All of our clients were other businesses. Our background and experience is recruitment and we basically supplied people to fit solar panels as a recruitment business, only difference is that what clients asked for was whole installation teams and to be charged a fixed price per installation rather than the normal recruitment model of supplyig people by the hour or by the day.

We installed systems from 8 panels to 200 panels. Some jobs went very well, were paid for in full on time but there were also a lot of very bad clients in the solar industry and some very bad sub contractors. In total I expect we have written off ~£150k where clients have either refused to pay after signing off timesheets or have been given very large discount.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing but if we could go back and have that opportunity again we would do it all very differently.. The most profitable thing would have been to supply direct to customers, and QC everything. I did want to do this but our investors did not allow me to as wanted to stick with B2B recruitment and delivery.

I would also have been charging clients in advance of the work and not paying subcontractors until we were paid, rather than paying off signed timesheets.

Over the last year Ive learnt more about business that 4 yrs business school and 7 yrs as a recruitment manager combined. Credit checking and credit control is so important in the private sector. I discovered last week what a Phoenix is!

Have you considered they might be trying to force you out? Make your resign?
Sorry to mention it.

I can see why you might think that but no, it's just down to economics - it didn't make financial sense to pay a £75k salary based on a loss making business. At the point they cut my wage I think they would have understood if I left but did not want that.

I've worked with these guys for 7.5 years and they dont like to lose people who make them money- although my first attempt at starting a business with them failed a bit, I have still made them many millions in years before that so I don't think they wanted to lose me or force me out.

Now that the business is making some money my own package is ok and could become very good if we continue to grow.

Thought I would post a quick update ITT as I just returned from a week in Asia setting up a new office in Makati city the business capital of Manila.

Due to rapid growth my investors were keen to get offices set up so we can operate 24 hours a day so we now have a team of 6 in Asia and 8 here in the UK.

The business is going to need more investment if it keeps growing and had an extra £100k funding agreed today. We are on course for £150k gross profit in Sept if everything goes to plan, but on a personal note my own finances remain very fragile and will be until we can consistently deliver £100k+ net profit for a few concecutive months.

I'll try to update this thread regularly as its interesting to look back and see progress from rock bottom. I'm also happy to try to answer any questions about recruitment or setting up business in Asia ITT

Just read the whole thread...

How vital are you to the day-to-day business of this venture?
How vital are you to its future success?

At the beginning of the thread you were in a weak position. Now you seem in a much better place and are in a strong position where it might be worth renegotiating everything. Is my sense of the situation accurate?

-Hiway

You should sort out your personal finances so that this cannot happen to you.
Your wife should get at least a part-time job to start with.

Three kids and a non working wife? Please put some of that money away for a rainy day. They always, always come.

Just caught up on this thread.. sorry for the break.
I would say I am essential at the moment to the day to day business & it's success.

My understanding of the market, the brand, and the elements that bring the company together would be difficult to replace.
I have an excellent team of people now with various attributes, some sales people, some admin / finance / marketing / compliance etc but there is no-one currently in the business or the group who would have the time, experience, understanding or passion to take the business forward as successfully as I believe I am going to.

Your sense of the situation is accurate, although it's difficult even now to negotiate up my salary or equity they have made it clear there will be opportunities for salary increase and higher equity share in the future if things continue to go well.

I have since the start of this thread renegotiated my base salary up to £35k (from £30k), and some of my bonuses are now paid monthly which helps my personal cash flow. (5% monthly / 5% Annual as opposed to 10% annual)

The company has been profitable for the past 6 months which helps.
We have also grown in numbers and now have 10 people in Manila, Our expanding team of 14 in the UK will move to new premises next month & we opened an office in Rio, Brazil last month.

Good advice, i'm working on this, have paid off ~£5k of debt in the last 6 months and intend to keep paying off debts as fast as possible.

manila - what made you choose there over any other Asian location? just language plus labour cost or does it have any other advantages related to the energy industry?

I couldn't tell from the above - does your mainly place do large scale contact labour provision of blue collar workers, or were you initially aiming for exec search and just happened to win the panel installation work you mentioned in Y1?

either way i'd be interested to hear your strategy for Brazil. obviously I can see the attraction for your company's to head out there with all the presalt activity, but what is the edge a relatively small foreign firm has when opening up there?

manila - what made you choose there over any other Asian location? just language plus labour cost or does it have any other advantages related to the energy industry?

Setting up in Manila was nothing to do with language. They speak their own language there different to most other Asia Pacific countries. Most of our staff there speak English and communicate with our clients in Malaysia Singapore Australia Indonesia UAE etc in English.

Low cost helps but the main reason is we have a link for easy setup and management in Philippines and we want to have presence in Asia Pacific region as they work opposite timeZone to us in the UK which helps us to work 24hours Mon-Fri.

One of the most challenging parts of my job is trying to manage and communicate effectively with the Manila team from here in the UK, but there are definitely benefits to having the offices there.

I couldn't tell from the above - does your mainly place do large scale contact labour provision of blue collar workers, or were you initially aiming for exec search and just happened to win the panel installation work you mentioned in Y1?

We do a mixture of exec search and pay-rolled contract work. The panel installs were something we focused on due to the UK solar boom in mid-late 2011.

Before the panel installs we focused on exec search in the UK renewables market so it tied in well and we already had databases to work with.

Today we recruit for everything from Engineering to Oil Gas, Nuclear & Renewables but we focus 100% on recruitment; No more project delivery for now!

either way i'd be interested to hear your strategy for Brazil. obviously I can see the attraction for your company's to head out there with all the presalt activity, but what is the edge a relatively small foreign firm has when opening up there?[/QUOTE]

Brazil is cool. It's early stages we've only had the office in Rio a few months and I haven't been out there yet. As a relatively small foreign firm our edge is we can bring recruitment expertise & years of experience to a relatively young market. If we continue recruiting strong Local consultants I think it will do well.

The business has gone through a tough period last couple of months posting small losses for Jan & Feb but looks positive for the future & money has been re-invested in new websites and tech, re-branding, new UK premises, advertising and more staff. The plan is to keep scaling up indefinitely...

This will of course be very challenging but if it was easy it wouldn't be very satisfying or lucrative would it!?!

It's funny how things turn out.

1 year on from my initial post complaining about my drop in salary, our business is on course to have it's best month ever.

The company lost money in March 2012, but have turned things around and are on course to turnover £350k in March 2013 with Gross Profit of £100k+ and net profit well over £50k for the month.

As with any businesses we face some challenging times ahead. I'm currently awake in the middle of the night unable to sleep as there's so many things going on at once. I often wake up and think about work; Not healthy. I have probably committed at least 70 per week to work over the past 12 months.

Here's a brief SWOT analysis of the business as it is today:

Strengths:
Branding - New website with a strong re-brand and innovative tech developments will be complete and ready to be rolled out soon.
Global presence - Having an office in Manila helps us a lot and will enable solid growth if we can get it right out there. Houston & Singapore offices planned soon.
Low cost base - Our business model is low cost; Everything from my salary to staff salaries is minimised and the location of our offices means compared to competitors our costs are low. We take advantage of governments schemes and currently 50% of our team are in work experience programmes, or apprenticeships.
I work hard to push down the cost of everything we invest in.

Weaknesses:
Young and inexperienced team - I am the only person in the business with previous experience. Having also a lot of young people in the team means a big responsibility on me to train everyone up in the art of what we do.

Opportunities:
Offices - Having just moved to new premises with capacity for 60+ people we have the chance to grow the business quite fast.
Funding - Being well funded helps us, and we aim to have bank funding in place by July this year.
New Markets - I'm working with a small young team on developing some new markets and new areas. Brazil is also a huge opportunity and I see it as a very exciting new market to work on.

Threats
Credit control - One of my biggest concerns. We are owed money by several companies outside of the UK who we don't have trading history with.
Competitors - We work in a competitive sector and go up against companies that are better funded, more experienced, and very hungry to gain market share.

Overall there's a lot to be positive about. My own financial situation should start to feel more comfortable in August once I receive an annual profit share bonus...

You need to get your contract and a raise like right now.

The contract should be through any day now. I agree a raise would be nice, ideally to 50k basic, I'm confident this will come over time.

Will update again once the contract is signed!

If my employers hit me with a stunt like that - essentially showing no loyalty, I would assume I am playing a cutthroat game - you versus your employers. The object of the game is to benefit yourself the most.

Sadly they have turned the game from "we" into "I". It helps to win the game if they don't know you are playing, so I wouldn't make a big deal about anything and do whatever is in your best interest always.