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"Taking over" the business aspect of things. HELP

Started by Goals2017, August 14, 2017, 10:14:23 PM

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Goals2017

 A family friend, we'll call him K, recently talked me into helping him with his logging business on the accounting and business end. He's been at this 30+ years but has told me that he's not longer keeping much track of his books except through the bank, and sometimes he doesn't even get that. I was wondering if anyone had some pointers for getting things back on track for him. He's running 3 different sites right now with a lot of varying on who's working for him. He basically wants me to be the manager so he can go back to doing what he loves, cutting. I don't know what major things I should be looking for and definitely not how to get this running more smoothly for him.
On top of that he wants me to learn loading and other machine work for him so he can work faster. Any tips for that too?  I 100% have no idea what I just got myself into but I have about 2 weeks to prepare and any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks! ;D

Gearbox

Good luck . Big project . Get a ledger and track all expenses for each job . assign each piece of equipment a # to track expenses . Or get a program and do it on the computer .
A bunch of chainsaws a BT6870 processer , TC 5 International track skidder and not near enough time

nativewolf

I'd be concerned about Risk (legal and tax) and Cost first off.

Get your hands around ever legal and operating requirement that he has. What bonds/insurance does he have?  On that many jobs he should have some.  Does he have employees?  If so, what about workers comp, etc.  Is all equipment insured properly?  NEVER TRUST, if he is managing from his bank account he could have completely forgotten about insuring a truck that kills somebody.  Start putting together folders and organizing for each aspect of the business.  Think about it, every truck needs registration, insurance, DOT #, DOT paperwork, you need to inspect each piece of equipment to make sure everything is good, that all stickers, licenses are there.  You need to see insurance statements listing all equipment.

Contracts- written contracts of each job.  Key because this is how you manage the business- did you make money or did some aspect of a contract hurt/help more than anticipated.  How can you write a contract that helps out more.  Lots of things other than price matter.  Site clean up, boundary line marking, etc.

That's just a small beginning.

Cost:
Do you know book keeping?  Does he have a book keeper? 

The first place I'd start is getting his bank records & tax filings, finding out how payroll is managed, making sure that he's got payroll done professionally and that insurance is in paid.  Then, he's got expenses, start getting ahold of all the expenses, he could be hemorrhaging funds there.

Is he going to be comfortable showing you the tax filings?  If not..I'd shy away because it will be hard to manage anything if you can't trust and tax statements are a key on trust. 

Then and after then start looking at the projects.  At that point it starts getting interesting and you can start doing analysis of each project and really understand what the costs drivers are and what impacts profitability. 
Liking Walnut

kiko

Also make sure he is up to date with payroll with holdings.   Being behind on payroll taxes and not paying in money held from payroll will bring the entire business to a grinding halt.   I can't speak for your state but here the tax man will seize your accounts and come in and close the business with chains and padlocks .  Like native wolf wrote..    PROFESSIONAL PAYROLL SERVICE

Riwaka

People I have read about when they took on a business in Missouri, they used experienced professional business/ accounting type people to set up their systems. That way the business operators could learn their business daily operations firstly (in your case running the loader), then they had the business people tutor/ train them on their business/ financial/ banking systems so the professionals could hand over the financial/ business responsibilities to the owners.
Using experienced business operators cost them money but they considered it money well spent as they avoided traps (the professionals did not overlook anything) they would have likely fallen into if the new business owners had tried to learn the business and financial side at the same time.
I think the wife (one half of the business owners) has taken online courses to gain extra knowledge/ skills (keep up with changes to rules, software) over the years.

Loader - if it is a trailer knuckle boom or truck crane etc. Start by lifting and moving, short pieces of log around for a while until you get used to the machine controls. Try stacking log discs and a few simple exercises. Loading - start with the light logs before you graduate to the big heavy logs that can turn the loader over. I guess your teacher will tell you the machine's characteristics and what to watch for when approaching the machine's limits.

gman98

It is very common here for the wives of contractors to handle the book keeping for the whole operation.  Many of them use intuit quickbooks with success.  It may be something to look into.
Forest technician and part time equipment operator.  Looking to get set up with some logging equipment of my own.

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