What are the benefits of running your own business?

The Greenways Partnership

“Success is a journey, not a destination.”

Small Business Survey 2004

The intention of this question was to act as the lead question in helping us to determine where the business was located on the Spiral. It was our intention to coax the respondents to reveal to us their motivation in running their own businesses, because we felt that a revealed motivation would highlight the underlying life conditions that the business faced.

From the outset, we expected a wide variety of responses. It was of paramount importance for us to record as much detail of the conversation as possible. This was important because, at the later stage of interpretation, we needed to make as informed a decision as possible about coding the answers in terms of the Spiral.

The bulk of the interviews were conducted in the Spring of 2004, a relatively buoyant period for small businesses, and one in which we might expect business optimism to be reasonably high. After collecting the raw data, each response was analysed by the team within the Greenways Partnership to place the response on the Spiral.

There was much raw data, and this needed to be put into a standard format before being collated and analysed. Each of the actual motivations expressed was classified in terms of eight standardised responses. These were:

1. The benefits of running my own business are that I am able to earn a living and to support myself (a Beige response).

2. The benefits of running my own business are that I am able to support myself, my family, and my staff (a Purple response).

3. The benefits of running my own business are that I can control what I do and when I do it (a Red response).

4. The benefits of running my own business are that I am able to ensure that I can do a proper job in the right way (a Blue response).

5. The benefits of running my own business are that I can improve my lot through my own efforts (an Orange response).

6. The benefits of running my own business are that I can balance my work commitments around my chosen lifestyle (a Green response).

7. The benefits of running my own business are that I can grow in my profession at a pace that I can set and in a direction that suits me (a Yellow response).

8. The benefits of running my own business are that I can tailor my contributions to suit the needs and wants of the business community (a Turquoise response).

Each of the 110 answers to this question was analysed with reference to these eight questions, and categorised accordingly. Where it was difficult to give a category to a given response, we made reference to the responses to the other four questions as a guide to the motivation of the respondent.

Perhaps a some examples would help to demonstrate the process. One correspondent, to answer the question, stated that the benefits to running their own business are that you don’t have a boss to answer to and that your time is your own. We felt that control was the central core of this response, and that the category that best captured this was the Red Category. As such, we categorised this business as a red business.

Alternatively, another respondent stated that the benefits to running their own business are that they can make their own decisions and, through this, control their own fortunes (meant in a material way). Although the issue of control came into the answer, we classified this as an orange business because it was very much a case of the business owner believing the rewards that they enjoy are part of the effort that they put into running their own business.

Finally, yet another respondent stated that the benefits to running their own business are that they provide the flexibility and independence to allow you to arrange your hours to work around family commitments. The inclusion of a reference to the work-life balance led us to classify this response as one from a green business.

Once we gathered the data relating to the classification of the businesses, we needed a simple representation to show the distribution of the population. One simple solution was by means of a Pie Chart (see below). This is a good visual device to show how a population is divided into various categories, but it does not allow for direct comparisons to be made, which is what we wanted to capture. Another alternative would be to use a Bar Chart (see below). This was a good visual representation that captured the feel of the distribution and the colour of the analysis. However, when used for more than one data set, the representation has too much information. Finally, we looked at the use of a Line Graph to show the distribution visually (see below). This appears to be a bit bland when showing a single data set, but it comes into its own when comparing the distribution of more than one data set. We decided to use the Bar Chart to examine the position of the Suffolk small business community on the Spiral, and to use the Line Graph for the purposes of Spiral Profiling.

The results of the survey did hold one or two surprises for us. We had expected a distribution skewed towards the earlier life conditions (the Beige, Purple, Red, and Blue areas). We were not too surprised by the distribution peaking in the Red Zone, given the importance of the control of one’s destiny to small businesses. However, we were surprised at how few Beige and Purple businesses were represented in the sample. This could mean one of two things.

1. As business is so buoyant, there are very few small businesses struggling at the moment. This is a combination of two factors. On the one hand, there is enough business about to ensure the solvency of the small business sector. On the other hand, if a business does face troubled times, there are sufficient job opportunities to permit the business owner to pass into paid employment.

2. It could be that our sample is biased against the Beige and Purple businesses. It could be that ISSBA is simply not reaching the Beige and Purple businesses to embrace them into their membership.

We have to accept that it could be possible that all of these factors might be present in a greater or lesser degree. They could be measured for their impact on the sample population, but that was outside the scope of this survey.

Beyond the sample peak in the Red Zone, the distribution exhibits a nice decay function. This is in line with what we might have expected at the outset of the investigation. There is a slight uptick in the Orange Zone, but this is not statistically significant, and can be explained by general sampling variations.

Once armed with the distribution of the Suffolk small business community in terms of the Spiral, the next phase in our study was to profile the sample. This is covered in greater detail on the relevant page.

For all enquiries, please contact us by E-mail at enquiries@greenways-partnership.com.

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