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    Get A Job vs Start A Business ?

    Get a job or start a business

    So you've officially become torn between getting a job or starting your own business....

    ....What to do??

    I've seen this conundrum play out hundreds of times, and hopefully this experience can help guide your decision.  Read on my friend:

     

    1.) Let's start why it's awesome to own a business:

    Running your own business is super glamorized because people see all the good stuff about it.....and to be honest, there ARE a lot of good things about it:

    When you're running the show, you get to do ANYYYYTTTHING you want!  Do you want your "global headquarters" (aka you with a laptop) located on a beach in Costa Rica?  Cool.....go!

    You get to write off a shit-ton of stuff on your taxes. You even get to save more money by being a business owner (a normal ROTH IRA allows you to sock away $5,500/year in savings tax free, however a business SEP IRA allows you to sock away $53,000/year.  That's 10x more.  Giggity).

    You get to be your own boss, call all the shots, decided what you want (and don't want) to do everyday.  It's 100% up to you.

    Many first time entrepreneurs go through this short-lived euphoria of setting up their business and it's exciting and fun!

    This is known as the "Playing Business" Phase.  It's where you get caught up in making business cards, making overly-complex business plans, thinking of incorporating an LLC, hashing out who's gonna be your C.T.O. and C.F.O. and Chief Whateverthefuckyouwant Officer.

    And by all means, you SHOULD enjoy aspects of this!

    It's fun!

    It's exciting!

    It's creative!

    But it also doesn't make you ONE GODDAMN DOLLAR.

    Soon this "Playing Business" euphoria starts to wear off, and reality starts to set in.  In whatever business you go into, there's going to be a lot more unexpected expenses and hassles than are generally reported.

    It kind of goes like this:

    Good and bad running business

     

    PERSONAL SIDE STORY:

    I have a friend who runs a big commercial real estate company.  It would seem like an envious and glamorous position to have millions of feet real estate under management, but if you were to go work for them, you would see the most whackadoodle shit of your life.  Tenants do some WEIRD things, people file dumb lawsuits, drunk drivers literally run into your buildings, homeless people setup camp inside buildings, insurance companies use borderline illegal tactics, people steal stuff, city regulations are always changing, moving a toilet and faucet for a tenant can cost more than $30,000 in plumbing alone.....it's just one thing after another.  

    It's never straight-and-simple as it seems.

    With that in mind, let's talk about the BAD parts of owning a business:

     

     

    2.) The BAD parts about owning a business:

    Let's just start with this my friend:

    You tend to see the "highlight reel" of someone's life, not the bad sides.

    For example, here's two pictures that make running a business seem awesome:

    1.) this is a pic of me having fun on a $5,800 gravity flight where a plane flies in parabolas over the ocean and creates a "weightless" environment:

    zero-g-neville

    Pretty sweet huh?  That flight wasn't cheap, yet the disposable income from my business allowed me to do it without thinking much of the price.

    ....and in this picture below I took a two-week-long workcation to Thailand. Here I am working in a hammock on a private beach:

    nev-hammock

    Seems pretty relaxing right??

    These two pictures you'll see on my social media accounts make owning a business seems pretty fun!!

    But what I don't show you is that for every 1 cool picture like that, there's 5 or more boring pictures like this:

    dark office neville lamps

    That's a picture I took....

    ....in a dark-ass office.

    ....all alone.

    ....at 1:45am.

    ....on a Tuesday night.

    ....and my contacts were dry and hurting from looking at a screen for 12 hours.

    ....doing work I didn't want to do.

    THAT my friend, is the part of owning a business that doesn't get much attention. Because I run my own business, it's 100% up to me to get things done, and sometimes this is what it takes.

    Owning a business doesn't seem so great at that moment.

    But people cherrypick what they choose to view something as.

    It's great working on your passion or working for yourself.....but there WILL ALWAYS be sour patches in the journey.  Lots of them.  The most successful people I know have one thing in common: They simply work a ton.  That's it.

    Yet that "boring" part of owning a business is rarely focused on.

    I pulled these quotes from some of my notes from interviews where people ask about a work/life balance:

    Question asked to Elon Musk:

    "How do you balance your work and personal life, and take care of yourself?"

    Elon's Response:

    "I'm not currently performing a set of actions that will maximize my life expectancy."

     

    Question asked to Neil DeGrass Tyson:

    "How do you balance your work and personal life?"

    Neil's Response:

    ::he laughs hysterically::  "I don't. If I achieve a balance, then I'm not working hard enough."

     

    Question asked to Mark Zuckerberg:

    "How do you separate your work and personal life?"

    Mark's Response:

    ::he laughs::  "I don't."

    The answers they gave all elicited laughs from the audience, but behind those answers are people who essentially work nearly every waking hour they have.  

    When a lot of people think about owning a business they imagine freedom, money & passion.......not 24 hours a day of work.

     

     

    3.) The GOOD parts about having a job:

    This part should more accurately be called "Good parts about having a GOOD job."

    If you're working a minimum wage fast food job and you're barely scraping by on that salary.....I'd imagine your job doesn't seem that great.

    However if you're highly paid engineer and you're making a great salary.....life probably isn't THAT bad!

    A steady job can provide you all sorts of sweet stuff:

    • You get a steady Income.
    • You learn new Skills.
    • It's hard to F-up TOO badly.
    • You learn how large companies operate.
    • You show up from 9-5 and take home a check.
    • You can balance work life and personal life.

    I think one of the greatest benefits of having a job is the stable income. Every single month you get a nice check!

    stable income drawing png

    Stable income is great in a lot of ways.  You can measure out exactly how much you can spend, therefore you can plan & prepare very well.  You are pretty much guaranteed this income.

    You don't have a feast-or-famine mentality like you sometimes get in a business.

    It would seem that if you:  Work with people you like + Working on projects you like + Get salary/perks you like = You probably like your job.

    I actually don't see the problem with having a job like this.  In fact I know tons of people at great companies who like their job at around an 85% level, and live a great life because of it!

     

     

    4.) The BAD parts about having a job:

    While having a stable income and job can be great, there's some obvious downside of having a job:

    • Your schedule always revolves around your job, not your own social activities.
    • You're sometimes forced to do things you don't want to do.
    • You're sometimes forced to work with people you don't like.
    • You're often pigeonholed into the same work everyday.
    • You get a stable salary, but the potential for that number skyrocketing higher is very low.

    Being forced to interact with people you don't like + Working on a project you don't like = You probably hate your job.

    As with anything in life, there's positives and negatives.  And despite all the good things a stable job can bring, it'll also bring some bad things.

     

     

    5.) Get A Job or Start A Business? It depends on your Risk Tolerance:

    A lot of young people working at a company will say this line: "I don't want to be like those old people who've been working there for over 30 years!"

    But that's not looking at it correctly.  Those "old people" are in their 50's and 60's and are trying ride out the cushy gig they've got going!  They treat their job as a way to earn money and live a nice life.  What's wrong with that?

    If you're young, hungry and aggressive.....then perhaps that lifestyle isn't for you YET.  But stack on 20 years of life experience, get a spouse, pile on some kids, get roped into a mortgage and maybe the view will change:

    family expenses

    It really just depends which stage in your life you're at.  The guy above needs some serious cash flow coming in to support his family, and he probably spends most of his time in one place near his home because of the kids' school, and he probably prioritizes family above work......so maybe he WILL want to ride out a cushy job for all it's worth.  A stable 9-5 job is probably ideal for this guy at this stage.

    However if you're freshly out of college and wondering what to do in life, assuming you have low financial burdens, you can pretty much DO ANYTHING YOU WANT for a few years with very low consequence.

     

    Personal Side Story:

    All through college I had little side businesses going, and I was also WAY more frugal than I am now, so I saved nearly all my money.

    By the time I graduated college, I had built up somewhere between $30,000 and $50,000 in savings to live on.  My rent at the time was something like $320/month, and I had extremely minimal monthly expenses, so theoretically I could live for 1-2 years pretty comfortably off that money and still have some emergency cushion money.

    So while everyone was busy getting jobs after college, I was able to just "test the waters" with entrepreneurship before I got a job.  I already had business(es) going at that time, and they were making money, so I wouldn't suffer any downsides by taking this path (like going totally homeless).

    So going the entrepreneur route for me was actually NOT a risky move at all.

    Some people think I riskily dove off a cliff into the unknown waters of business......but it's more like I slowly walked down a staircase into the water, AND had a life jacket on (my savings account), AND had a lifeguard in case things went terribly wrong (my parents).

     

     

     

     

    6.) What to do if you're curious about starting a business:

    Without fail, this is the specific path I've seen for people who've successfully transitioned out of their jobs:

    Keep job --> Work on side project in spare time --> If it gains traction, go harder --> Quit job when side income becomes greater than job.

    I'd say there's an 80% chance of you actually not enjoying running a business at all, or not willing to push/sell hard enough to make it.  If you can't successfully run a business "on the side" then you probably won't be able to run one full time either.

    You have to be CURIOUS and WORK HARD at whatever you do, and expect that you might not make money for a loooonng time.

    What if I told you the "marketing blog" you're starting will NEVER make a cent.  Ever.

    Would you still do it?  Would you still slave over posts at 3am trying to make them perfect?

    A lot of people want to follow their passion, but ALSO expect it to make hella money.  These are conflicting views, as your passion may not always make you a lot of money.

    But also without some passion, it's unlikely you'll push hard enough to make a business.

    Here's a thought experiment:

    There's two YouTube channels started on the same day:

    YOUTUBE CHANNEL 1.) A grown man starts a YouTube channel because he saw that some YouTuber's make lots of money.....so he starts doing product review videos and putting a bunch of affiliate links in the description. He hopes his new YouTube channel will make him millions like that famous YouTuber he is copying.

    YOUTUBE CHANNEL 2.) A kid in his parents house who is absolutely obsessed with tech gadgets, computers, and programs makes a channel for fun where he reviews tech and does tutorials on hundreds of programs.  He does it for fun and it's his hobby.  Making money from it never entered his mind.

    Which of these two YouTube channels will end up succeeding?

    Channel 2 is the answer.

    Here's a real life example of that:

    This is Marques Brownlee.  He's been one of my favorite tech reviewers on YouTube for years.  He produces super high quality gadget reviews, has good opinions about new tech stuff, and gets access to all these gadgets before they come out:

    marques

    He's super influential with 3.5million+ subscribers. I was surprised to find out that currently he's only 22 years old.  One would surmise that being such an influence in tech AND so young: "This kid came out of nowhere!!!"

    However if you look back on his YouTube channel, it goes back over 7+ years to when he was 13 years old.....and he did literally HUNDREDS of tech reviews and how-to videos per year since he was 13!!!!

    In our How To Become A Famous YouTuber research we analyzed how long it took Marques to become popular, and the data shows it took him over 4 years of getting no traffic before he started taking off....and in that time he published HUNDREDS of videos just for the love of it!

    MKBHD Youtube Channel Stats Chart

    You can see his oldest videos here and notice he published several times per week for YEARS before gaining a lot of traction:

    https://www.youtube.com/user/marquesbrownlee/videos?sort=da&flow=grid&view=0

    marques brownlee old photo

    Seriously, check out his old archives and click "more videos" to see them all.....it's literally HUNDREDS OF VIDEOS PER YEAR.

    Clearly this kid had a passion for reviewing and showing off tech, and also one hell of a work ethic to consistently put out this many videos by himself, in his spare time.

    So is it really any wonder he's one of the top tech reviewers today?

    Is it really any wonder the guy that posts 4 tech reviews and amazon affiliate links gets frustrated "he made zero dollars" and promptly quits?

    I can't wait to see Marques' face when someone asks him "How did you get 4.8 Million subscribers so quickly?"

    His answer will be: "I consistently filmed, edited, and published over 2,000 videos over the course of 8 years."

     

    Personal Side Story:

    I've done the "passion" thing before, and I've done the "let's just grab some money" thing before.  They both work if you're willing to put in a lot of effort:

    PASSION/HOBBY:

    When I started NevBlog I didn't realize it would lead to other stuff.  It's just that blogger.com was an easy way to keep track of monthly finances in chronological order.  I never in a million years though NevBlog would make a cent.  I updated that blog for YEARS just because I wanted to track my finances, stay accountable, and remember what the hell I did the prior month.

    I even have an ultra-old website Neville1.com that dates back 17 years to the year 2000 where I posted articles and pictures using Microsoft FrontPage 1997.  It was a hobby.  It was fun to me.

    So when people ask me about how KopywritingKourse got to become such a large blog so quickly.....I don't think of it like that.  I think of it as a slow 17 year progression starting with some dumb personal website I made as an experiment and continuous improvement ever since.

     

    STRAIGHT UP CA$$$SH:

    A business I started in high school and made money all through college for me was HouseOfRave.com (I sold the business in 2011 so I no longer own it).  I drop-shipped rave gear. I didn't give a CRAP about raves, I've still never been to one till this day,  However I was totally in love with eCommerce and being able to sell stuff online.  HouseOfRave was started out of pure curiosity to see if I could start an eCommerce business.

    It quickly started making money, however it never gave me as much joy as other hobby projects.  I kept it around to make money.

     

     

    By doing something on the side, you will quickly figure out if you love it or hate it.

    Many people romanticize the idea of owning their own business.  Many want to "be a blogger" and in their head imagine some nomadic lifestyle with money magically pouring in.

    I'll hardcore push these people to START their own blog, even if it's ghetto at first.  Normally at this point they spend 90% of their time doing dumb stuff like picking out a blog theme or obsessing which email service provider to use in the future when they have 800,000,000,000,000 subscribers.

    Almost without fail, within a month they've stalled out.

    They stop blogging because they quickly realized they hate it.

    We're humans and we tend to romanticize what it'll be like "on the other side."  We see only the positive aspects, but until we experience those negatives, it's difficult to realize those negatives even exist.

     

    It's hard to figure out what you like.

    It's easier to figure out what you DON'T like.

    No no no YES

     

    Personal Side Story:

    I really really really expected myself to become a doctor when I was in high school (after all I AM Indian).  It just sounded cool to be a doctor, so I enrolled in this program in high school where I got to leave school for 3 hours every-other-day and shadow different doctors.

    I think it was around the 6th week of shadowing doctors that I ABSOLUTELY KNEW I would not enjoy that work.

    It just wasn't for me.  The empathy required, the paperwork required, the rules you have to follow, the amount of caution you need at every step, the amount of studying biology involved.....I could just tell my personality at the time would NOT have fit into that profession.

    I still didn't fully know what I wanted to be, but I sure as hell knew what I DIDN'T want to be.  I could clearly tell that I was not willing to dedicate the next 10 years of my life to enter that profession.

    Knowing this saved me years of time in college (had I not done that program, I would have enrolled in a pre-med course and wasted years of time).

     

     

    "Bro....you haven't answered my question. Should I get a job or start a business??"

    Here's my ultra-short answer:

    If you have job + love it = Stay at job.

    If you have job + hate it + curious about business = Milk your job long as you can and start something on the side.

    If you don't have a job + don't have a business = Try both.

    Try a bunch of things on the side.  Remember, it's easy to find out what you DON'T like.

     

     

    Job Vs. Business Quotes From People I Respect:

    My opinion is just ONE opinion.  Here's a few other viewpoints on keeping a job vs starting a business:

    job vs business advice

    job vs business advice

    job vs business advice

    job vs business advice

    biz-vs-job

     

    Hope reading this post helped you clarify if you want to go down the path of starting a business or getting a job! You can download this entire post and signup for my email list to get more great info about which way to go:

    Download this entire post for your own files:

    Get this whole post sent to your email so you can keep it for future reference or send it to a friend:

    TkGpeDDdAVZHBAfBOXBoXJYt-zP5jCKqNKoLpoEK

     

    Here's some related posts to keep reading:

    Neville Signature

     

    P.S.  I LOVE LOVE LOVE hearing people's stories or opinions on this subject.  Comment below letting me know which you think is better (Starting a biz -or- having a job)?  What did you choose your path, and why??


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    Guest Neville

    Posted

    Excellent story Christian!

    I especially like that you were a touring musician and soon realized you hate it. I know a lot of people see someone else's life (such as a rockstar) an think they'd want to do that also, but they only see the COOL parts like being on stage....not the boring parts like driving in a cramped bus to a different city every day.

    Thanks for sharing!!

    Link to comment
    Guest Neville

    Posted

    If you've got a nice chunk of savings you can live on, then I think it's ok. But generally a slower transition seems to work best.
    Link to comment
    Guest Neville

    Posted

    Hey Ian, that's cool you and your friend were making money through Fiverr. I actually have a huge experiment on Fiverr in case you've never seen it:

    https://copywritingcourse.com/is-fiverr-worth-it/

    The other thing I'd suggest you do is checkout the Consulting As A Side Job article I wrote. I bring in $100'000's+ per year worth of consulting fees, and I basically layout the entire process there:

    https://copywritingcourse.com/consulting-as-a-side-job/

    It generally helps to be a well-known person in that industry, but I know you can still make good money on Fiverr and Upwork.

    Link to comment
    Guest Rob (Updated June 15, 2016)

    Posted

    Stop. Don't do it.

    I just posted a time waster that you avoided.

    Here's a fast review: Green dot salesman having trouble > figures out

    red dots sell. Later he discovers orange squares are better.

    Spoiler (aka: end of story): He would not have known about his business

    if he was not doing his business.

    P.S> It would be great if you had a Appsumo that performed transcripts of Youtube videos.

    That's because I spend a lot of time learning how to read faster in the 80s. Videos are

    HUGE time vacuums.

    Link to comment
    Guest How Do I Make Money? A detailed explanation

    Posted

    […] Get a Job vs Start a Business? […]
    Link to comment

    Hi Neville,

    I get the impression I might be a bit older than your typical demographic (in my late-40s), but I have another short tale of why both is good (for now), in hopes of helping some of your other readers:

    In 2012, things were getting dicey at my job (I'm an architect). With the economy problems, building projects were on hold and my company was laying people off in large swaths (10% at a time).

    Further back in 2008, I'd swung a deal to start working remotely from home, got a big bump in pay and moved 3 hours away from the office. It was a sweet deal, but once the layoffs started, I was getting worried about job security. I was a big target: being that guy living "out in the boonies," making more money than the rest of my peers.

    It was around that same time I'd stumbled into marketing and copywriting and got bit by the bug to start my own business. I started learning everything I could and stacked up quite a bit of debt buying different programs and books.

    I started reaching out to a few businesses to get some work, but only had a few bites and didn't amount to much side income. I was building a lot of knowledge, but not much practice. I was "Playing Business."

    Then in Fall 2014, the ax fell at work and I wasn't close to being ready to go on my own. I had the new debt, a family to feed, and a huge mortgage. So I dropped my dreams of a side business and ran to find a new job.

    I easily found one within a month, for 20% less income than my previous job. But my wife & I were happy to have the security of insurance and a steady income. But I still had that niggling in the back of my head that I wanted/needed something else. (Plus I needed to at least pay off the debt I'd created to pursue the dream in the first place.)

    I eventually asked my new boss (a former classmate) if it was cool if I did some copywriting on the side. (we have a strict no-moonlighting policy) After I explained what "copywriting" was, he said it wasn't an issue as long as I wasn't writing for our competition and not doing any architectural design work that could come back on the company.

    So I picked the torch back up and started looking at side gigs again. It was still only half-hearted since I was busy with my new job and anxious to please. So the side business only brought in the occasional small writing project.

    Then, in fall 2015, another hit came. The company had to do some layoffs, and the rest of us had to go to 3/4 pay for the foreseeable future. Ugh!

    What kept our family afloat financially was my side business. I turned up the heat on looking for side work and had also just read Neville's post on the three-pronged pricing technique (Thanks, Neville). So, by the end of 2015, I'd picked up two new clients who both signed up for NICE sized copywriting packages.

    Now, here at mid-2016, my job is back to full-time/pay - plus I'm making enough from my freelance work that my total income is back up to where I was at my original job.

    The best things to come out of the setbacks and forced acts of desperation? I now have more confidence that the side business can work, I only do package pricing now, and I have some solid examples of what I can do. So I'm able to get even more work.

    I'm still a work in progress, but I've definitely seen first-hand the value of keeping the security of a job, while honing your new skills and building the other streams of income to help fill in the gaps that are sure to come up.

    I hope that's helpful.

    Link to comment
    Guest Sabreen Harris

    Posted

    I actually like my career and like copy writing so even if my copy writing business takes off like a rocket, Im still gonna stay put in my career and do both. I think lol
    Link to comment
    Guest Jamiw Woods

    Posted

    There are going to be some great companies out there to work for, I'm told startups backed by VC's can be fun and profitable !

    However I'd avoid large organisations for long term happiness (after all that's the most important thing?).Take my (ex) boss as an example. He graduated University and signed his life away to a large FTSE. He gave them his best years (twenties), rose through the ranks, moved to a different country for them, then moved back but it wasn't good enough.

    He was given a poisoned chalice and asked to manage a team who had to sell an unsellable service line. The service line was too futuristic and there simply wasn't a demand for it. His wage suffered, there was no bonus, no pay rise and finally no job for him. I'll remember him coming in on the first day of the new financial year. Dressed up smart in a new suit, with an undefeated smile on his face and ready for his next challenge. The next day he was gone, it was cold and no one was allowed to speak of it. He was due to be married the next month, it was almost psychopathic.

    So why gamble your twenties away and give an organisation that power over your life ? That was it for me, I started looking for a new job two weeks ago, launched my first affiliate website and signed up to fiver. Anything has to be better than that, I'm glad I experienced it though.

    Link to comment
    Guest Kristian Jeffrey

    Posted

    Another brilliant article Neville! I started my Street Advertising business ten years ago and it was the hardest/best thing I've ever done. My only regret is I didn't start ten years earlier. I now have three pretty successful companies and the key to them all is failure. Ive started and failed dozens of ventures in the last fifteen years and almost all of them failed but I learnt lots every time I failed and carried the lessons to the next venture. My advice to anyone thinking of starting a business is do it part time whilst holding down your job. James Altucher wrote a great article about starting a business and he said (I'm paraphrasing..)" 85% of new ventures fail in their first year but 90% of ventures succeed if they have a customer before they start a company". So find a need, create a solution and then offer it to someone and see if they are willing to pay you for it. If they do then you have started a company...
    Link to comment
    Guest Winnie Tam

    Posted

    Can't agree more with "Keep job –> Work on side project in spare time –> If it gains traction, go harder –> Quit job when side income becomes greater than job."

    I am keeping my full time job while working as a freelance translator, event host and life coach. I am not turning them all into businesses, but having these side gigs creates a safety net for me in case I want to quit my job or am fired. Definitely work on side projects before going all-in!

    Link to comment
    Guest Neville

    Posted

    This is a FANTASTIC story Neil, thank you so much for sharing!
    Link to comment
    Guest Neville

    Posted

    That's awesome Sabreen, you're in a great place where you get good income, a good work environment, and still get to do your own thing on the side...you're killing it!
    Link to comment
    Guest Neville

    Posted

    Hey Jamie, I'm sure there are some definite downside cases such as this one. Thank you for sharing!
    Link to comment
    Guest Neville

    Posted

    Thank you Kristian, and awesome to hear about your successes!

    I think starting on the side first is a great idea.

    Like I said in the article above:

    If you can’t successfully run a business on the side, then you probably won’t be able to run one full time either.

    Such good advice!

    Link to comment
    Guest Neville

    Posted

    I think you're doing this the absolute right way Winnie. You still have your career and stable job, and you're trying out different side businesses.

    Now if ONE of the side businesses just totally takes off and replaces your full-time income, then you can decide to leave your job and pursue it as a profession.

    Great job Winnie!

    Link to comment
    Guest Finding A Career Or Business Which Suits Your Personality

    Posted

    […] too old for people to consider you, it can be very frustrating. But, you’re not out of options. Starting your own business would take away these restrictions, replacing them with your level of determination and ability to […]
    Link to comment
    I'm debating this exact thing right now. I've been an email marketing specialist at a local company for years, and so I know all the ins and outs of it all, and for awhile I've been thinking I should just leave this company and start my own business doing the same I've been doing...and I've finally decided to go for it. However, I can't get started until I quit, b/c of conflict of interest if they find out while I'm still employed there...But, the great thing is, a good chunk of the startup process has already been done, b/c a family member of mine already owns a successful computer repair and networking company, so we will just open a new department, and he feels a good number of his commercial customers would be interested in doing marketing emails with us, in addition to the new clients nationwide we bring on, so we're really optimistic! It's scary yet exciting at the same time!
    Link to comment
    Guest Sameer

    Posted

    Yes, that's correct, I agree with these points up to some extent, Although I always recommend Business over Job. I can understand it well because I have 15-month experience of JOB.
    Link to comment
    Guest Arijoy Mitra

    Posted

    Hi!

    I'm a professional SEO content writer doing stuff like blogs, articles, PRs and SMO posts all day! Oh...and I don't like the company I'm working for either and would love to quit lol.

    But what it says in this post is true. Even if your job is crappy, its best to grit your teeth in and work hard on the day job and try your hand at a side business. Hey, even crappy jobs pay bills.

    I've decided to learn how to create White Papers on the side because these pay more than normal blogs and articles, and is in considerable demand. If so, I can do with just 2-3 clients per month. Anyways, thats the plan. Gotta have a plan. Even 1 project per month won't be bad as its supplementary income ($500-$1000 is the starting cost I think for a 10-page document).

    (I thought about learning copywriting, but it seems I may not be very good at convincing people in buying anything. The best I may do in copywriting is bonk a potential customer on the head with a Stone-age-caveman-club and drag them to the shop :P)

    I found out that I love researching though :) It's addicting to solve a problem and to really dig something up. And for making a basic White Paper it needs tons of researching. Not easy, but yeah. I'm creating 3 samples and putting up a basic portfolio website and learning how to use Linkedin to get clients. But I still gotta learn how to market the services later on, and of course how to get really good at writing White Papers.

    Here's my plan:

    Keep day job: $265/month or INR 18000 (yup that's what my crappy company gives :( ...)

    Hopeful minimum future side income/month starting out: $500 or INR 34000

    Hopeful max future side income/month starting out: $1000 or INR 68000

    That's for 1 client and 1 project. Hopefully, I can scale it from there later on. And hey...if the supplementary income continues to surpass my day job income for 6 months or a year, then I plan to do that permanently.

    Link to comment
    Guest WeRIndia

    Posted

    There are many people who love to do a job and there are other sets of people who love to do a business of their own. Thanks for sharing words of encouragement with us. Keep up the good work.
    Link to comment

    Whoa! WHOA! Nev' you smacked that outta the stadium.  Brilliant 360-degree view and conclusions (well not really but, giving us the material to decide ourselves).  I'm an American working (own biz) in Asia.  Initially, I was with the TV station and then followed my accountant's advice and left the station and started my own business.  Crazy! That was 28-years ago.  Now, get this.  I mentioned, (1) I'm an American working in Asia: (2) I did not come over as an expat (working for an American company); (3) Went from choreographer (day job at the TV station here in Spore), to hosting my own fitness stuff, to getting a certificate in fitness and starting personal training, to teaching dance to kids on the side, to consulting as creative director for local biz, to going to New York to take a year's break, to being asked to fly back and direct/choreograph Miss Thailand World to being a guest judge on a new Spore dance reality show, to going into online training, to now creative director behind the scenes for an upcoming company in Indonesia.  All the while trying to keep my online coaching going...phew! Still with me?  And there is NOT a day that doesn't go by where I'm wishing I had a day job along with my up-and-down private, solo business.  I got it all backward and at 60 I'm trying to grab back the day job.  Oh, did I say I'm in Asia? So, I can't actually take a day job over here.  I can only create a private limited and make it happen here.  I'd have to go back to America (now the foreigner as I've been away for 30-years) to get a day job.  That's why I'm boning up on the online coaching models.  So, what am I getting at?  Dude, you are sooooooooo spot-on.  This stuff ain't easy.  And for all those out there who plan to leave their day job, as Nev' highlighted, DON'T leave it.  walk in the grass first.  Then go into the forest.  When you look back you'll see that path was all over the place.  Now, where'd I leave that client list?  Nope, that's not it, that's my tax bill...sheesh!

    Mic'-drop!

    Link to comment
    Guest Why You Should Start a Business - Travel Eternal

    Posted

    […] In case you still need some list of ins and outs of owning your business, here is an interesting article to read. […]
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    Guest How to be self-employed (With no qualifications)

    Posted

    […] things first—is self-employment even right for you? Because it’s definitely not right for everyone. In fact, it’s probably not right for most […]
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    Guest How to be self-employed with no qualifications - Batch 1

    Posted

    […] things first—is self-employment even right for you? Because it’s definitely not right for everyone. In fact, it’s probably not right […]
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