ANTECEDENTES DE LA INVESTIGACION

Experience, reason for business entry, family business activity

Location, type, age of business, growth pattern, other businesses, employees Business aims

Rationale for inclusion

Identify extent of personal and family business experience and activities. Establish rationale for business entry decision.

Link business aims and growth pattern with succession plans.

Findings

Business entry decision

For 1st generation migrants, the move to self-employment was perceived to offer opportunities for an improved personal and/or family lifestyle, this decision frequently being associated with changing attitude to sojourner/permanent migration attitude.

In contrast, 2nd generation business entry decisions were linked to family commitments, changing aspirations and personal, family and business aims. These issues are developed in Section 4.6, linking with succession and motivation issues. However, the individual business entry decision was guided by three broad factors: to gain and build on experience (1, 6, 8, 9, 15, 16), immediate and wider family

encouragement (2, 4, 10, 11, 14, 18, 19, 20), and due to no perceptible options or alternatives through health issues (13), immigration factors (21) and obligations of the business being “a bad gift” (5: 28).

Experience

As noted in Section 4.1 above, none of the c-store owners interviewed have any formal business education. However, all have experience in family or community owned similar enterprises, learning on the job being perceived as the most appropriate and valuable lessons. As Respondent 4 comments:

I have been born in to this. being brought up in business, that’s my advantage … It’s second nature … you know in the newsagency, you begin to pick things up as you go along so you have a bigger picture, er, than just the theoretical side of it. To any businesses, yes, the basic principles are there to make money. (4: 8 and 287-98)

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Similarly Respondent 18 stressed: “You just learn, that’s right you just learn as you go from the customers. The customers, you know, it’s just common sense most of it really” (18: 408-10).

It should be noted that not all experience is positive at the time, but a means to learn lessons for the future. This is illustrated in the experience of Respondent 9. On migration to the UK, he gained language experience and business examples from an uncle who owned a petrol station. This was followed by experience working on the uncle's ice cream van, learning as he went along, all day-to-day experience seen as good learning experience and the basis upon which to embark on his own business. However, "that first shop was a bad experience and I lost a lot of money. I put in lots of hours but now see that it was a dead shop" (153-4), and the business was exited after one year. The next step was to take an opportunity in Livingston when the New Town was being developed as chance to work hard and build on experience gained in the bad business. This further, more successful experience resulted in the move to current premises, which it is now hoped to expand as the sons are increasingly involved in the day-to-day and planning aspects of the shop. The follow-up visit suggests that these plans have been partially implemented, as the business still operates in the same premises, but with the second generation now running the business with limited advice from their father.

Family business activity

As discussed in Section 3.6, the Edinburgh Pakistani community migration was via other Scottish and UK-wide locations. Although a number of respondents have experience of personal or family business activity in Pakistan (2, 4, 10, 11), initial UK economic activity was predominantly employment in manufacturing industries. The move to Scottish self employment followed extended family UK business involvement, predominantly in small and micro-retailing. On start-up, use was made of family and community connections, advice and access to finance (this is presented in detail in Section 4.5, Ethnic Strategies). In addition, other business activity also tends to be linked to family/community experience

All but Respondents 5, 13 and 16 have wider family business involvement, predominantly in retail, hospitality, property and construction.

Business aims

The stated business aims fall into two main divisions: personal or business.

The personal aims focus on two main issues: survival (2, 6, 8, 9, 14, 15, 16) or exit (5, 7, 11, 17, 20). Contrasting extremes are illustrated in Respondent 2’s aim to be "in such a position where I don't have to come in and work with my hands" (2: 355) and the hope that business the will be able to "run itself for 100 years. To carry the name of xxxx for 100 years" (2: 699-700), and Respondent 5’s view of the business as “a bad gift … I don’t think I can do very much … sell it off and retire” (5: 28, 157).

The business aims involve “trying to build and become a professional business” (1: 583) in order to enable the business to continue and expand, even if potential is perceived as limited due to external factors (1, 2, 3, 4, 8, 13, 18, 19).

Three business owners state aims focused on wider personal and community issues: being a good example of the Muslim way of life to family and the local community (12), offering service to customers by being “handy, we are handy, we are good servers, we are handy. We give good service. That’s it. Nothing else" (21: 346-50), and using business skills to increase the acceptability of ethnic minority communities (3).

Growth pattern

For all business in the research sample, growth is perceived as limited due to the nature of the c-store sector and external business issues. For those with aims to remain in the sector and continue to develop this and other business activities (1, 2, 3, 4, 7, 9, 10 11, 18, 20), growth is seen as linked to other economic activities, gradual, and success related to the ability to change direction and diversify into other sectors.

Other business activity

Opinions, involvement and approach to business activity split into two groups – developing a diversity of economic activities or remaining focused on a single enterprise or sector; the stance taken being linked to personal skills, ambition, motivation and aims, presented in Section 4.3 below.

In all cases, the c-store remains the core, or sole, individual and family business activity as, as Respondent 3 commented:

We had been considering a few years before that to, to try and do something else but it's very difficult to break from something that might be demanding, you know, and very hard working but at least it's something you can rely on for your bread and butter. (3: 55-59)

Respondents 6, 7, 10, 16, 18 and 20 are also involved in property rental and development.

Respondent 4 is unique in the sample and has a developing business empire building on that started by his semi-retired father (Respondent 10), with involvement in a wider range of sectors that expands and contracts with market changes and opportunities to diversify. These sectors include retail, wholesale, construction, food and wine distribution, printing, tanning, property rental and development, finance.

Succession planning

While there is little evidence of formal succession planning, aims for 2nd and 3rd generation migrants fall into three main categories: develop family business activity (3, 4, 9, 10, 17, 18), continue business run by staff (1, 2, 7, 8, 11), exit self- employment or pursue formal education (5, 6, 12, 13, 20).

Respondents 14, 15, 16, 19 and 21 have no plans for the future management of their businesses.

The variation of attitudes to succession issues between generations emerged as an important factor and was added as a new interview topic. The findings are reported in detail in Section 4.6 below.

Employees

All those interviewed are actively involved in the day-to-day running of the business. Immediate and wider family and ethnic community members are employed in businesses 2, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 11, 16 and19, with mainstream community members brought in to provide specific Post Office skills (16), to enhance links with the local community (2, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 11, 17, 19) and for security at busy times (8, 9, 19) or when female family members would otherwise be on their own on the premises (14). The use of family, community, mainstream employees focuses on issues of cost, security and trust, as illustrated by the following comments:

It's just myself and family members do come in on a daily basis to help out, but it's just family really … Well we've got the other shop across the road as well. We've got staff I there. So if there's ever a need we just get someone to come across from there … There's no really any point employing folk to sit around. (7: 549-54)

Small shops are struggling to survive. Now we’re fairly lucky we have quite a large family. Now if somebody here was just by themselves they would be done because, one they would have to employ somebody. Apart from the Edinburgh Council ripping us off and everybody else ripping us off, the manufacturers, the wages bill would be astronomical. It certainly would not be a profitable, viable business to be in, this. If somebody else was in my shoes now and a manager or owner of this shop, they would have closed this shop a year ago. (20: 701-8)

We did not look for ethnic, just wanted good staff, trustworthy staff because it's hard to find reliable, trustworthy staff. (4: 195-7)

4.3 Motivational factors