A few quick comments on the legal aspects of organizing your business… There are several forms your business can take for legal and tax purposes. Those forms include, but may not be limited to:
- Sole Proprietorship
- Partnership
- Limited Liability Company (LLC)
- Sole Proprietorship LLC
- Professional LLC
- Professional Corporation
- Subchapter S Corporation
- Subchapter C Corporation
- For Profit Corporation
- Not For Profit Corporation
- Non-profit Corporation
- Charitable Corporation
I’m only going to give you one piece of advice on the best legal structure for your company. Talk to your family attorney if you’re a small or home-based business or to an attorney specializing in business and tax law if yours is a mid-sized or large organization.
My partners and I are organized as a subchapter S corporation that provides professional consulting services, and we each own stock representing our investment in money and intellectual property. This form limits our liability and passes tax reporting responsibility to us individually. I also have a sole proprietorship LLC which offers consulting and technical services. It too limits personal liability and is disregarded for tax purposes. Suffice it to say we had the advice of a very experienced family and estate planning attorney and certified public accountant when legally forming our businesses.
However, my purpose with this blog is to deal with structuring your organization for performance. So here’s a very important “Better Business Basic” for you, leave the legal stuff to the experts!