The employer hires an employee because he can’t do all the work alone. He needs others to delegate some of his tasks and help him make more money.
Every employee is an investment. Arguably, it is the most important investment for any successful company. The employee’s value is defined and controlled by the employer. The risk is not particularly high, given that he can lay off his employees when he learns they are no longer profitable.
The goal in every business is in return for a worker’s service; the employer pays the employee as little as possible, and the business owner takes as much of the profit as possible.
The employee
- gets as little money as possible for his work (this maximizes businesses’ profit)
- has no potential for exponential growth of income (because his income growth is tired to demand created by employers)
- has limited vacation controlled by the wish of the employer
- spends his best hours, the morning hours, as per the demands of his employer
The question then is why anyone in their right mind would want to be someone’s employee.
Gaps & Fear
What stops every individual from pursuing his own means of work? Why are we choosing the path to corporate slavery when greater freedom and leverage are available with solopreneurship? I think, upon reflection, three things are stopping people: uncertainty, multiple skillset gaps and social pressure.
Uncertainty
A corporate job is usually highly skilled and has a detailed job description. This is very important as you don’t have to find clients, solve a business problem, or do marketing to get it to sell. All of that is done for you.
All you have to do is your job roughly outlined in your job description. You get paid for showing up! As long as you provide the value the company needs, you can feed yourself, live in an apartment and live a decent, comfortable life (if you happen to be in a developed country).
With the entrepreneurial route, there’s great uncertainty. First, you don’t know where to start. With the stories you hear of most entrepreneurs failing and the sacrifices they undergo to make it, you wonder whether it’s worth it.
Also, when the economy is bad, if businesses are incurring losses, they have to do the heavy lifting when it comes to taking the burden of the stresses of the economy; you, as an employee, are still in the same position. You get your bi-weekly pie as long as you have a valuable job function.
Multiple Skills Gap
Another challenge facing those thinking of going solo is the skillsets gap. You might be comfortable solving a technical problem because years of school have taught you how to do delicate and rigorous work. It’s not new; it’s just different regarding work — instead of solving complex homework, you get paid for solving complex business needs.
But how about running a business? This is not obvious. It’s not enough to solve complex technical problems. Here, you must talk to people, build a product, research, market and sell. Convince them that you have a compelling product or service. Most people don’t want to pay for anything unless they have to.
Netflix must create hours of new content to retain customers who will pay them a meagre $20 monthly. Yet, it’s a huge challenge for them. They have so many competitors waiting to eat them at every chance.
Running a business or gig on your own requires honing multiple skills. It is not enough to be good at one thing, which is often enough for a job; for running a business, that is only a start. To be a successful business owner, you need to be at an intermediate/advanced level for many skills and know when to use each skill at the right time and place.
Social Pressure
This is probably the biggest obstacle we all face. If you land a fancy job, say a six-figure one, family and friends will come to congratulate you. Everyone tells you how lucky you are to have such stability.
Whereas if you were to start something independently, everybody would see it. You would spend years and a lot of money on something which could result in nothing.
Also, you don’t want to be someone else’s joke. That you tried so hard, yet you failed. The pressure to not fail is intense. And the pressure to succeed is very high. It makes sense socially to be successful at the most risk-free thing, i.e. finding a job, than to hedge your bets in unknown territories.
Solution: Solve One Problem at A Time
Each of the problems mentioned above, uncertainty, multiple skills, and social pressure that stop us from making an income on our own is a problem to be solved.
The best formula to solve any problem has two parts
- Part one: divide the problem into small parts
- Part two: solve each of these parts one at a time
With this formula in mind, we can tackle the above challenges slowly but shortly. It requires some self-belief, confidence and, above all, intrinsic motivation. Motivation is a hard problem about which much is to be said. I will write more about it elsewhere.
Problem 1: Uncertainty
Uncertainty is not new to anyone. We all have faced it in our lives, and we always will.
I remember the most uncertain period of my life, the period after high school graduation. I had no idea what to do. I didn’t even know the next step was applying for colleges!
But I spent one year dealing with that uncertainty, and eventually, I went to a great college from which I graduated successfully.
To deal with uncertainty. We have to sit on it. That is, the more time we spend thinking and doing something about the said uncertainty, the less uncertain it becomes.
We acquire more knowledge and derive more intuition about a given problem with time. Finding a new job is highly uncertain; many things, including colleagues, bosses, and company culture, could go wrong. But most of us have learned to deal with that uncertainty because we have spent a lot of time on it.
Getting a job and sitting securely in a nest without uncertainty is a false sense of security. Most people hit the reality when they get fired. The so-called family breaks up. And all uncertainty gets thrown on your face.
I believe that we should wake up every morning without expecting to sleep in the same bed we just woke up in. You never know what can happen during the day. If you hit a car, you might very well end up in a hospital bed!
Problem 2: Multiple Skillsets
Nobody will tell you there is a hard limit when gaining knowledge.
Everyone (almost) agrees that there is no complaining about knowing more stuff. The more you know about the world, the better for you, the better you can thrive.
The same applies to skill sets, whether hard or soft skills. Each additional skill set increases your potential and opens more doors of opportunity.
To many, it might feel like you’re never enough. You need solid hard skills to get a job, for, e.g. marketing, coding, or writing, which is hard enough. But on top of that, you need these gazillion skills to start and run a business. Isn’t that a bit too much to ask of an individual?
Here, the trick is not to immediately get good at all kinds of skills. But give yourself time to get good at the most important skill first and then work your way up.
But as a problem to have, this is the best problem one can have. We should be happy and excited to have more skills to gain, not sad and gloomy about it. It will make us better individuals over time, something our parents, family, relatives, friends, and society will be proud of.
Problem 3: Social Pressure
The easy answer to the social issue might be ignoring everybody. But I don’t think that is a realistic and helpful perspective.
Our social realities are our most important reality. Life is interesting because of the people in our lives. People are the joy and happiness of life.
When our reputation and identity are at stake, it is natural to be extremely protective of it. We don’t want to lose friends or make our families feel weird about who we are.
Going out of the ordinary means often leaving the normal route. That can shock friends and family, and we are unsure how they will receive it.
Whatever the case, this is a personal challenge for every individual. We can hint at our changing identity by discussing it early. As in having small conversations, you’re thinking of starting something independently.
When I started blogging, I told everyone about it so that no one was surprised to learn I have a blog one day. Everyone knows about it, even potential families I met for marriage. They mentioned it when meeting me, but no one particularly cares, which means it is normalized in my circle. That is exactly what I wanted 😉
Conclusion
The social pressures, skill gaps and uncertainty faced when taking the entrepreneurial path are undeniably complex obstacles.
These obstacles are, in a way, good problems to have. Overcoming them will make us better individuals over time.
And life is too short to be stuck in one thing. Keep moving unapologetically and remember the two steps to solving any problem in the world: (1.) Divide the problem into smaller parts and (2.) Solve only one problem at a time.
