Some entrepreneurs are young when they start their company while others wait until late in their life. I knew a young man that started his first of many companies when he was just 12 years old and within four months was earning more than his father, a school teacher. I have also known those who worked for others until they retired and then decided to start their own company.
Many of America’s 77 million baby boomers have found themselves unemployed due to layoffs or company closings at a time in their life when slowing down is the last thing they want to do. In our current economic environment with 10%+ unemployment and about 7% under-employment, if you are 55 and older, the odds of reentering the work force at the position you last enjoyed are very slim. For every opening there are approximately 6.3 other people who are also applying for it.
Sooner or later, they give up on trying to compete with younger candidates who are willing to work for a lot less and seek outlets for their experience, energy, and drive that are more personally and financially rewarding, while also providing the flexibility and direction they might not have enjoyed during their previous careers.
Do these incentives sound like the potential rewards of owning a small business? They should.
Statistics show that of the nation’s 10.9 million self-employed workers, the largest category is boomers, aged 45 to 54 at 25 percent. In 2006, the number of self-employed persons aged 65 and older totaled 781,000—a 19-percent increase in just six years.
As with entrepreneurship at any other age, a boomer’s entrepreneurial direction has many influences, such as interests, knowledge, location, financial resources, and personality. Some may relish the challenge of building a new business, even to the point of working as many hours as they did before retiring or becoming unemployed. Others may prefer pursuing an enterprise with more limited hours, allowing them to make the most of that long-awaited leisure time.
Fortunately, there’s a growing range of resources designed to help boomers pursue second careers as entrepreneurs. For example, AARP’s Website helps those approaching retirement to weigh second career opportunities such as consulting and franchise ownership. Mature Resources, an online magazine that covers a wide range of issues related to aging, contains a business section with articles about 50+ entrepreneurs, as well as a business directory.
Marketing consultant Andrea J. Stenberg has created The Baby Boomer Entrepreneur, which provides small business marketing strategies and motivation aimed at helping aspiring 40-plus entrepreneurs to build new businesses.
Another multifaceted information resource is All Business, an online service that helps address real-world business questions and presents practical solutions. All Business provides articles and directories for aspiring small business owners, as well as a section dedicated to analyzing boomer marketing and demographic trends.
For women eyeing a post-retirement career in small business, the TIP$, or Turning Ideas into Profits, Mid-Life Women’s Business Community offers free information, tools, support and networking opportunities.
Many boomers are turning to SCORE for free counseling and mentoring to help them start a new business or for volunteer opportunities as a counselor and mentor to help other small business owners.
At the other end of the age continuum, Gallup studies of high school students show:
- 70 percent want to start their own business
- 44 percent think it is very important to teach entrepreneurship in schools
- 35 percent take economics courses
- 27 percent take entrepreneurial business courses
If you fall into this category, you will find value in Entrepreneur.com’s Center for Teenage Entrepreneurs. Another resource for the young entrepreneur is the Retire @ 21 blog. Looking for business news for the young? Try YoungBiz. Two other great resources are the Small Business Administration’s Teen Business Link and SCORE’s Young Entrepreneurs provides free counseling and mentoring for our youth.
I hope you find this information useful. If you would like to contact me, you can do so by emailing me at mike.clough@bestbizpractices.org or visiting my LinkedIn page.
Posted by: Mike Clough
