Let's play catch up.

In November 2007, I was laid off by Lennar Homes. So what did I do? Went on a 2-week vacation just before Christmas to a tropical island. Why would I mope around the house? Not worth it. I've been laid off before, during the dot bomb of 2001, which truly hurt my ego. This time around, no sweat. It's a fact of life nowadays.

Anyway, January 2008 came along. I was convinced by my husband and another person he works with (let's call her "B") to set up a consulting company with "B". I had my reservations on so many levels about agreeing to this business partnership, which need not be discussed here. But I conceeded to the idea. So this was my next venture into entrepreneurship!

The target market? Small physician offices with less than 5 doctors. Our company was to provide revenue management services and operational efficiences to these doctors. I had no healthcare background, but had the IT background. The healthcare knowledge came from living with my husband who has been in health IT for many years so I've learned a few things. The rest of the stuff about medical practices and their culture I learned by reading lots and lots stuff on books and over the web (e.g. Physicians Practice, Medical Group Management Association, etc) . In addition, "B" has been in the healthcare industry and has intimate knowledge of medical offices: workflow and operations. So she was well-connected. By the way, B had a full-time job and this was to be her other job. I questioned this from the very beginning, but I was somehow convinced me that she will have time for both. Big mistake! Always trust your gut feeling.

The cost of start up was out-of-pocket since I was hesitant borrowing money from the bank until we knew the partnership and business will work out. Thank goodness for this foresight. My role was to be the principal consultant and "B" was the business development person in charge of drumming up business.

Long story short. We formed the LLC in January 2008. We decided to dissolve the partnership in December 2008. In between the formation and the dissolution, we won only 2 contracts: one worth $50K and the other worth $15K. The $15K project only netted us $9K. We had to write off the remaining $6K because the client didn't have any $$ and ended up closing his practice. Along the way, the business relationship suffered due to several factors. There was an unpleasant confrontational meeting which terminated the partnership. End of story. Violins playing.

Here are the take-aways from this experience:
1. NEVER start a business with people you personally have not worked with or been friends with.
2. ALWAYS trust your intuition, gut or whatever you want to call it.
3. ALWAYS document everything: meetings between partners, agreements in writing, etc.
4. If you want something done right, do it yourself. Don't wait for others to do it for you. If I had just taken the initiative to do the business development as well, maybe we would have gotten more contracts and things would have turned out differently....maybe.
5. ALWAYS hold people accountable for their duties and responsibilities. Call them on it right away instead of staying silent and hoping things will happen the way it's supposed to.

So, another chapter in my life ended. Another one is beginning. I've started a new venture....but that's another story. Now we're all caught up with what has happened since my blog from 2006.