Jeremy Wright writes a piece over at the Wealthy Blogger about actually having multiple jobs within one job as a ProBlogger – something I was only speaking to a friend about yesterday. He writes:
‘My real secret is that my dream job isn’t just one job. Currently, I hold the following “positions” at “Jeremy Wright, Inc.”:
1. Blogger
2. Consultant
3. Author
4. Courseware developer
5. Speaker / Trainer
6. WriterAnd I do these in areas such as time management, personal finance, blogging, communications, marketing and technology.’
I’d add to the list of jobs that I’m increasingly finding myself doing things like:
- Accounting/Bookkeeping
- Marketing
- Sales
- Public Relations
In a sense being a sole trader blogger is like any other small business where you end up doing any and every aspect of your business. At times this can be incredibly stretching – at other times its tempting to ignore the parts you don’t naturally gravitate towards – but overall I’m finding it to be a rich experience and one that I hope is adding to what I have to offer in future ventures (blogging and otherwise).
With an income over 10k a month, one should be able to pay another person to do some parts of the job.
With my income I’m not able to pay my coke ;)
You’re right Markus – and increasingly I’m finding people to take on some of the different aspects of what I do – but its been a long time coming and a couple of years of hard work. Hang in there with it – it starts with buying a coke and slowly grows to something bigger.
You certainly do reach the stage where you can start to employ others to do some parts of the work that needs to be done.
It’s at that point you take on the role of supervisor and worrier – will they get the work done on time? Will it be up to the standard that you want? Will they let you down at the worst possible time?
Still I look back to when we started working online full time and I would never want to go back. Life since then has been way too interesting since then :)
Damn – posting – eating a snack and talking with your partner all at the same time just doesn’t mix :)
You could always try a large bet on England to win the Ashes, then you’ll be able to pay the bookeeper, at least :-)
Quite true Darren, quite true. =)
Blogging is definitely a do it yourself, do or die proposition since it really is dependent on the person only to do the work.
Hiring people has its own share of headaches.
I started my business as a one man shop in 1983. By 1987, I had five employees. It just about killed me, financially and emotionally. I am simply NOT a good manager of other people, and I’m far too optimistic about other people’s work ethics. I did eventually fire everyone and was back to “just me” by 1989, but the damage had been done and it was hard, hard times from then on. I was in debt, very discouraged, felt like a complete failure, and found it very hard to keep putting one foot in front of the other.
After a rocky recovery, which included having to work for other people myself for a few years, I started over in 1997 and have remained without employees since then. That’s not always easy, of course. There are times I could use some help, and times that I’m very stressed by the volume of work that needs to be done. But for me, staying just like this is the best way.