May 17 2009: Regular Work Just Isn’t For Me
Filed under Uni/Work
I’ve been thinking over yesterday’s entry, and I’ve come to a conclusion: Regular work isn’t for me.
By regular work, I mean the standard nine-to-five office-based that characterises most professional occupations – the type of occupations that most people will expect me to aim for as a university undergraduate who will complete their post-graduate studies in a few years. My personality simply isn’t suited to that type of work – I’ll feel stifled and rather than working for a large corporation, need to feel a certain type of autonomy and independence in my work. Something where I can see the instant results of my work and can change the way I do things immediately without having to clear my actions with higher management.
Now this decision isn’t based on pure laziness and an unwillingness to be a productive working member of society. I enjoy work, I enjoy keeping myself busy, I enjoy earning money. I have an excellent work ethic. I simply don’t enjoy submitting myself to a corporate environment. I want to be my own boss and reap the monetary benefits of my own hard work. So ideally, what I envision for myself would be something along the lines of:
- Part time administrative/retail work two to three days a week (I’m realistic, I know that I’ll need a steady backup income in case there are months where I don’t earn as much in my other ventures).
- Developing my eBay business from its current form as a private venture (buying items and reselling) to a more commercial venture (selling other people’s unwanted possessions for them for a basic fee and a cut of the profits)
- Grow the potential organisational clutter clearing business idea into a legitimate money-making venture. Start small with friends, and friends of friends, in the hope that word of mouth spreads.
- As immodest as it may be to claim this: I believe I have a way with words. I’d like to take on a few freelance writing/editing projects for a few quick bucks every now and again.
Along the way, I’m bound to find other sources of revenue as well (I have a knack for making money from unexpected sources), so if everything takes off, I’d be earning the equivalent of a full-time income while being my own boss and managing my own time with my work benefiting myself, rather than a CEO earning millions a year.
8 Responses to “Regular Work Just Isn’t For Me”
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I’m glad you are still being fairly realstic while pursuing what you really want to do. Most people go about doing what they want to do the wrong way and usually end up washed up bludgers.
I like the choices you have – they all sound very cool and the 4th one I definitely agree with – I enjoy reading your blog for the way you write things and also because you edit my schoolwork. If you did take this on, I would gladly use you as my “draft reader” for a very reasonable fee haha.
I also believe taking your private ebay business to a more commercial stance would do you well – you have great marketing skills from what I can tell and matched with your communication skills I think this could very much take off.
I wish you good luck ho!
April on May 17 2009 #
If I had my way, I’d do my own freelance type of work. I’d love to be my own boss. I’d have to learn to be more productive, though.
Caity on May 17 2009 #
Yea, I don’t think I could do the 9-5 either, but I’m not sure how many viable options that leaves me with.
Shen-Shen on May 17 2009 #
Freelance is pretty fun. :D Good luck with whatever you decide to do!
Noellium on May 18 2009 #
I don’t know, 9-5 as an editor/writer in an office was a pretty awesome job. Anyway, as an arts undergraduate the only professional jobs you’re expected to be applying for are at Maccas or Safeway. [Yes, Macca's is working out well for me ;) ]
You’re looking for a job with autonomy and a reasonable degree of variation and creativeness without a stuffy corporate environment. Pick the right company and you can find those in most non-entry-level areas. Look for smaller companies, more creative companies, or more autonomous roles within those. Why not consider a job in marketing (you get constantly varying projects, a chance to be creative and use your brain, and to work with people), or even in admin at one of the unis? Not suggesting to not go for one of your dreams, but there are a lot of other bearable jobs as back-up.
Rebekah on May 18 2009 #
See it’s great that you know what you’re good at and that you actually want to exercise the skills that you do have. Sometimes I feel like my love of the end job of being a doctor far exceeds my ability to do Chemistry and Calculus… It’s almost a bad idea.
I also don’t think I’ll do well doing the whole 9-5 thing. I keep wanting to blog about it saying that I’d probably shoot myself if I had to work a job like that but 1) I don’t want to offend some readers or make readers who work 9-5 jobs who hate their jobs to want to shoot themselves and 2) I have a bad feeling that I *might* end up there too.
Felisa on May 18 2009 #
You should start with dead people. They usually have houses full of clutter and their sons and daughters are fighting for assets =) Good money there.
Or there’s always people moving house.
Mish on May 18 2009 #
With everything you just mentioned, you sound like you’d do great in network marketing. Don’t know what your views are on that, but it’s part time, involves some retail, you reap all the money from your own effort, you sell your products/services by word of mouth advertising, and yeah. Might work for you, who knows?
Kat on May 18 2009 #