Scotiabank Vision Achievers action coach Marcia Woon Choy is appealing to SMEs to forego misconceptions about entrepreneurship, and instead engage in proper planning and innovation to ensure sustainability of their businesses.

Speaking at the recently held Vision Achievers Programme, Woon Choy revealed that new business owners are often ill-advised about the management of a business and have misconceptions which contribute to the failure of businesses.

“Proper planning gives everybody direction and focus. If you are looking to grow — which is what businesses should be all about — you should be setting goals to grow the profits in the business,” she stated in a release from the bank.

“Over my five years of coaching, I have observed that only one in 40 SME businesses here in Jamaica seem to know what their true numbers are, look regularly at their financials, and have any major plans as to how they are going to be profitable.”

Studies have indicated that four major challenges that start-up companies face often include a lack of a proper foundation, falling into the debt trap, limited capitalisation of business ideas, and lacking the right mindset to be resilient in the face of challenges.

Consequently, Woon Choy stated that 80 per cent of businesses have failed in the first five years, and another 80 per cent of the remainder fail over a 10-year period.

Since 2011, through the Scotiabank Vision Achievers Programme, Woon Choy has coached some 25 entrepreneurs on tactics to take their businesses to the next level, while avoiding any impending pitfall. She is the owner of the Jamaican franchise of the critically acclaimed, US-based ActionCOACH.

The Scotiabank Vision Achiever coaching programme falls under the bank’s mandate to build the capacity of the SME sector and lasts for 17 weeks. It is a comprehensive programme which covers an array of topics, inclusive of leadership, marketing, sales, finance, systems and team building. Seventy-two start-up entrepreneurs have already benefited from the programme.

Woon Choy noted that many entrepreneurs are often optimistic about opening a business but do little research on the market and eventually run into difficulty.

“They believe that you just open the doors and people will come, but it is not like that. There are people who open a business and borrow money to develop products, but they don’t recognise that once you get the products on the shelf, you have to get them off,” she reasoned.

“Many SMEs in their early stages do not invest in marketing, or only use one or two marketing strategies, whereas in ActionCOACH we suggest using at least 10. In marketing, you educate people about the product, communicate the benefits, and tell consumers why they should buy. If you are not doing that, you are not going to sell your products.”

The coach urged entrepreneurs to find more sustainable ways to fund and promote their businesses, including the sorting of angel investors, asking family or friends to provide equity, or growing the business using one’s own funds.

“On your income statement, marketing is an expense but it really should be an investment, but only if you test and measure to know what works best. Utilise the online space, use Facebook and social media; it is a community waiting to be explored and is fairly inexpensive too, but the benefits are unlimited.”

She noted that not capitalising the business and charting its path is also a recurring challenge, as prospective owners do not invest in strategic planning or become intimately involved with the business plan for their company. Furthermore, many do not have the knowledge to manage a business, although they may have the love for creating a product or service, which often proves futile.

“In business, you must be in the game to win. If you intend to grow your company, you have to become that person who will focus on the development of your people. Leadership is influence; companies don’t succeed, people do,” she said. “You have to hire the right people, educate, lead and inspire them to be the best that they can be, and then you will be able to move your company from good to great.”

— Karena Bennett