If you have been running your wedding business for awhile, you may find that you don’t have enough time to manage all of the tasks you need to do. Or you may be turning away event inquiries because your schedule is full.
At this point, many of us ask ourselves whether it is time to hire an employee. If you already have employees, you will likely be asking when is the right time to hire another employee? This is a decision that requires planning and analysis before moving forward.
If you are considering hiring your first employee, ask yourself if you can manage people AND if you actually like to manage people. This is an important consideration. What have your past work experiences taught you? Also consider the fact that you will need to be the leader of your team of employees in addition to the event services you provide. In small wedding businesses, most owners are both a leader and a doer. You also want to be absolutely sure that hiring an employee is a smart financial move for your wedding business.
Some event professionals prefer to run their business without employees, which is perfectly acceptable if you can run your business and meet your goals on your own or by outsourcing to contractors. When you work solely on your own in your wedding business, the operation of the business is less complex than when you have employees.
Let’s talk about the advantages of being a solo business owner versus having employees:
Advantages of Having Employees
- If you grow your team, your business can likely take on more events. Not only does this bring in more cash flow, it also expands your exposure in the market. Your company will be managing more events which reaches more potential clients, gives your business more exposure to new vendors and venues, expands the business portfolio, and you have more events with the potential to be published.
- If you have employees who can handle events on their own, you can be more selective about the types of clients and events that you personally take on.
- You’ll have more help to handle the tasks that are overwhelming you.
- A new employee can breathe new life into your business and generate new ideas.
- You have more time to focus on strategic planning for the business. Every minute that you spend working on tasks that can be delegated is a minute that you are not planning, strategizing, and building the best wedding business possible.
- Employees can be your backup in the event of accidents or illnesses. They typically know how you provide services for events and can likely take over if you aren’t available.
Advantages of Being a Solo Business Owner
- Having employees means more responsibility and running a more complex business. From paying your employee(s) to creating an employee handbook to filing tax forms, there is a substantial amount more work that needs done compared to running a solo business.
- Employees can be a liability if they cause problems such as stealing, breaking company rules, illegally using your company’s work in a future business, or causing problems with clients.
- As an employer, you would have the responsibility to provide employees with a safe, healthy, and fair place to work per OSHA regulations, the Equal Pay Act, and the Americans With Disabilities Act.
- Hiring, training, and managing new staff takes a marked amount of time. Setting expectations is one of the main keys to success when managing employees.
- If you have employees, it can be more difficult to provide personal service as your business grows. Wedding businesses often provide a one-to-one service to their clients. When you hire employees, you might not be able to deal with every client on a personal level.
- There is a significant financial commitment when you have employees. An employee costs you money for wages, unemployment tax, workers compensation insurance, medicare and social security taxes, training expenses, benefits, payroll costs, new equipment, and software licenses. You may feel the added stress of another person being dependent on your business. As a solo business owner without employees, you only have to consider your income needs.
If you choose to expand your business and hire staff, keep in mind that this process is a marathon, not a sprint. It can take years to build your dream team of employees. You will make mistakes along the way and that is perfectly fine. It’s how we learn. If you love working by yourself and have no desire to hire employees, own that plan and do exactly what you want with your business. Take the time to plan for a successful future whether that means you keep your boutique wedding business or building an empire.
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