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I always heard it was an accountant and a lawyer. I was wondering who else you would say are most important to hire.
And for the posters who are more caught up in semantics we are not talking about hiring an accountant or a lawyer full-time. But you want to start working with these folks early, even if you are only hiring them for a meeting.
Location: East of Seattle since 1992, 615' Elevation, Zone 8b - originally from SF Bay Area
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I had a small business for 16 years, and never hired or used an accountant or lawyer. It just depends on what experience you have from previous work. A complete novice in accounting and tax law would definitely benefit from some professional help.
There's a "grey" period when a company starts where it's pseudo legit. The key thing when you start your business is to identify your market, service and make sure it works and is competitive. That you need to have planned out. In terms of "hiring" you probably don't need to hire an attorney, but it's smart to have one. Similarly in terms of an accountant, you may want to start with a bookkeeper at first and have an accounting resource that perhaps is a hourly consultant from time to time to make sure you are on the right track.
One startup I worked with has a massive hit that they've managed to roll-out around the world. The founder is loyal to a fault, however, of the initial bookkeeper he brought on. She was quite possessive of her role, despite her limitations. In this case, the limitation is that the company never charged and collected sales tax wrongfully thinking it wasn't applicable. Now they're out of compliance around the world, and what was a non-event (charge and remit - no P&L activity) has gone on so long that there's no way they can do an IPO and have to be content to fly under the radar and hoped to be bought out.
Another built some really cool drones but they simply expensed everything they got. As it was also a startup, and these things had a thousand parts in them that were constantly changing a mess ensued. In major cleanup, they were faced a terrible conclusion. They're awesome drones cost way too much money to use commercially. They could have had a closer answer $100M previously.
But it really depends on the business. It's worth talking with both and finding what's thought. Both are busy professions so there's less need to worry about getting milked by the top.
I always heard it was an accountant and a lawyer. I was wondering who else you would say are most important to hire.
And for the posters who are more caught up in semantics we are not talking about hiring an accountant or a lawyer full-time. But you want to start working with these folks early, even if you are only hiring them for a meeting.
1) A really good lawyer.
2) A really good accountant.
3) A really good marketing person/team.
If you cannot afford these three from the get-go, then you don't have enough money to start a business. I've witnessed way too many business fail because the would-be entrepreneur thought he/she could start it on a shoestring and half-assed everything.
First People You (try to) Hire When Forming a Small Business
The competent and capable of doing the work of the business.
They'll be difficult to find or to afford to hire as most have GOOD jobs
and will have accumulated complications (medical etc) that will keep them put.
I always heard it was an accountant and a lawyer. I was wondering who else you would say are most important to hire.
And for the posters who are more caught up in semantics we are not talking about hiring an accountant or a lawyer full-time. But you want to start working with these folks early, even if you are only hiring them for a meeting.
Depends on what kind of business and how experienced you are in that area, I think. Maybe you need to work with an engineer or scientist first, or a business planner, production expert, web developer, etc.
Your whole business plan might be off or need revised way before you need an attorney.
I always heard it was an accountant and a lawyer. I was wondering who else you would say are most important to hire.
And for the posters who are more caught up in semantics we are not talking about hiring an accountant or a lawyer full-time. But you want to start working with these folks early, even if you are only hiring them for a meeting.
Well I plan on getting a real good lawyer on retainer once i start my company because my business will involve a lot of contracts so a lot of depends on what kind of business you are going to start.A good lawyer would be more critical in my case.A lot of it depends on your situation.I doubt i would need a marketer but i would need accountant.
Well I plan on getting a real good lawyer on retainer once i start my company because my business will involve a lot of contracts so a lot of depends on what kind of business you are going to start.A good lawyer would be more critical in my case.A lot of it depends on your situation.I doubt i would need a marketer but i would need accountant.
So situations depending it sounds like the big three are...
Lawyer
Accountant
Marketer
Then maybe web designer/IT person since that’d probably be something different than the marketer. Unless you just want to throw up a website to have a website which a marketer could do or you could do if yourself. For a really good functional website, a web designer or IT person would be very important though.
In my own experience my business is quite tiny. I haven’t had to hire anyone (not like I have the resources to do so either lol). The only one I’ve used at all is an accountant to help with taxes/a little bookkeeping.
I’m planning to expand more and possibly shift focus within the next few years though. So I’m almost certain I’ll need to have some folks on retainer. Of course you don’t want to hire people just you hire them. A good business person is looking to not hire people if anything. I’d imagine an accountant and a lawyer will be necessary for me. Probably a web designer/IT person too.
Hire muscle in case someone tries to get rough with you./
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