Scarcity and Self-Employment

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You could say that one aspect of choosing self-employment instead of a job is that you enter the world of financial scarcity and insecurity. You run out of money. There’s no reassuring regular incoming salary at the end of each month with which to pay your bills. Another way of looking at it is that you take on that responsibility in employing yourself, to pay yourself instead of expecting someone else to do that. In all my time of working for myself I’ve been on the financial edge more times than I care to remember, and I’ve also been in […]

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Self-Employment: Your 365 Opportunity

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When I was in the shower this morning, I thought I would write to you today about self-employment and how it is your challenge 365 days of the year. Then I realised that was a bit dark for me, the Queen of Positive Thinking. So I deliberately re-framed it. Self-employment is your opportunity 365 days of the year. I was thinking back over my 2014 and one of the highlights was taking part in the 30 Day Challenge in June, as their coach. 30 Day challenges are a high-energy way to kickstart a project, get you into action and get you thinking about leaving […]

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100 Gratitudes: What I Learned About My Own Entrepreneurship

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A friend and colleague challenged me to participate in Dr Robert Holden’s 100 Gratitudes.  I accepted with alacrity, as is my wont, and then repented at leisure, as is also my wont, when I worked out how time-consuming it would be for me to fully participate. Then I sulked for a bit, resentful of the ‘work’ I had taken on. Then – as luck would have it – I leaped out of bed on a Sunday morning, early, and they all just flowed out of me. Gorgeous when that happens, when I allow. As I prefer to write everything online, I […]

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Entrepreneurs Are Different

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The UK government has a scheme for young entrepreneurs aged 18-24 which offers start-up loans averaging £2,500. I am wondering if this would have encouraged me when I was starting up, aged 22. Yes, I think it would; it would have paid for a few essentials like marketing. As one commenter said, in this day and age it is more than enough to set up a business online which is as good a way to start as any. The scheme is aimed at young people with a business idea and offers them training and support in developing a business plan. Stefan […]

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The Beauty of Self-Employment: Every Day is Unique

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The beauty of self-employment, for me, is that no two days are the same. Today, a Tuesday, always my least favourite day of the week at school, looks like this: First thing I will blog. This is it. Blogging is something I love to do, it is also a central plank of my marketing. I have also challenged myself to blog every day throughout 2014 and today is Day 77. Don’t they mount up quickly? Next, there is a call-in between 11 and 12.30 for the members of my Small Business Big Magic group. This group is now entering the 7th […]

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Show Me YOUR Sexy Spreadsheet!

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Sometimes when you’ve been blundering along for a while in self-employment and yet you are still struggling with money, there comes a time to face the truth and create – da da dah! – a spreadsheet. I have known Sue off and on for a number of years and one thing I knew straight off was that she deserves to be making a great living in her business because she is studious and diligent and hard-working. She does all the right trainings, knows all the right people, and does all the techie things most of the rest of us cannot […]

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Want to be Self-Employed but No Idea Where to Start?

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Sometimes I make the mistake of thinking I’ve heard everything. No sooner do I do that than people turn up to surprise me. This week I met a very sensible Creator. Who even knew they existed when we thought they were all head in the clouds? Turned out she did have books full of ideas somewhere, ideas on the back-burner, she had just parked them for a while. I told you already, she’s sensible. Phew! My world went all topsy-turvy there for a bit. Then I met someone who had had the spark of creativity lit within her Starry self […]

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Work We Love Will Be The New Pension

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People of all ages are waking up to the fact that global demographics mean that either our pensions will be delayed, or have a reduced or zero value. Most self-employed people I know don’t even have one. Maybe we thought we had plans in place which would provide a pension by alternative means but, with things as they are, maybe those plans aren’t working out as intended either. Or we never had any pension in the first place because we couldn’t afford the contributions. Yikes! What to do, especially as we get fearful about our advancing old age?  I’m not […]

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Successful Entrepreneurship: Cashflow & Marketing

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Almost every email I receive from business folks asking for help is about either (a) managing cashflow or (b) marketing. They are the twin evils – and ultimately the twin joys – of making your business work. The issue of cashflow is about doing enough business at the right price and collecting the money for it speedily and efficiently.   If you are not bringing in enough money it’s safe to say you are not yet happy with asking for the business and asking for it at the right price. I was an accountant for twenty years and we used […]

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Good News Masquerading As A Problem

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Yesterday I was chatting to one of my favourite clients and we were experiencing the same sort of thoughts about our working lives. My client somewhat sheepishly revealed didn’t have any problems she wanted to discuss with me in her call and this was a first. She couldn’t remember a time in her life when she wasn’t driven by sorting out her problems and what was she to do with all this spare energy and time? What a wonderful “problem” to have! We were able to agree on that and have a little self-conscious laugh at ourselves and then we […]

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