Everyone who has seriously considered buying a franchise business has at some point in time wondered if they "have what it takes" to be successful. You find yourself saying, "Sure, all those other franchisees seem to be doing fine. But will I?"

Franchising is a cooperative relationship between a franchisor and one or more franchisees, based on an agreement in which the franchisor provides a licensed privilege to the franchisee to do business. It's a phenomenally successful business model and accounts for nearly half of all retail sales in the United States. However, not everyone is cut out to be a franchisee.

Before you decide to start your own franchise business, you’ll need to make sure you have the attributes of a successful franchisee, which we'll refer to as the "Bill Gates" profile, and not the characteristics of a business flop, which we'll call the "Barney Fife" style.

There are two things that you can do to help answer these questions for yourself. The first is to evaluate yourself on the success factors common with all franchises. The second is to conduct a careful investigation of whatever franchises you’re interested in to determine the unique characteristics of successful franchisees in that particular system.

Now, it's obvious that Bill Gates (American entrepreneur, philanthropist, one of the world's richest men, and chairman of Microsoft, the software company he co-founded) is a rather extreme example of success. No franchise company will expect you to be that, well, awesome in your abilities.

But we've balanced Bill with Barney Fife, that hapless deputy in the one-deputy town of TV’s Mayberry. He was so inept that Sheriff Andy only let him have one bullet for his gun, which he had to keep in his shirt pocket.

Most people will fall somewhere in between Bill and Barney, but where? How can you be sure that you’ll measure up and achieve the success that is your motivation for getting involved in business ownership in the first place?

The following self-test will help you determine where you stand in relation to these questions. Rate yourself in each of the following categories, using a score of 1-5, where 1 is the best (Bill Gates-like) and 5 the worst (Barney Fife-esque).

• Goal orientation. Successful franchisees are invariably goal-oriented. They have a clear idea of what they want to accomplish and how they plan to do it. Their goals are written down and they refer to them regularly. Does this sound like you? Can you form this habit and make it part of your every day activities? Give yourself a score of 1 if you excel at this ability and up to a 5 if you're more of a Barney in this area.

• Decisiveness. Successful franchisees are decisive people. They gather whatever information they need to make smart decisions and then they act in a timely manner. They are not procrastinators. Does this describe you and are you comfortable with this process? Hint: If you don’t know how to answer this question, that's an automatic score of 5.

• Leadership. Leadership is not given—it's taken. Are you the type of person who normally takes charge in work settings? Do you feel comfortable accepting the responsibility that comes with making decisions and dealing with the results of those decisions? Do others seem to follow your lead or are you usually part of the crowd? It’s obvious that Mr. Gates is a take-charge type of guy—how about you?

• Honesty. There is no attribute more important to success in a franchise relationship than integrity. This applies to your relationships with employees, vendors and the franchisor. You need to be the type of person whose personal values and morals are beyond question. Is this an area of strength for you?

• Moderate risk taker. Franchisors are not looking for people who are daredevils. They also don't want to work with people who are dominated by their fears and concerns to the point where they can't take calculated risks. They want to work with people who are willing to accept risk in a business setting but only after gathering information and determining how to minimize the risk. What is your risk profile? Are you a "Fraidy-Cat Fife"?

• Coachability. The strength of franchising is that a good franchise has a system that shows you exactly how to operate the business. Franchisors are not looking for people who want to reinvent the wheel. They want people who will execute a proven system to obtain predictable results.

Are you comfortable following and executing someone else's system and giving up the control that this implies? Now the Don Knott’s character, Barney Fife, may not have wanted to reinvent the wheel but he was not very good at following Andy’s orders, either. An ideal franchisee must be willing and able to learn a franchisor's system. Are you? If so, you can give yourself a score of 1 or 2 in coachability.

After rating yourself on this self-test, you'll determine a total score of between 6 and 30. Obviously, a 6 would put you in the business realm of Bill Gates. If you’ve been honest in your answers you’ll most likely find your score to something greater. Any score lower than a 15 indicates a good general aptitude for becoming a franchisee. Any score above 20 suggests that a different career path may be a better choice.

In addition to looking at the total score, look carefully at any individual question where you scored a 4 or a 5. These answers may indicate a strong potential for trouble with any franchise system. Recognize and remember this factor and look for a franchise where you feel that this high score will cause the smallest challenge to your success. For example, if your score in the leadership category is a 5, you should look for a franchise where you will not be directly managing employees.

        

The second thing you can do to help ensure that you will be a successful franchisee  is to conduct a careful investigation of specific franchises to determine what it takes to succeed in that system. The best sources of information about any franchise are the existing franchisees.

When you receive the Franchise Disclosure Document (FDD) from a franchisor, it will contain a list of the existing franchisees. It is up to you to call them. The key to these calls is to make enough contacts so that you have an accurate and complete picture of the business from a franchisee’s perspective.

You should select a mix of franchisees to call that represent every differentiation that might provide varied input for you. This means you'll want to call franchisees that are new and old, successful and struggling, men and women, and from varied locations around the region or country. Make sure you have an adequate sample of existing franchisees to call.

When you call these franchisees, you'll typically want to determine information on three main factors. These are:

1. The franchisor. You want to determine what kind of people you'll be dealing with if you become a franchisee. What are their values and actions like once you become a franchisee? Is the franchisor helpful when there are problems? What exactly do they do to support the franchisees? Do the franchisees like the franchisor? Would they get into business with these folks again knowing what they know now?

2. The operations. You want a clear picture of what your life will be like if you become a franchisee. What hours do the franchisees devote to the business? What activities do they do on a day-to-day basis and where do spend most of their time? What do they like best and least about the business? What is the critical path to success as a franchisee? Knowing what they know now, what would they do differently if they had everything to do over again? Would they still want to be a franchisee in this system?

3. The finances. You need to have realistic expectations about the total investment that the business is going to require and the amount of income that it can produce. Ask current franchisees if the total investment figures that the franchisor quotes include adequate working capital amounts and verify all the other investment estimates in the FDD with each franchisee. Determine what is realistic in terms of income and the time frame that it can be realized. How long does it normally take to reach break-even? How much income is realistic in the first, second, and third years? Thereafter? What is the most important thing that a franchisee can do to influence these income figures?

After you call enough franchisees and get these questions answered, you'll have a pretty clear idea of what it takes to be successful in this particular franchise. Then ask yourself if you've got what it’s going to take to be a success in this franchise. If the answer is doubtful, move on and investigate a different franchise.

Once you've determined that you have franchise aptitude (by scoring lower than a 15 in Step One) and then compared yourself to the existing franchisees in the system (by following Step Two), you will have an excellent idea if you have what it takes to be successful as a franchisee. There are many good franchise companies available but no franchise is right for everyone. Keep looking until you find the one that seems to match up well with what you have to offer a business. If you're careful about selecting a franchise, you'll find yourself a Gates-like success instead of a Fife-like flop.