Contacting the 'opponent' in a small business world [HELP]

[Wiezel]

Currently I'm working as an employee in the Aviation industry.
My ambition is to discover and solve problems and creating my own business based on that.

Therefore I'm reaching out to managers/directors and CEO of Aviation related businesses.
Since I'm living in a quite small country (The Netherlands) a lot of people in the Aviation business know each other.
It kinda scares me that my current employer will find out I'm working on a business myself and therefore contacting the 'opponent'.

I'm quite sure if they find out they won't like and that might lead to me not getting a contract extension. (ending in September this year).

How do I proceed and what is some general advice for this case?

 

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[Wouter]

Currently I'm working as an employee in the Aviation industry.
My ambition is to discover and solve problems and creating my own business based on that

What problems do you hope to uncover and what questions are you going to ask them?

Therefore I'm reaching out to managers/directors and CEO of Aviation related businesses.
Since I'm living in a quite small country (The Netherlands) a lot of people in the Aviation business know each other.
It kinda scares me that my current employer will find out I'm working on a business myself and therefore contacting the 'opponent'.

Your employer won't know that you contact them with the intent of starting your own business. If they ask you questions about it, just say that you wanted to get a clearer picture of what they were doing so you can figure out what your employer needs to do to stay ahead of them.

I'm quite sure if they find out they won't like and that might lead to me not getting a contract extension (ending in September this year).

How do I proceed and what is some general advice for this case?

Go ahead and contact them. Figure out what you want to know and ask the right questions. If they want to talk to you: great. If they don't: figure out a way to make it of value to them. No point in worrying about things that 'might' happen.

 

[Stargazer]

Good Afternoon Wiezel,

The aviation industry will have a variety of Trade Magazines which are a good source of what is happening in the industry, predictions, opinions etc etc.

This industry also has Trade Shows with the movers and shakers, as well as supply chain companies, all there. Good opportunity for you to go and get a feel for things and pick up business cards and make contacts.

Additionally I would also be getting the Annual Company Reports for shareholders of the competitors. Buy 1 share in each company, if listed, and you will get it delivered to you. This will have the Chairman's Statement and the CEOs Statement on what went wrong/right last financial year and what the plans are for the upcoming financial year. It will also show all of the figures for the company and how the revenues are allocated.

This sort of thing, which is not a full one as it is online.

http://www.annualreports.co.uk/HostedData/AnnualReportArchive/r/NYSE_COL_2016.pdf

The gist is that you can find out quite a lot about an industry and if you add that knowledge to what you see going on in your own company you can become an idea factory.

Dan