This week, 50 independent business owners in Playa del Carmen started a Business School.
The initiative was organized by the municipality's Economic Development Secretariat, in coordination with Alianzas Sostenibles, Coparmex Riviera Maya, and the Autonomous University of Quintana Roo. The opening session was led by Ruth Carrillo, consultant at Alianzas Sostenibles — and partner at Kiin Hub.
The program covers the technical foundations every business needs: finance, profitability, marketing, operating model, stage diagnosis. It's exactly what's missing when someone starts a business without having studied management. And it's good news that the Secretariat, a chamber of commerce, and a public university are putting resources into making this free in Playa.
We could use more programs like this. Hopefully more come.
But there's one foundation no class can teach
Technical foundations get learned in class, in books, with a good accountant. They can be taught because they have structure: there are rules, formulas, proven methodologies. This goes here, that goes there, gross profit is calculated like this.
What can't be taught in a course is the other part. The decisions you make when no one tells you how.
Do I take this big client who pays well but will eat up the mornings I came to Playa for?
Do I raise prices and risk losing the client I've had for two years?
Do I let go of the person who's loyal but no longer performing?
Do I shut down this service that barely makes money to focus on the other one?
Do I stay solo, hire, or take on a partner?
These are the decisions that define whether an independent business survives. And for these, there's no manual.
What you only learn from other business owners
There's a huge difference between reading an idea in a book and hearing it from someone who already lived it.
The book tells you: "diversify your client base so you don't depend on one". Sounds right. But the independent business owner who already tried it tells you how they spent three months chasing five small clients when one big one would've given them the same revenue with less pain. And from that you learn something the book was never going to tell you: diversification has a cost, and sometimes that cost isn't worth it.
Chambers and academia teach the principles. Other independent business owners teach the nuances.
And nuances are what separate the business that survives from the one that doesn't.
Why the table matters as much as the classroom
Every independent business owner makes hundreds of decisions a year. Most small, some big. And the quality of those decisions depends on something almost no one mentions: who you talk them through with before deciding.
If you talk them through only with your partner, you'll get emotional support but rarely technical perspective. If you talk them through only with a paid consultant, you'll get technical perspective but sometimes without local context. If you talk them through with other independent business owners who already went through something similar, you'll get both, plus something more: the distilled experience of someone who already paid the cost of being wrong.
That's why the table matters as much as the classroom. And that's why, once you finish your Business School, the next step is finding where the table is.
To wrap up
If you were one of the 50 who started this week — congratulations. The technical foundations you're about to learn there are essential, and it's worth taking advantage of what the Secretariat, Coparmex, UQROO, and Alianzas Sostenibles are putting on the table.
When you finish (and while you're at it), it's worth finding where the other independent business owners of Playa are. Not to replace the course. To complement it with the conversation no course covers.
At Kiin Hub there are people like you. Some have been running their business for two years, others for ten. All are willing to bounce ideas, share what worked and what didn't, connect with you if what you do adds value to someone else.
If you want to drop by, no appointment or plan needed. Stop in any morning 8 AM to 5 PM and we'll buy you a coffee. We'll keep the conversation going from there.
Kiin Hub Cowork — Playacar Phase II. Bookings and questions: +52 990 403 6041.
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