1.    Personal Problems

1.1           Controlling and handling everything personally

1.2           Working harder and making less than working as an employee

1.3           Too many responsibilities

1.4           Taking the job home with you

1.5           Pressure and negative criticism from everywhere

1.6           No longer having any fun

1.7           Procrastination, making no decision, upsetting and demoralising the staff for lack of leadership

1.8           Loss of vision

1.9           Low pay for managing director / owner to reduce costs / improve benefits

1.10      Low self-esteem

1.11      Making all decisions personally

1.12      Too many people to satisfy

1.13      Lacking formal business training

1.14      High stress levels converted into chronic negative stress

1.15      Health

1.16      Family problems and concerns related or caused by the business

1.17      Expected to be a jack of all trades with neither the breadth of experience or educational background

1.18      Loneliest job in the world without some disinterested neutral party with whom to bounce and share ideas

1.19      Less than 20% of businesses have a managing director / owner with sufficient experience of running a business

1.20      New technology leaving managing director / owner behind

1.21      Keeping current with trends, technology and business practises (reading and researching)

1.22      Lack of confidence in spending money on traditional consultants / business advisors; expensive, nearly useless reports, projects based, theoretical

1.23      Laws, legislation and regulations (local, national, international)

1.24      Passiveness in looking for help or looking for it too late

2        Management Problems

2.1           Cannot see the wood for the trees

2.2           Difficulties in keeping abreast with the amount and rate of changes

2.3           Focusing on the day to day stuff

2.4           Crisis of all types handled without the necessary expertise

2.5           Day to day conflicts without disinterested neutral party to discuss them with

2.6           Establishing accountabilities and responsibilities

2.7           Exposed to a variety of risks taking without the  proper background information

2.8           Fast changing environment

2.9           Going from an informal to a formal organisational structure

2.10      Having no specialist board of directors

2.11      Lack of effective delegation

2.12      Lack of information

2.13      Lack of knowledge from some areas and no ready access to experts in those areas

2.14      Lack of management skills:

2.15      Lack of marketing / sales expertise

2.16      Lack of organisation and focus

2.17      Lack of preparation for succession / exit planning

2.18      Lack of team work

2.19      Lack of time / time management issues

2.20      Lacking international business experience

2.21      No controls in place

2.22      No planning mechanisms in place

2.23      No use of economy of scale

2.24      Not knowing how to maximise resource utilisation

2.25      Not knowing when to acquire / absorb another business to expand

2.26      Not knowing where to find and how to get government grants and funding, or not having the time and expertise to request them

2.27      Not recognising and implementing the structural changes required at certain points of growth / no growth preparation

2.28      Not setting priorities or not keeping to them

2.29      Overwhelming paperwork

2.30      Victims of their own success: business expansion problems where a significant step change is required

3        Financial Problems

3.1           Cash flow difficulties

3.2           Deliberate late payment by clients

3.3           Unreasonable terms from suppliers and clients

3.4           Debt collection

3.5           Old debts

3.6           Process of collection

3.7           High bank charges

3.8           Increasing costs

3.9           Lack of cash

3.10      New orders in the pipeline and not knowing how / where to get the machines / premises / staff / supplies

3.11      Poor financial practices

3.12      Price erosion

3.13      Productivity issues

3.14      Too many expenses

3.15      Unaware of technological opportunities for saving costs and running the business more efficiently

3.16      Unfair competition

3.17      Sourcing raw materials / supplies in appropriate quantities at the right time

3.18      Outsourcing to other countries

3.19      Quality issues

3.20      Difficulties in finding necessary funding / loans

4        Sales and Marketing Problems

4.1           Client conflicts

4.2           Competitiveness issues

4.3           Lack of appropriate advertising strategy

4.4           Lack of clients

4.5           Disloyal clients

4.6           Disorganised sales efforts

4.7           No deliberate marketing

4.8           Peaks and troughs in demand (lumpy seasonal business)

4.9           Multinationals competition

5        People Problems

5.1           Dealing with family members in the business

5.2           Dealing with untrustworthy people

5.3           Employee training

5.4           Providing cover for staff absent due to holidays, sickness or training

5.5           Staff management and training issues

5.6           General labour shortage

5.7           Hiring

5.8           Rotation of staff

5.9           Satisfying staff’s expectations and development

5.10      Staff conflicts

5.11      Staff development

5.12      Skills shortages

5.13      Untrained staff

5.14      Inappropriate use of temps

5.15      Handling difficult people