Back in the eighties a British politician infamously told the nation’s unemployed to “Get On Yer Bike” and look for work rather than relying on state handouts. It was harsh and a lot of people didn’t like it, but at least it kind of stuck.
But seeking out gainful employment isn’t just a pastime for the potless. It can also be a handy way of bring in some much-needed extra cash while you build up your own small business to a point where it can pay its own way.
That was precisely what I did when I first set up my business and finance consultancy. Because I began with precisely zero clients there was a bit of a cashflow imbalance between what I needed to be earning just to live and what I was in fact earning from my non-existent customer base.
So Do You Know What? I Went out and Got a Job in a Bar!
That’s right, by day I was giving advice to people about how to save their money and by night I was taking it out of their hands for the price of a beer. Needs must and all that.
I also spent my lunch breaks and other general business downtime bringing in a few extra cents filling out online surveys for market research companies. It’s slow, and it’s irritating, and nobody ever got rich doing it, but those small totals did slowly add up and when I did get a check through the post for fifty bucks it really did feel worthwhile.
There really is no limit to what you can do to earn a few dollars with a little imagination.
I also actually enjoyed being out and about and meeting people, even if the wages were frankly shitty. And the sheer effort of it all reminded me why it was that I wanted my business to succeed.
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