The Owner's Responsibilities in the Start-Up and Beyond

14 important questions on The Owner's Responsibilities in the Start-Up and Beyond

What is workers' compensation insurance?

Payment for insurance that provides benefits - in the form of medical expense reimbursement and replacement of lost wages - to employees injured on the job. Workers'compensation is a state-mandated, no-fault insurance system, and, when you have employees, it appears as a hefty expense on your profit and loss statement.

What is the experience modification factor?

A numerical expression of a company's accident and injury record compared with the average for the firm's industry. The higher your experience modification factor, the higher the cost for workers' compensation insurance.

What is the job classification the state assigns each job?

In addition to the experience modification factor, job classification plays an important role in determining the cost of your workers' compensation insurance.

A particular rating - and subsequently a particular premium - based on the estimated level of risk involved in the performance of that job. The higher the job classification, the higher the cost for you. Because the classification criteria are often fuzzy, argue for the lower classification when possible.
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Why should small-business owners aim for a two-year lease of their space?

Long-term leases are a no-win situation for the small-business owner: if your business grows, it will outgrow the long-term lease and you'll pay a higher price for its cancellation; if your business doesn't grow, you'll pay an even greater price to get out of the lease.

Why are employee records important?

The day you hire your first employee is the same day you must create and begin maintaining your first employee-personnel folder. Be sure to maintain a written record for every employee, covering such issues as:

  1. Employment agreements (including salary history)
  2. Performance reviews
  3. Business goals
  4. Commendations
  5. Reprimands

Which tips should be followed to guard your cash like it's your life, because it is (well, it's your business life, anyway)?

  1. Schedule an audit at the end of every year. Simply ask your certified public accountant (CPA) to spend half a day reviewing your books. Your CPA knows the sensitive areas to focus on.
  2. Make sure your bookkeeper takes a vacation every year. Most bookkeepers who are siphoning off their employers' cash don't want anyone else probing their books, even for short periods of time.
  3. Review and approve every invoice yourself.
  4. Balance the bank statement yourself.
  5. Require two signatures on every check (or require one signature - yours).

Which small-business functions are most frequently outsourced?

  1. Accounting and Bookkeeping
  2. Human Resources
  3. Manufacturing
  4. Sales (potentially dangerous)

What does Human Resources include?

  1. New-employee hiring procedures
  2. Policies and procedure manuals for employees
  3. Payroll and related information-gathering systems
  4. Employee training on human resource issues
  5. Employee training on a wide variety of sensitive issues, such as ethics and sexual harassment.

Which three options can be considered when determining which accounting system to employ?

  1. An outside accounting service
  2. An in-house manual bookkeeping system
  3. An in-house computer-based accounting system

What are journals and ledgers?

Journals are where you make the entries; ledgers are where you total the journal entries.

What are the four categories of computerized systems?

  1. Quick and easy: they're basically an electronic checkbook register with the capacity to categorize and cumulate expenses and generate both profit and loss statements and balance sheets. The most often used example of Category 1 is Quicken.
  2. Plus payroll and inventory
  3. Following the audit trail
  4. Modular power

Which two kinds of expenses need to be controlled?

  1. Fixed expenses: those expenses that don't fluctuate with sales, including such categories as insurance, rent, and equipment leases. Effective control of fixed expenses requires your skillful negotiation, because after they're established, renegotiation time probably won't come around for a while, which means you're stuck with them.
  2. Variable expenses: those expenses that fluctuate with sales. These expenses include cost of goods sold, sales commissions, and outbound freight. You need to approve all purchase orders and sign all checks that relate to variable expenses, the responsibility for controllin them always rests with you.

What is adjusted-for-inflation budgeting?

A way to budget expenses. You assume a percentage increase for each expense category, both variable and fixed.

When do you need a lawyer?

  1. When forming your corporation or LLC.
  2. When taking in a partner or partners.
  3. When creating shares of stock in your company - for you and for others.
  4. When signing a lease, contract, or binding agreement.
  5. When buying or selling a business.
  6. When dealing with someone else's attorney on a conflictive issue.
  7. When creating an employee handbook.
  8. When designing employee bonus programs that result in company ownership for the employees.
  9. When dealing with a situation that could result in expensive litigation (such as terminating a longtime employee).
  10. When considering bankruptcy (we hope that never happens).

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