Entrepreneurship Center’s Business Planning Class with their business financials.

Organize a volunteer day for your employees

This can foster increased engagement and team-buildinghelp and also boost employee morale. You don’t have to have employees to volunteer. My volunteer experience with fellow Potrero Dogpatch Merchants Association members at the San Francisco-Marin Food Bank was a fun bonding activity for our local merchants association.

Share your knowledge/skills with local organizations

Create a partnership with a local organization that is in alliance with your business and offer your expertise. Avital Food Tours offers unique culinary adventures in the Mission District, the Haight Ashbury, North Beach and Union Square. Owner Avital Ungar volunteers with the Legacy Bars and Restaurants Project run by SF Heritage. She has helped train tour guides for SF Heritage’s Haas-Lilienthal House and organized a pop-up speakeasy to raise money for the Project.

Create customer incentives

Commit to donating a certain percentage of each sale to an organization, offer discounts to customers who support particular causes, or create a contest to encourage customers to engage. Shivani Ganguly, owner of Bom Dia Market in San Francisco’s Noe Valley neighborhood supports the non-profit Kitchen Table Advisors. In February, she supported them by donating all proceeds from the sale of prepared foods on one day.

Donate products

Donating products or giving away samples at events can be a great way to reach new customers and support a cause that you believe in. Claire Keene of Clairesquares frequently donates delicious products to support organizations doing good work. She recently donated her treats to a silent auction supporting Techbridge, an organization that inspires girls to discover a passion for technology, science and engineering.

Donate to organizations in line with your values

Supporting organizations that you believe in shows your customers your business’ values. Keith Goldstein, founder of Everest Waterproofing and Restoration Inc. is committed to donating a minimum of 10% of pre-tax profits to charitable organizations, both local and international, He also sponsors Tibetan refugees for jobs, helping them create new lives for themselves and their families in the United States. Neal Gottlieb, founder of Three Twins Ice Cream launched an initiative called Ice Cream for Acres. Three Twins donates money to land preservation efforts every time they sell a cup or pint of ice cream.

Join a non-profit board

Ken Stram, owner of 2Bridge Communications is a board member of the Golden Gate Business Association, the city’s LGBT chamber of commerce. “I’m a bit introverted,” he says, “so being a board member gets me out of the office and keeps me engaged with the LGBT small business community. The board experience is sharpening my leadership and collaboration skills, too. The experience is also good for business—it positions me as a leader and puts me in front of an important audience on a regular basis.” The Volunteer Center helps to match Bay Area non-profits with individuals looking to give back and get involved at a deeper level. Check out their Board Match events.

A Circle of Giving

Your small business can also get a lot in return by giving. The causes and organizations you support will differentiate your business from competitors and can strengthen your ties to customers and clients. Giving back to your community can increase your visibility, increase customer or client loyalty and also increase employee morale. There is no reason NOT to give, and there are so many ways to make an impact!

How do YOU give back? Who are the small business owners that you know who are making a difference?

Business skills and lessons learned

March 23, 2016
Profiles
PTA
No Comments

Some of the most enjoyable moments during my years of teaching the Renaissance Business Planning Class were when past students came back to class to share their experiences and business advice. They would talk about their successes and also reveal their struggles and mistakes, and what they might have done differently. They would share how they improved their skills and their capacity to meet the business’ complexity, and also how it was a constant juggling act. Often, they stressed that “learning from doing” was a primary teacher. Their advice always had a profound impact on the students who were about to launch or expand enterprises of their own.

Here are some words of advice from small business owners (and past students) about tackling complex business issues, building on lessons learned and honing your management skills.

Elizabeth Leu
Fiddlesticks

When Elizabeth Leu started Fiddlesticks, a children’s boutique in Hayes Valley, she thought she was prepared. She first worked for someone else and learned as much as she could about the retail business. Elizabeth also took the Renaissance Entrepreneurship Center Business Planning class.

She started her business with a solid foundation of hands-on experience, working for others, and thoughtful planning. Yet she couldn’t prepare herself for what it would actually feel like when she was completely responsible for her own business and all its complexities.

“As a small business owner, you have to be the master of all in everything you do, and that’s not easy. You have to wear ALL the hats and ideally, they should all fit. I think management capacity is finding the correct fit with all those hats — and that’s hard! It takes a lot of time and experience to get them all to fit.”

Elizabeth’s advice for small business owners:

LEARN AS MUCH AS YOU CAN ABOUT EVERY ROLE IN YOUR BUSINESS.

“You may love only a few of those hats but you have to figure out, master and tolerate them all — at least in the beginning until you can outsource. Once you get strong enough to outsource, you still need to understand how it all works to keep a watchful eye on the whole operation.”

STAY POSITIVE AND JUST KEEP GOING.

“I have worked very hard to grow my business and I have had some significant setbacks. With every setback I can either choose to learn from it or become bitter and harbor frustrations. I have worked hard to learn from them. All of the setbacks were complex and difficult, especially because it was uncharted territory for me. But I learned and I am still learning. What is it they say, ‘two steps forward, one step back’? As long as you move forward, business complexity feels easier because you keep breaking it down, tackling it piece by piece.

Heidi Gibson & Nate Pollak
The American Grilled Cheese Kitchen

When Heidi and her partner Nate opened The American Grilled Cheese Kitchen they already had general business expertise, people management skills and financial management experience but they were new to the restaurant industry and lacked specific industry skills. Heidi and Nate’s approach was to be honest with themselves about their own abilities and get help. “We took a cold hard look at what we did and did not know how to do, and then we recruited advisers who could teach us, or hired staff who already had the skills we lacked.”

Heidi and Nate took a similar approach when opening their second location. They had never run a multi-unit operation before. They sought consulting from other multi-unit operators, and hired general managers for each store who had come from multi-unit backgrounds. “We tasked the managers in the stores with the responsibility of ensuring consistency across the stores, not just within their own. For us, hiring managers who brought experiences and skills to the table that we did not have ourselves was crucial.” With the added complexity of two locations, Heidi and Nate decided to outsource their bookkeeping, too. “We hired a bookkeeper who had deep experience with multi-unit restaurants, which brought more expertise to our operation and freed up our time to handle other issues.”

Heidi’s advice for other small business owners:

BE BRUTALLY HONEST ABOUT WHAT YOU ARE GOOD AT AND WHAT YOU’RE NOT.

“For the things you are not good at, find a way to outsource them to someone who is good at them. This goes double for bookkeeping and accounting if you are in a high-volume, low-margin business.”

ASK FOR HELP.

“There are a lot of resources out there for growing business owners, including Renaissance, SBDC, ICA and most importantly, other business owners. People want to see you succeed and you’ll be surprised at how much they want to help.”

DON’T SKIP FINANCIAL FORECASTING.

“Many small business owners underestimate their financial management needs and make mistakes with finances when starting or expanding a business. The worst-case scenario is running out of cash, and sometimes growing can really chew up cash. You’re in a much stronger position to secure financing before you run out of cash rather than waiting until you’re down to the wire. Take the time to forecast cash flow, accounting for your growth needs, and start investigating funding options early rather than late.”

Claire Keane
Clairesquares

Claire Keane, owner of the artisan, handcrafted sweet treats company Clairesquares, says that her business skills did not match the complexity of her business when she started. She had a steep learning curve. But Claire gained the skills she needed by seeking out specific business knowledge and support and her daily experiences in business brought many lessons learned.

Claire’s key steps for developing core business skills:

Write a business plan.

Claire took the 14-week Business Planning Class at the Renaissance Entrepreneurship Center and wrote a business plan. “To this day, I frequently remember key pointers from each class.”

Join an incubator.

Claire joined La Cocina’s Incubator Kitchen and received the help of that community and all their support services.

Attend lots of workshops.

Claire learned from others to increase her skills. “Whenever there was a workshop relevant to my lack of skills, I made sure to attend it. I was able to take tips from each training and apply it to my business immediately.”

Develop a support team.

Claire knew that she could not do it all alone. “It was very helpful to have a business mentor, new business friends with similar start-up business pains and other friends and family to lean on for advice to get me through the learning curve.”

Keep at it, even through failure.

Ultimately it has been Claire’s tenacity and her perseverance that has made her business a success. “No amount of workshops can prepare you for real world experience. In the end, I learned from trying, failing, and trying again.”

Check out these additional tips on balancing business skills with business complexity. What has worked for you and your business?

Launched!

There are many small businesses that launch every month in the San Francisco Bay Area. Each launch is proceeded by months (if not years) of hard work, detailed market research and fundraising before the new business owner can “open the doors”. A number of our business planning students at Renaissance Entrepreneurship Center launched their businesses in 2014. Show your support by visiting them and spreading the word!

Calibur

Sean Patrick and his business partner opened a new burger and fries place in San Francisco’s West Portal neighborhood featuring burgers, fries and milkshakes made from 100% organic ingredients sourced primarily from California. (They even have a veggie burger for me!) Check out their recent San Francisco Chronicle review.

Pinhole Coffee

JoEllen Depakakibo just opened a new coffee shop on Cortland Street in San Francisco’s Bernal Heights neighborhood. The curated space features a variety of coffee roasters and other locally made goodies. Check out this recent profile of JoEllen and her new business.

The Good Hop Bottle Shop

Melissa Myers opened her bottle shop and tasting room on Telegraph Avenue in Oakland, offering hundreds of craft beers from around the world, with mostly local beers on tap. You can enjoy your brew on site or take away, and attend their classes and monthly events.

Hoi Polloi Brewpub and Beat Lounge

Viet Vu opened his brewpub with his brother and wife on Alcatraz Avenue in Berkeley. The pub features a variety of beers, including their own creations, and all beer comes with popcorn drizzled with truffle-oil. Check out this recent San Francisco Chronicle review.

Communitē Table

Michele LeProhn opened the doors to her neighborhood restaurant in Oakland’s Laurel district this December — seasonal American comfort food to eat there or to take home. Check out this recent article about Communitē Table in the East Bay Express.

The ReCrafting Co.

Andrine Smith opened The ReCrafting Co. as a crafter’s resource for quality recycled crafting materials, supplies and tools. The shop also offers crafters a convenient opportunity to recycle their surplus crafting material and supplies on consignment for cash.

Liquid Gold

Tim Lee’s bottle shop and tap room opened in lower Nob Hill the Fall of 2014. The focus is on locally sourced beers and wines. In November, Liquid Gold made Zagat’s list of the 12 hottest new bars in the United States!

Urban Putt

Steve Fox and his team have created Urban Putt, the City’s first and only indoor miniature golf course in San Francisco’s Mission district. It is a playground for people of all ages with organic and locally-sourced food and drink. Thrillist calls Urban Putt “quite possibly the best thing to happen to the Mission.”

Are you ready for your encore?