2011-03-03 Self-Employment , Practice Before You Jump In
Seminars@Hadley
Self-Employment; Practice Before You Jump In
Presented by Urban Miyares
Moderated by Billy Brookshire
March 3, 2011
Billy Brookshire:
We would like to welcome you again to Seminars at Hadley. My name is Billy Brookshire, I'll be your moderator today. Your presenter is Urban Miyares who is an internationally known entrepreneur. He's also the President of Disabled Business Persons Association and just an incredible presenter. You're going to enjoy his presentation this morning.
Without any further nonsense from me I think we need to give as much of our time as we can to Urban, so by all means listen closely. If you've got any questions chime in any time you want to. Urban, I'm going to hand the microphone over to you. If you would tell the folks a little bit about yourself before you get into the self-employment stuff.
Urban Miyares:
Welcome everybody, it’s a pleasure to be talking to all of you. A little bit about myself. I returned from Vietnam in 1968, a disable veteran. After six months in the hospital I went out and due to a friend was able to get a job right away in New York City on Wall Street.
At that time the job position was Margin Clerk. It's a position that is no longer around and I had to go through a few weeks of special training which was quite difficult for me. Barely getting through high school and you're throwing all these numbers at me and started working. After a short time they found out that I was a disabled veteran and I got fired because I was a “baby-killing, needle toting Vietnam veteran” so that was 1968 and the tone of the country was not very positive to us so we had to keep our veteran status quiet.
Also after being in the hospital six months I wasn't aware of all the benefits that I was entitled to. I got out of the hospital, couldn't wait to get out and I had a wife waiting for me. And I started my life not knowing I could receive any benefits. So I went out to work right away, got fired from that first job and a neighbor who was also unemployed at the time, we started a little business together and going on 43 years later – I've had 23 businesses over the last 43 years. Way back when I started my first four businesses failed and I was so frustrated and angry because people basically told me that as severely disabled as you are there is no way you could compete in the work place as a business owner.
I guess I'm one of those that you don't say you can't do it to. By the time the first business came around I got lucky and I was made a promise way back then that one day when I could show how someone with a catastrophic, with severe disabilities could be successful in business I was going to help others. The end result is in 1985 after selling a large manufacturing company I had, I had over 100 employees in that company. I started the Disabled Business Persons Association based in San Diego to provide free assistance, services and primarily information on how people with disabilities could look at, evaluate and be successful in the able-bodied and sighted business world of business and that's where we are today.
Today I volunteer about 90 hours a week providing educational programs around the country. Sometimes I'll pick up a client here and there and help them personally, it depends on their disability, where they are and what their commitment is to self-employment. But primarily I do educational programs and I still run a few businesses and do some other entrepreneurial stuff around the country.
Basically that's a quick synopsis so I guess I'd better tell everybody what my disabilities are. I'm totally blind, hearing impaired or classified as deaf/blind. I have post-traumatic stress, PTSD, I have Type 1 diabetes, I have spinal cord issues, I have internal organ damage and I occasionally get tumors in my body. So far I have been cancer free. The tumors and some of my disabilities are presumed to be due to a defoliant used in Vietnam which was called Agent Orange and I know many of you know about that.
I've had a stroke and some other issues, but I still work, I still have fun and love self-employment. Self-employment has been the reason I've stayed so healthy. Even when I came back from Vietnam in 1968 they gave me at best 20 years left to live and I'm still here and healthier now than I was in 1968, 43 years ago.
So there we go Billy, that's a quick synopsis, soon to be out in a book I hope.
Billy Brookshire:
I love it Urban. Thanks for doing that introduction. I just appreciate it very much and I'm just going to turn this over to you now to talk about self-employment for these folks. How do they practice, what do they need to learn about business in general before they jump into their own?
Urban Miyares:
Well the first thing to realize is that business and self-employment is completely different than employment. People get into business for a number of reasons. There are three primary reason people start out in business and you need to identify upfront which one of these primary reasons it is. There's only one that you need to select or be aware of. You're either getting into business due to control, you want to be in control of your life, you want to control your future, you don't want to have to rely on others to tell you if you have a job or if you don't have a job.
The second reason that people get into business is because of pleasure. They just want something to do. They want to get out. We're seeing more and more people in their retirement years, people that we're serving, I can't believe the average now is over 50. Just 20 years ago the average of a person looking a self-employment was around 30.
As we're getting older, and we are living longer. I remember when I went to blind rehab many years ago they told me that because I was blind I was going to live seven and a half years longer than someone who was sighted, mainly because I wasn't driving. I always found that humorous and I don't know if they still say that but many people get into business because of pleasure, just something to do. Sometimes it's a social network they're alone, they're single. It's great to find a companion or a loved one or a mate in the business world.
And then the third reason people get into business is money. I've got to make money right away, I want to make a lot of money, I want to be able to afford what I want. Most people get into business because of control, especially those of us with disabilities. We want to control our future. To get all three of those pleasure, money and control as a reason to be in business; that generally takes time and being in the right business.
So again, seldom, if ever do you get into business for all three. You know, I want to make money, I want to have control and I want to have pleasure. Generally when you get in it is for one reason only. When Bill Gates first got into business he didn't get into business because of money. He got into business because of control and those who know Bill Gate's history and his background will readily understand that's the reason. That's just one of many examples.
Talk to people to are successful in business, I'm not talking about people who have been paid to be the head of a company, a founder of a company I'm talking about. You'll find out most of them got into business just to control their own future. Maybe they didn't have another employment option, but probably if I would have had a job in 1968 that paid me what I thought I was worth and was satisfying and challenging I'd still be there, I wouldn't be talking to you today.
So the first thing is to understand about that, about why you're actually getting into business. For those who are getting into business strictly to make money you'd better start out with a lot of money because it's going to be a real shocker to you, especially when you're starting business for the first time, because you are going to make mistakes and if you don't have money to pay for those mistakes you're going to go broke really quickly so it's an important part.
The next thing is business is all about you, not necessarily the product, the service you may be selling. Unlike employment when you're going to get work from someone else you need a job skill. You need to be able to do something that the company is looking to hire somebody do that position or job description. You'll either have to be knowledgeable on the computer or be able to do something for the company to hire you.
For self-employment, believe it or not, you really don't to know that much about your product or service that you're selling. The whole secret in business for self-employment is being able to manage others and be able to understand business. So if you're an individual that is highly skilled, trained or proficient in a specific field and you can't get employment today, your sight loss may be a problem or barrier to that. The other thing is it may be you, something about you, but if you're that good, you should be able to get a job.
Now I know there's going to be people out there that will disagree with that. I just say, “Are you working? If you are working how much are you making?” In business, if you ran a company centered around your expertize it could be a barrier to you because you know so much about what you are selling that you may wind up selling or giving the customer more than what they're paying. That comes with being a perfectionist and being proud of what you're doing.
Sometimes as a business owner, and there are always exceptions to this by the way, I've found that in my 23 businesses most of the businesses I've had where I knew something about the business I didn't do well in. Those businesses that I didn't know that much about the product or service but learned it through time are the businesses that I did much better in. When you sell something you want to sell exactly what the customer is paying for and not give them more than what they're paying because that extra that you give them actually is coming out of your own pocket, so you've got to be very careful.
So those are the upfront things to realize about business. If you are proficient, you love something, you have a hobby in something, an interest in something. It's nice if you could go into that business because of personal passion. But if the focus is to be successful in business that passion may also be a barrier to you so you being aware of it is critical.
The third issue that I want to bring up that business is all about you, the person, the business owner. You've got to realize that what your personality is, your character, your traits will mold or shape the business. There's a saying in business “You want to find out about a business, just go into any company and talk to the very first person you see to talk to.” That might be the receptionist at the front desk. If that person has been at that company for a long time is positive and all, you have a good feeling. It gives an impression or personality of that business and probably the business owner too. But if the person is negative, you're uncomfortable with them, they're disrespectful to you because of maybe your sight, or your dog guide or something like that, generally you have a negative feeling about that business.
So business is all about you and this is a problem with many people, especially those of us with sight-loss when you do home-based businesses. We don't get out and meet the people and our personality is our biggest barrier in business, not necessarily the product or service that we sell or market. So you're got to look at yourself and I do educational programs on all these topics.
Your personality is shown as one of the big ones where you could change your personality or predict or guess what the person you're talking to, what their personality is like so that you know how to communicate with them, possibly sell them something or get something from them. If you're going for a bank loan as an example, your personality is so critical, more so than your business client or any other reason that you are going.
We've had people that have claimed bankruptcy and have been able to get a bank loan, 30 and 60 days after a bankruptcy. You hear all the time that my credit is so poor. People lend money to people. They don't lend money to businesses and if your personality is uncomfortable about the person you're talking to, because they really don't know you yet. Then the chances of you getting a business loan, being able to sell a product or even getting a job is, you're putting up a red flag right away and you've got to be aware of that.
So you've got to look at yourself first and this is the most important thing, is being able to look at yourself first and then re-evaluate if you get a 'no'. To me a 'no' is a “come and ask me again” type of response so you've got to really look at yourself and your personality.
When I came back from Vietnam I stuttered terribly. I went to Toastmasters so that I could stop the stuttering. This all came about that as business owner, in one of my early businesses a TV channel came in and they wanted to talk to me on TV and instead I gave it to one of my employees to talk about the company and a customer said “What's the matter Urban?” and I said “I just can't talk in front of the media, I just freeze up and I start st-st-stuttering”.
He signed me up for a 6:30 a.m. Toastmasters group and I went with him to Toastmasters and that's how I broke my stuttering. It wound up being so successful because he told me then that until I was able to speak in front of the public I would never achieve my potential in business. He was exactly right, whether you're talking to employees one-on-one or to a 100 employees. I've spoken to groups as large as 10,000 plus. Until you're able to that, you don't have to be a professional speaker, but at least be comfortable on stage or you're never going to reach your full potential.