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Suggest who benefitsBonus Episode: Kurt Wilkin Hates Business Books. So He Wrote One
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Suggest questionThis week, in a special bonus episode, Kurt Wilkin talks about how he helped build several businesses, including most recently a recruiting business called HireBetter, and explains why he hates most business books. It has to do with the attention deficit issues he, like many entrepreneurs, tends to experience. So when he decided to write a business book of his own, he kept it short, and he structured it so that you can find the parts that are most relevant to you and skip the rest. It’s called “Who’s Your Mike?” and it features chapters on the kinds of hiring and management challenges all entrepreneurs confront, including situations involving employees like Mike. Who exactly is this guy Mike? Oh, you know. He’s the incredibly loyal and hard-working employee who’s been with you from day one but who isn’t necessarily growing with the business. Says Kurt, “We all have, or have had, or will have a Mike.”
About 21 Hats
The proponents of employee stock ownership plans can make them sound like the greatest thing ever. A business owner can take a big chunk of money off the table—or even all of it—while still getting to run the business. And there are some pretty great tax breaks. Oh, and it will also solve income inequality in America. On the other hand, if ESOPs are so smart, why are there so few of them?
Jim Kalb of Triad Components Group in San Diego and Jeff Taylor of Crafts Technology in Chicago have both implemented ESOPs. Jay Goltz of the Goltz Group in Chicago has reached his 60s without a succession plan, and he’s considering his options. In this 21 Hats Conversation, you get to listen in on a street-smart discussion of the pluses and minuses of ESOPs from the business owner’s point of view.