Troy Shantz
Sarnia-Lambton has an untapped resource that could potentially mean thousands of jobs, according to a new report.
There are more than 7,500 small businesses with zero employees on the books, which represent 68% of all small businesses locally. If each hired just a single employee the economic benefits would be significant, says the local labour market update from the Sarnia Lambton Workforce Development Board.
“It is an untapped resource and I think part of it is because a lot of these folks started the business to stop being employees themselves. So they don’t really see themselves as a boss,” said executive director Shauna Carr.
Many business owners focus on providing their services or product before tackling the daunting task of adding employees, she said.
“They don’t necessarily have a Human Resource background and they don’t necessarily have a financial background.
“When you bring on employees, you’ve got a lot of government remittances to do that get a lot more complicated the minute you add one employee that isn’t, say, a family member.”
Carr said educating zero-employee business owners should be a priority for both the county and the province.
“If you look at Ontario, and if you look at Sarnia, we can spend all of our economic development dollars to try and coax in the big guys – and that would be great. But the reality is that it’s these (small business owners) who we need to be assisting. This is who we need to be propping up.”
Don Anderson, general manager of the Sarnia-Lambton Development Corporation, said hiring staff isn’t quite as simple as the report suggests.
“(Owners) want to know they have the work, and have work for a period of time, before they’re going to commit to adding an employee,” he said.
Anderson added that hiring requires administration and additional expense that he believes is the crux of the issue.
The SLWDB report acknowledges insufficient financial resources is the single largest barrier faced by local small business owners. Legalities and regulatory requirements are third.
“I think we have a very strong entrepreneurial mindset and I think we are a safe community,” Carr said.
“People realize that they can make a go of their business here. They don’t have to be in the larger centers.“
To read the labour market update, visit www.slwdb.org