Our small company started as an IT company 15 years ago. We moved into AV about 12 years ago, and have been steadily growing, relying upon subs, getting amazing job after job.

But, as we know, it's not the easiest job to sell, schedule, purchase, deliver, design, and install a project. In fact, it's much harder than most people understand.

So, I'm at a transition. I either refer the AV out to another company in an arrangement, or I just shut down that side of the business. I don't think I want to build it up with the required overhead to really make a difference.

Has anyone been there or have ideas?

What's your goal?
Keep making money on referrals?
Sell book of business, parts on hand, website, name, RMR, etc?

If not and you're not interested in doing it, that's simple enough.

I guess I'm not understanding your question.

watoosi,

It sounds like you don't want to manage the A/V projects any more. You could hire a project manager and revert to what you personally want to do. As a company grows, the founder, who might be able to perform every required task very well, does not have enough time, arms, and legs to do everything.

You have already outsourced many of the physical tasks to subs. This can be a very flexible arrangement. Rather than making do with a staff person, you can have best of class on every task. This also allows you great flexibility with respect to scale. If you have a peak in demand, bring in a few more subs. If there is a lull, you don't need to carry dead weight staff.

It's a hard transition for some founders who don't want to give up any direct control or add any expenses -- as you have indicated. This is unfortunate, because it sets a ceiling on the scale of your business.

The very best founders become the team building chief, and this is their real skill, rather than personally touching every little detail.

You can look at this project manager person as a tool. It might seem expensive at the outset, but the big job tool allows you to (efficiently) take on many more jobs. I can remember (a long while back) when a hammer drill seemed like a huge expense. We struggled and struggled with puny little consumer drills. As a teen I learned the value of good tools, but my partners had to learn this at their own pace (It's a slow lesson for them and classes are still being held). Finally, we bit the bullet and bought the hammer drill. You all know the outcome -- nasty, almost impossibly hard jobs became trivial.

Watoosi,
I do both IT and AV in my business and would never give up either customer base.
Are you burned out on the AV side?
This may not be the norm but my AV jobs are way easier and more profitable than the IT side.
Sounds like your margins may be too low either on the pricing side or the cost of labor of your contractors.

Where are you located?

Ditto. Commercial AV is where the money is at. IT is just gravy to add on top.

I sure appreciate these great answers. I am a little of each of your replies, and I don't think I have burned out on interesting AV, but we do worldwide cyber security and networking, which doesn't involve driving all over LA or having tremendous overhead, and which is a steady, consistent cash flow.

For me, I suppose the question of what I want is the confusing one, because I love working on Av and solving problems, but I hate the dance to get it all together. I know I can't do it all, but I'm not sure if I can transition to a team-builder.

Hhm.