『Mission Driven Business』のカバーアート

Mission Driven Business

Mission Driven Business

著者： Brian Thompson
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概要

 Diverse entrepreneurs share their experiences, strength, and hope to help mission-driven businesses thrive. In a series of intimate conversations, attorney and CFP Brian Thompson and his guests provide practical steps to create businesses with impact and profit. マネジメント・リーダーシップ リーダーシップ 経済学
エピソード
  • S-Corps Explained: Tax Savings, Trade-Offs, and What No One Tells You

    S-Corps Explained: Tax Savings, Trade-Offs, and What No One Tells You
    2026/03/24
    The S-Corp question is one of the most common Brian hears from entrepreneurs, but the answer is almost never as simple as the internet makes it sound. In this episode, Brian Thompson breaks down what an S-Corp actually is, how the potential tax savings work, and the real-world trade-offs that often get left out of the conversation. Whether you're considering the election for the first time or revisiting the decision, this episode gives you the context you need to make an informed choice. What is an S-Corp? First, an important clarification: an S-Corporation is not a business structure, it's a tax election. Your business might legally be an LLC or a partnership, but you elect to have the IRS tax it under Subchapter S of the tax code. That election allows business income to pass through to the owner's personal tax return rather than being taxed at the corporate level. The key difference for most small businesses comes down to how payroll and self-employment taxes are handled. How Do S-Corps Save on Taxes? When you run a business as a sole proprietor or single-member LLC, your net profits are generally subject to self-employment tax of 15.3%, which covers Social Security and Medicare. With an S-Corp election, you pay yourself a reasonable salary (which is subject to payroll taxes) but any profits above that salary can be taken as distributions, which are generally not subject to self-employment tax. A straightforward example: on $200,000 in net profit, splitting it evenly between salary and distributions could save roughly $15,000 in payroll taxes. That's the number people are chasing when they talk about S-Corps. S-Corps Trade-offs The savings aren't guaranteed, and there are two major caveats. First, reasonable compensation. The IRS requires S-Corp owners who work in the business to pay themselves a reasonable salary before taking distributions. Reasonableness evaluation is based on your experience, role, time devoted to the business, and what comparable professionals earn. For service-based businesses where the owner is the primary revenue generator, this requirement can significantly limit how much income can realistically be treated as distributions. Second, administrative costs. Running an S-Corp means running payroll for yourself, filing a separate S-Corp tax return, issuing a K-1, maintaining better corporate records, and typically paying more for accounting and tax preparation. For some businesses the extra steps are worth it. For others, the time and cost eat too much into the savings. State and Local Tax Considerations for S-Corps For many entrepreneurs, particularly those in cities where a large share of LGBTQ business owners live, state and local taxes add another layer of complexity. Brian breaks down the specifics: Illinois S-Corps pay a 1.5% personal replacement tax; California S-Corps pay 1.5% on net income with an $800 minimum franchise tax; New York State imposes a fixed dollar minimum tax based on gross receipts; and New York City doesn't recognize the federal S-Corp election at all, meaning city-level corporate taxes of up to 8.85% can still apply. Washington DC has its own franchise tax currently at 8.25%. If you operate in Chicago, LA, San Francisco, New York, or DC, these rules need to be part of your analysis. The PTET Opportunity Despite the complications, Brian is clear: he recommends S-Corps for many clients when the numbers make sense. And there's an additional tool worth knowing about — the pass-through entity tax, or PTET. Created in response to the federal SALT cap, which limited state and local tax deductions on individual returns to $10,000, the PTET election allows the business itself to pay state income tax at the entity level, where it can often be fully deductible for federal purposes. The SALT cap increased to $40,000 in 2025, which reduces the urgency of this workaround for some. But for higher income business owners, PTET can still create meaningful additional savings on top of the payroll tax benefits. The Right Questions to Ask About S-Corps Instead of asking "should I become an S-Corp?", Brian reframes the question: Does an S-Corp make sense for my business? The considerations that matter include what type of business you run, how much profit you actually generate, whether revenue is produced primarily by you or a broader team, your willingness to handle the administrative requirements, the state and city tax rules where you operate, and how the decision fits into your broader tax and retirement planning. You also don't have to decide on day one. Many entrepreneurs start under simple tax treatment and elect S-Corp status once the business becomes profitable enough for it to make sense. Your Action Step This week, take three steps: look at your most recent business profit, estimate what a reasonable salary might look like for your role, and have a conversation with your tax advisor or financial planner about whether the numbers actually...
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    11 分
  • Budgeting Series #3: A Guide to Building Your Financial Strategy

    Budgeting Series #3: A Guide to Building Your Financial Strategy
    2026/03/17
    Awareness and acceptance lay the groundwork, but nothing changes until you take action. In this final episode of the budgeting series, Brian Thompson brings the framework full circle by focusing on what to actually do with your numbers. Because understanding your finances and accepting where you are is only powerful if it leads somewhere. This episode is about making intentional, strategic decisions that move your mission-driven business forward. Start With Vision, Not Spreadsheets Before diving into tactics, Brian starts with something that might surprise you in a budgeting conversation: vision. Your budget is more than a financial document. It's a reflection of the business and life you want to build. Do you want a lean lifestyle business with flexibility and freedom? A growing company with employees and systems? A business optimized for profit so you can invest, travel, or retire early? There's no wrong answer. But the budget you build should reflect your vision, directing your money toward what matters most to you. The Three Financial Levers Once you know your numbers and your vision, the path forward becomes clearer. Brian outlines three levers every entrepreneur can pull. The Income Lever. Sometimes the most straightforward way to improve your financial picture is to focus on revenue growth. That might mean raising your prices, adding new services, improving your marketing, or increasing your capacity to serve more clients. The Expense Lever. Reducing expenses doesn't mean slashing everything or operating from a scarcity mindset. It means asking thoughtful questions: Are there subscriptions or tools you're no longer using? Services you could renegotiate? Expenses that don't actually move the business forward? As Brian noted in the first part of this series on awareness, sorting expenses from highest to lowest can reveal a lot. Sometimes one or two adjustments can significantly improve your financial flexibility. A Combination of Both. Most of the time, the right answer lives somewhere in the middle. A small price increase combined with trimming a few unnecessary expenses can create a surprisingly big impact on both sides of the equation. The Profit First Framework For clients looking for a practical system to manage cash flow, Brian recommends the Profit First model. Rather than treating profit as whatever is left over after expenses, Profit First flips the equation so you are allocating income intentionally across four key categories from the start: profit, owner's pay, taxes, and operating expenses. Setting percentages for each category and revisiting them quarterly creates guardrails that keep your business financially healthy and enforces a powerful mindset shift: profit is no longer an afterthought. It becomes a priority. Give Yourself Permission to Have a "Building Year" For anyone feeling pressure to make every year better than the last, Brian offers a grounding reminder: business growth is not a straight line. Some years are building years. Maybe you hired your first employee, invested in new systems, launched a new service, or restructured your client roster. In those years, expenses often increase before revenue catches up. And that's okay. Sometimes investing now is exactly what creates something better later. Your Action Step Look at the numbers you gathered during the awareness exercise and ask yourself one question: which lever do I need to pull right now? Do you need to focus on increasing income, reducing expenses, or a combination of both? Then identify one intentional change you can make this month. Just one. Small, consistent decisions are what ultimately build strong businesses. Thank you for following along with this three-part budgeting series. If there's one takeaway from awareness, acceptance, and action, it's this: budgeting isn't about restriction. It's about clarity, compassion, and intentional decision making. When you know your numbers, accept where you are, and take thoughtful action, you give your mission-driven business the foundation it needs to thrive. If you found this series helpful, share it with a fellow entrepreneur — and as always, Brian welcomes your questions and insights on Instagram at @BTFinancial. Resources + Links Episode 110: Budgeting Series #1: A Guide to Financial Awareness Episode 111: Budgeting Series #2: A Guide to Money Mindset Shifts Newsletter Sign Up Follow Brian Thompson Online: Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, X, Forbes Follow & review the podcast: on Spotify and Apple Podcasts About Brian and the Mission Driven Business Podcast Brian Thompson, JD/CFP®, is a tax attorney and Certified Financial Planner® who specializes in providing comprehensive financial planning to LGBTQ+ entrepreneurs who run mission-driven businesses. The Mission Driven Business podcast was born out of his passion for helping social entrepreneurs create businesses with purpose and profit. On the podcast, Brian talks with diverse ...
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    7 分
  • Building a Profitable Practice with Authenticity and Heart

    Building a Profitable Practice with Authenticity and Heart
    2026/03/10
    Rooted in identity, community, and purpose is what it truly means to build a business with heart. Brian Thompson sits down with Kala Lacy, an EMDR-trained yoga psychotherapist and founder of The Well Healing, a holistic wellness practice centered on Black and queer people of color. Kala shares how she turned her own healing journey into a thriving private practice, why niching down with radical specificity was the key to her success, and what inspired her newest venture: the Wellspring Care Collective, a mentorship community for Black, queer, and trans clinicians building aligned private practices. A Business With Heart Kala defines a mission-driven business as a business with heart. One that is striving to create a positive impact and isn't solely focused on profit. Her path into mental health began with her own early experiences and a curiosity about what healing could look like if it were created with someone like her in mind. She entered the field through yoga, which she found integrated naturally and powerfully with therapy, and The Well Healing grew from there, shaped by what her community asked of her. The Power of Showing Up Authentically Kala's journey wasn't without self-doubt. In graduate school, she felt pressure to whitewash who she was in order to be taken seriously as a clinician. It was a professor who openly claimed a Black feminist lens in her work that gave Kala the permission she needed to believe there was space for her in this field. Brian connects this deeply to his own story, reflecting on how seeing a Black gay CFP early in his career gave him the confidence to pursue his own path. Representation, they agree, changes everything. Niching Down and Finding Your People Kala is intentional about naming Black, queer, and trans clinicians as the specific community she serves, even when she had reservations. The result? Nine out of ten people who reach out to her are already aligned. Her private practice went from part-time to where she wanted to be in about a year and a half. As Brian puts it, the more specific you get, the easier it is to find your people and for your people to find you. Introducing the Wellspring Care Collective Kala's newest endeavor is The Wellspring Care Collective, a monthly mentorship group for Black, queer, and trans mental health clinicians building private practices. The collective offers weekly connection, learning on topics specific to private practice, guest speakers, community support, and space to show up as their full selves. Kala is candid about why this matters: grad school teaches you how to be a therapist, not how to run a business. The collective bridges that gap by offering both practical entrepreneurial skills and an affirming community. Resources + Links Newsletter Sign Up The Wellspring Care Collective Connect with Kala Lacy: Website, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, TikTok Follow Brian Thompson Online: Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, X, Forbes Follow & review the podcast: on Spotify and Apple Podcasts About Brian and the Mission Driven Business Podcast Brian Thompson, JD/CFP®, is a tax attorney and Certified Financial Planner® who specializes in providing comprehensive financial planning to LGBTQ+ entrepreneurs who run mission-driven businesses. The Mission Driven Business podcast was born out of his passion for helping social entrepreneurs create businesses with purpose and profit. On the podcast, Brian talks with diverse entrepreneurs and the people who support them. Listeners hear stories of experiences, strength, and hope and get practical advice to help them build businesses that might just change the world, too.
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    37 分
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