Out of the blue a couple of weeks ago, I got a call from a headhunter on my mobile phone. I happened to be walking across a parking lot at the time. I glanced over my shoulder — like a refugee in the witness-protection program — and wondered, “How did they find me?”
The truth is, my professional background includes more than one successful stint in corporate America. I am a loyal, hard working, high-achiever type who plays well with others. I’m the kind of employee who is continually awarded both recognition and additional responsibilities. My M.B.A. usually counts for something, as do a list of references who are willing to sing my praises. My husband admits that he hated working with me when we were in wireless telecommunications together. He claims I was the quintessential teacher’s pet. I’m not a corporate wonk, but I can play that role when I have to.
The headhunter — I’ll call him Deep Pockets — cited my previous experience as a sales analyst with a Wal-Mart supplier and told me he was looking to fill an account manager position at a large company. He asked if I’d be interested.
I receive phone calls like this one on occasion, although the longer my absence from corporate America, the less frequently they come. Whenever I get them I automatically go into my spiel about owning my own business. But this time I hesitated.
I don’t think it was perceptible to Mr. Pockets, but it shook me to the core. I lost my rhythm and found myself floundering through my spiel and then agreeing that there might be a possibility of meeting for coffee sometime. When I got off the phone I was horrified. What had just happened?
After several weeks of introspection, here’s my take: I think the Great Recession, which I’ve been keeping at bay, finally got under my skin. It has diminished, however slightly, my usual bravado and left me wondering just how safe it is to be a small-business owner right now. One of the most insidious enemies in the business world is uncertainty, and there seems to be a lot of it going around these days.
It’s easy to thumb your nose at big companies when things are going well. But Mr. Pockets made me stop and think in a way I haven’t in several years. Most of us are happy just to be in business right now. But is that good enough? Is it foolish — or even irresponsible — to turn down the prospect of a good job with benefits in today’s economy?
It’s one thing to proclaim stoically that the market punishes the weak. It’s another to watch a war of attrition take place before your eyes. In the past 18 months I’ve watched three of my closest competitors fall. One closed up shop and took a chief financial officer position, one vacated his office and appears to be working out of his home, and — rumor has it — another had to get a personal loan from a friend to keep the doors open. Now is certainly a tempting time to duck and run for cover in a cubicle.
I have no safety net, other than the fact that we live below our means and maintain an out-sized rainy day fund. I have no inherited wealth, no friends or family members with money to lend (that I’m aware of).
What I do have is faith. Faith in the path that my husband and I have chosen, faith in our abilities and our business, faith in the future of our industry, faith that this economy — like every other down economy I’ve lived through — will turn the corner, and those of us who have survived will be well positioned for the future.
So, I was tempted to have coffee with Mr. Pockets. Even in a good economy, being a small-business owner can be a tough gig. It can be a thankless, lonely existence where being successful can get you hated as much as it can get you liked. The hours are terrible; the stress is constant. Why not go skulking back to corporate America? Because for all its warts and troubles, this is what I do. And the majority of the time, I love it.
For me, the most unsettling effect of the Great Recession has been that moment my voice faltered on the phone. Most people would probably forgive me for entertaining, if for only a split second, the thought of a cushy job at a big company. I just don’t know how long it will be before I forgive myself.
Are you ever tempted to go back to the cubicle? How are you keeping the faith?
Barbara Taylor is co-owner of a business brokerage, Synergy Business Services, in Bentonville, Ark. Here is her guide to selling a business.
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