The amazing wedding photographer who gets paid $10,000 for a day’s work has an amazing business right? Not necessarily.
What happens if that same wedding photographer falls ill or decides they don’t want to photograph 30 weddings a year and their income stream dies down? That wedding photographer has created a well-paying job for herself.
The phenomenal public speaker who gets paid $8,000 for an hour’s work and speaks at 70 events a year – that’s a wonderful business right? Depends how you look at it. If that same public speaker sent Joe Bloggs, employee, in their place to do a keynote speech – do you think the client would go for it? The public speaker has created a well-paying job for himself.
The retail store owner who can sell anything to anyone and has five staff members? Now that’s a business right? Not if the moment he walks out the door sales drop 50%. He’s created… you guessed it – a well-paying job for herself.
Now, I’m not saying that having a well-paying job isn’t wonderful – especially if you love the work – but (1) it’s hard to sell a well-paying job as an asset and (2) a well-paying job suffers if you’re off “work” for an extended period of time (illness, pregnancy, taking time to explore the world).
The great thing about everyone above? There’s ways for them to create business aspects to what they do.
The wedding photographer who sells prints, does other work that can be put into a book or exhibit finds ways to create leverage.
The public speaker who leverages their brand into a book, an e-series, an online educational program or a subscription-based website instantly creates an income stream that works for them day or night.
And the retail store owner who lets go of being the face and trains her staff to take the fore can turn his job into a business – and a saleable one at that.
Do you have a business or a job? Do you want to start your own business or create a job for yourself? Is what you’ve built saleable? Does it work for you whether you spend the day in bed in your PJs or you’re out in the field? Mmm…. I’m writing this in my PJs!
Kirsty Dunphey is the youngest ever Australian Telstra Young Business Woman of the Year, author of two books (her latest release is Retired at 27: If I Can do it Anyone Can) and a passionate entrepreneur who started her first business at age 15 and opened her own real estate agency at 21.
Now Kirsty does lots of fun things which you can read about here. Her favourite current projects are Elephant Property, a boutique property management agency, Baby Teresa, a baby clothing line that donates an outfit to a baby in need for each one they sell and ReallySold, which helps real estate agents stop writing boring, uninteresting ads.
