This is a book to help people make the transition from fed-up wage slave to enthusiastic self-employed free-man, or freewoman, whether your dream is to be a florist, a plumber, a consultant or any other gig where you don’t report to an odious lump of a manager and where you are free from the shackles of an annual appraisal. A world where personnel managers are just a distant memory. A world where you can decide what sort of phone to buy and where you don’t have to use it to report in to a lame duck bastard of a boss, because you don’t have one of those any more.
These pages have not been lovingly crafted, printed and bound for people who want to borrow £5 million and buy an established business, or who already have wads of cash and just want to play at it. No, this book is aimed squarely at people like me who started with little more than an idea and a sense of self-belief that would have made the Angel Gabriel cough with surprise.
A clue to the content and style is in the title. Cunningly the book is not called 1001 Ways to Get Started because you would fall asleep by the first chapter and probably consign the rest to the shredder. Instead it has the word ‘bastard’ in the title because when people make this kind of leap they are full of emotion and don’t want to be force-fed lists of tip-top tips. What I wanted when I started was a book that would help me to understand some of the business basics, which make the difference between having fun and having a house. I wanted to read something that was informative and made me think, and that wasn’t varnished by the dead hand of parental advice. Most of the business books on my shelf are half-read because completing them is like trying to drive through a snowdrift without a steel snow plough bolted to the front of your car. No matter how hard you try, you just get bogged down and then have to wind down a window to let off a flare and be rescued. Leave The Bastards Behind comes without any snow-related safety kit, because it is breezy, pithy, informative and useful, so that you won’t get stuck in the cold, wet, white stuff.
The world is full of bad language and it’s fair to say that some of it has migrated into these pages, waiting quietly to be read, laughed at and thought about. If you’re not the sort of person who likes to read a few naughty words then you have a choice. You can put the book back on the shelf or you can hand it to the person looking over your shoulder who doesn’t have such hang-ups. I don’t mind, because we all have choices to make in life and exercising your right to choose is what it’s all about.
Choose to continue reading and you’ll find some practical guidance to help you get going with your pet project. If you Google ‘business books’ you get a whopping 502,000,000 responses, but this is the only book to contain a handy height chart, some rude words about marketing types and a useful and unique personal planning kit. And if that wasn’t enough, it even warns against the dangers of playing with fireworks.
Working for yourself is like sex. You can have fun, you can indulge your fantasies, but once you have fired the starting gun then there are going to be consequences, tears and a sticky patch. So this book is here to help. It’s not intended to be a dull slog through the intricacies of discounted cash flow, the niceties of business law, or the pain of hiring help. Instead it covers the main issues people face when deciding to go it alone, and it invites them to think. I know, because I have worked for myself for over four years and so this book is part helpful companion and part reflections from the other side.
I have worked more hours than I ever worked when I was employed by someone else. I have had to learn fast to keep eating, and I have had days that have been so fantastically rewarding, I could have cried with the pleasure of just being me, doing what I wanted to do. On sunny days when I pull up to a client and park my car I still pinch myself that this is work. On the days when I’m stuck at home wading through accounts I also pinch myself that this is work, but the rough and the smooth is what makes life as a selfer so exhilarating and so stretching.
Read this book from cover to cover, and have fun working out for yourself what you will do and how you will start doing it for yourself. And if you are already in business, read it and think about all the decisions you can change now, and about all those little loose ends that you still haven’t got to grips with. Then when you’ve finished it and completed the personal planning kit, if you want to spend some of your precious seed money on more books you have 502,000,000 choices to investigate. Life is always about choice, and Leave The Bastards Behind is here to help give you choices and invite you to consider your options. Have fun!
Whilst you’re having fun, remember that no one is really a bastard. We might like to scapegoat our bosses for their bad behaviour, but as we own our own behaviour, we can choose to be powerful and do what we want to do. Think about the boss you hate. He (or she) may be overworked, under-trained and having to uphold a set of business objectives that he doesn’t personally believe in, but being the boss he has to toe the party line or face the chop. Given the need to earn money to pay for life, it’s inevitable that people’s reaction to stress can be to treat their ‘team’ with harsh words and a short fuse. Don’t pity them, simply think about how life must be for them, then focus on what you want to do for yourself and give them a cheery wave as you paddle off into the sunset.
There are no businesses that operate in a little bell jar, all on their own and isolated from the world around them, and it’s the same with writing a book. Despite my sincere wish, this book did not arrive one morning in the post, completed, edited and ready to be read. So from my big jar of sweets I have some treats to hand out. First up is me, for actually managing to write the damn thing and for making sense of a pile of scribbles on odd bits of paper (loosely called planning). I’ll have a rhubarb and custard sweet, I think.
Next up is my friend and chief supporter Harry Hemens, who has generously given me his experience when I needed it and who has listened patiently to my dribbling for many years. He gets a big round lollipop, as does Steve Tracey who lets me call him at odd times with crazy ideas, and who took the trouble of reading the drafts and giving me sincere and muchneeded feedback. Thank you, chaps, and have a big lick on me. A chewy bar goes to Joe Holmes, who very kindly asked me a whole bunch of useful questions which got me thinking, and a big bag of jelly babies goes to the following supporters to share out and munch on: Julian Hammond, Alan Robertson, Frances Donnelly, Rob Godwin, David Jerram, Craig Walker, Mum and Bill, and the late and much missed John Morgan.
Finally a couple of bags of sherbet dip are reserved for Pom Somkabcharti and Martin Liu at Cyan. Without them, this would still be on my laptop, instead of in your hands. Enjoy all the sweets, everyone, and especially enjoy a tube of Daddy-Mints each, Lucy, Theodore and Rebecca, who have all helped me to become successful. If Newton stood majestically on the shoulders of giants, then I have perched on the wobbly shoulders of two small children and one hard-working wife. Thank you!
So if you fancy a dip into the world of ‘after I had a proper job’, complete with bad language and strong stories, then read on. Remember that you are responsible for all your choices, actions and inactions, because the responsibility to manage your own business sits squarely on your shoulders at all times. The book does reflect my genuine experience and is full of my failures and thoughts, but I don’t intend to be sued, so keep your eyes open and your ears alert at all times. In addition, the examples have all been disguised, so that only I know who is really who, to save red faces and the threat of litigation.
Finally, if you’re wondering why I bother to use strong words, then it’s because life is like that – and don’t pretend you didn’t know them already!
Richard Maun