Brian's Introduction

By Brian Walsh (Founder & CEO of Entrepreneur.co.za)

As an entrepreneur you have certain responsibilities, both to yourself and to society. Make sure that you take administration seriously from the word go.

A business is only as good as its admin system. Those words should be written in red and stuck up in the office of every small business. I might add that many medium sized businesses, and even some larger ones, could do with that admonition. For the most part small business owners and entrepreneurs are notoriously bad at keeping proper records, and utilising proper systems. Their argument will always be that they have to get the job done, and that’s the most important part. However a business, just like the human being that owns it, cannot run with no legs, and certainly cannot write with no arms, or even left handed. Asking your business to do that is going to ensure its inevitable failure, just as much as asking a man without legs to run a mile. I do not know how to emphasise this enough, because it is so difficult to make people believe in, and act on it.

- Extract from the guide My Own Company by Jack W Walsh

There are various forms of administration that will need to be handled. These include the following:

• Registering your company and fulfilling the relevant requirements like meetings, writing up minutes and shareholders’ certificates.

• Registering with the various authorities such as SARS (for company tax, VAT, PAYE etc) and UIF.

• Complying with acts like the Factory Act, Labour Act, Companies Act, etc.

• Making sure you have the required trading licenses.

• Setting up bank accounts.

• Setting up accounting systems.

• Setting up a filing system.

This may all seem overwhelming, but I can’t stress the importance of effective and consistent administration enough. Running a business is a privilege within our society, and you need to make the effort to do it well and according to requirements. The up-side is that you will have a neat, organised company which makes accessing financial requirements easier, and also makes selling your company for a profit that much easier.

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