In their words
I started working at fifteen and never really stopped. Spent thirty-five years working with small Calgary businesses. Restaurants, trades, a couple of hair salons, some contractors. The problems were almost always the same. Good people who were great at their craft and completely lost when it came to the money side. Not because they were careless. Just because nobody showed them.
What I see now with the younger generations who start businesses is different from what I saw twenty years ago. They're starting things earlier, they're more creative, they're comfortable with technology in ways that still impress me. But the financial anxiety is real, and worrying about money is constant. They're running a small business while carrying student debt, while renting because they can't buy, while watching their expenses go up every year. That pressure shows up in how they make decisions.
A lot of them avoid looking at their numbers because they're scared of what they'll find. I understand that completely. But avoiding it makes everything worse. I can help take some of that fear away just by sitting with you and making it less mysterious. I've learned the new tools — Wave, QuickBooks Online, Square. I'm not going to tell you to use something from 2005.