Article by Richard Eaton

As a business mentor, I found that I was repeatedly being asked the same questions. Where can I find finance for my business? How can I best make use of social media for advertising my business? Where do I find business support services? What steps can I take to implement cyber-security? Should I form a Company or be a sole trader? What do I need to think about when employing staff or taking an apprentice?

To make better use of my time and also that of my mentees and to enable me to avoid having to repeat myself, I decided to prepare some mentoring fact-sheets. While doing this and at the same time researching relevant websites, I realised that what a mentee really needs is something that is more comprehensive than a fact-sheet which provides simple and straightforward access to desired information and advice. I also realised that the plethora of business start-up and business self-help books that are available in fact put-off many prospective and existing small business owners, who perceive them to be too specialised and complicated and generally so daunting that they rarely read past the introductory pages.

So I decided to write a short, pocket-sized (in the print version) book containing simple, jargon-free text but which nevertheless links (by hyperlink in the e-book version) to detailed and comprehensive online information. My aim being to leave it to its readers to decide how deeply they wanted to research the information that they considered to be relevant to their specific business proposal. In this way, the book does not present as being crammed with specialist and complex information although, in fact, should the reader choose to investigate further, it does link to such information online.

Owning a Business: Things you need to Know is an updated and improved version of my earlier book Getting Ready to Start a Business. It acknowledges that most small business owners simply want to get on with working in their business and that they want swift, inexpensive access to relevant information. It also makes clear that, to be successful, a business owner needs to spend time working ON as well as IN their business; something that my book will help them to achieve.

The book includes:

• Access to detailed information about starting and managing a small business;
• A guide to researching practical business matters;
• Essential reading that refers to more than 70 online links to business practice;
• Achieving success: a checklist of key small business components;
• Compact and straightforward overview of important business processes;
• How to define and promote a small business to prospective customers and clients;
• A brief, structured and innovative approach to identifying information and advice about starting and managing a small business.

Owning a Business – Things you need to Know is available both as an e-book (price: £4.97) and as a compact, pocket-sized printed book (price: £5.37) from Amazon. Comments from reviewers include: ‘…essential reading for anyone who wants to start their own business’ and ‘The most relevant business start-up and ownership book I have seen…’

Thanks to Richard for sharing the aims of his book with us. Richard is a City Law School alumnus.