Can you keep your full-time job while building your franchise business? As you might expect, there is no black and white, cut and dry answer that applies to everyone. The answer depends on two main factors: YOU, and the franchise in which you’re investing. Enjoy my information-packed video below!
First, let’s consider why you’d want to keep your full-time job: Many good reasons exist for keeping your full-time job and tiptoe into entrepreneurship. Some franchisors do allow what’s called “semi-absentee ownership”, where you can keep your job while you’re ramping up the business, with one foot in your Corporate America position and one foot in entrepreneurship.
So, what do semi-absentee owners do if they’re only there ten to twenty hours a week? That’s when you get to work on your business rather than in your business. Semi-absentee owners are CEOs. They’re managing teams, the operations, the business’ efficiency, watching the financials, and the marketing. They’re focused on growing and scaling the business. Semi-absentee owners are not needed in any one location every day that it’s open. You’re coming in with the mindset that you’re going to be relying on people, that you’re leveraged through a brand and a location or a system, and you’re coming in with that vision. Your primary focus as the semi-absentee CEO is on multi-unit growth, where you’re looking at the total portfolio as your investment rather than any one store.
If the franchisor does not allow semi-absentee ownership, it may not be the best idea to try it on your own. Why? They may not approve you as a buyer if they know that you want to keep your full-time job. Many businesses require the owner’s full-time attention because driving that sales plan in the first year is so critical to the business’s long-term success.
If the franchisor has enough leverage and infrastructure built such that they know that you can be a semi-absentee owner, then go for it! The best way to know if a business can be run semi-absentee is to talk to as many franchise owners as you can who are running their business semi-absentee. If the franchisor allows semi-absentee ownership, even if you can’t find an owner who validates the way that you want to run your business, it doesn’t mean that it’s not possible for you–it just means you’re going to be the first one to pave that way. Some of those owners who are trying to run it semi-absentee may tell you it’s not necessarily as easy as they thought. Others will say it’s exactly as they thought and planned that it would be because so much of how you run your business and what you get out of your business is going to be based on your experience, skills, and passion. So much of your success is based on you.
So, the answer to the question “Can I keep my full time job and own a franchise?” The answer is yes, IF you’re investing in a franchise that allows for semi-absentee ownership. But I’d encourage you to take a moment to think about why keeping a full time job is important to you.
To learn about opportunities that allow semi-absentee ownership, please reach out to me right now using the contact form below!