Are you scared of making the leap to being self-employed?
There are a lot of risks and fears that we need to confront when we consider leaving a stable job to become self-employed – and these fears and risks will vary depending on your age, your location, and your financial situation.
But there are a number of hard and soft barriers to making the move that are pretty common across the board – things like not having the money to pay down debt or pay for training; not wanting to give up benefits (especially health insurance for you Americans); and fear of earning less, and having inconsistent income.
In this episode, I discuss those and a number of other challenges with Matt Baker from Freshbooks.
Freshbooks does a survey each year on self-employment in America – and we discuss the findings of that survey – specifically, the things people love about being self-employed, and how people who want to be self-employed and de-risk the move.
You can listen to this episode below, or on your fave podcast app.
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Highlights from this episode:
- Even if accounting is not your favourite aspect of business it is essential to keep an eye on your books.
- “Having yourself a budget is really just setting some targets before reality happens and that way you can compare yourself to something” {Matt}
- Freshbooks latest survey of self-employed professionals shows that 90% of respondents would not return to a traditional job in the wider workforce.
- “Once you take on the mindset of I’m the owner, all of a sudden you feel in control. And sometimes people have more control over their regular job than they realise. It’s just a mindset” {Matt}
- The survey revealed 63% of respondents think money is less important than quality of life.
- “For a lot of small business owners personal and life is all intertwined” {Matt}
- You have to start saving for taxes immediately and start preparing for the peaks and troughs of your income and expenses.
- “Once you work for yourself your income is lumpy” {Matt}
- Take the time and do the maths on your pricing—if you charge this much how many clients do you need to service to supply.
- Think about how much money do you want to earn each year. How many of your products would you need to sell at the current price to make it feasible to have a profitable business?
- “There is a tendency when you get started to really undervalue the work you do” {Matt}
- A lot of makers forget to include overheads in establishing their product costs. Don’t forget to include electricity, mortgage, mailing lists and more.
- Ensure you invest time and energy into caring for yourself. You are your greatest resource.
- “It’s really important that you do take care of yourself from the beginning. If you fall down the business falls down.” {Jess}
