One of the biggest problems young people face when they leave education is that they have never been taught how to monetise their skill sets other than working for somebody else.
Unfortunately, as businesses continue to embrace new technologies the number of jobs roles available in unspecialised industries are in a steady decline. Young people in the digital economy need to learn to embrace the ability to create value for themselves and others through online and offline entrepreneurship.
“Start a business on the side. Deliver some value—any value—to somebody, anybody, and watch that value compound into a career.” – James Altucher
One difficulty young people face when tasked with starting their own business is their inability to get scrappy. Too many young people strive for perfection straight out of the gates, leaving them disheartened when their business venture doesn’t quiet meet their vision and so they quickly lose motivation and resort back to status panic.
“Perfectionism is sometimes the most dangerous set of thoughts you can let make their home in your head.”
Nowadays, it’s possible to have an e-commerce store up and running online in less than an hour or you could offer your services to a local business with a simple A4 print out of what you can offer. Learning to be scrappy from the off helps you to keep startup costs down and allows you validate your ideas without too much risk other than your time. If you genuinely believe you have a product or service that can add value to a potential customer then nobody will judge you on your beta version. Remember, If you can make money for somebody else you can make money for yourself.
Fortunately or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it, the new economy is destroying the ‘play it safe’ mentality forcing us to get scrappy or go without. Getting scrappy may go against everything we’ve ever been taught but it’s the lifeblood of the new economy. You can either continue fighting for the pay per hour jobs that are in a steady decline or you can learn to monetise your skill set doing the things you care about.
Say Hello on Twitter @ckyildiz And Google+
The first Apple Computer, also known retroactively as the Apple I (1976) It’s ok to be scrappy on your first attempt.