Why Not Just Work For Myself?

Job hunting is hard. It's hard because it's tough to sell yourself, it's tough to stand out in a crowd, and it's tough to be judged by someone else's standards after you've worked your entire life setting your own and trying to meet them.

It's also been tough the last few years because nobody's hiring.

That's ok, I get that, and I'll take my lumps with everybody else.  This isn't the first time in the history of the world that the economy has been less than gentle with recent grads (and the rest of the population...). I get that.

But there is one difference: today, it's easier than ever to create your own company, to work for yourself, and to not rely on anybody else to determine your success.

It can be daunting, but that independence is a good thing. It means you don't have anyone looking over your shoulder, telling you how to do everything.  You are the only one who determines your goals and what you're working for, and you are the only one who determines whether you're successful or not.

In other words, it's up to you and you only to sink or swim.

(Gulp: yeah, good and daunting.)

Job hunting is hard and I got sick of it, so I decided to try a new tack.  I found a partner with 30 years in business who was also looking to do something new, and we formed Pollinate, a marketing firm that specializes in personality branding for businesses (we're new enough that that line changes every time I try to explain it!).  Before that, I had been freelancing (and job hunting) and I wanted something bigger. Except all I kept hearing was "we'd love to hire you, but we don't have the money in the budget for that position." Well, I'm not going to wait around until they do have the money to hire me (which is good, because my landlord isn't going to either).

Enter Pollinate.  Don, my partner, and I collaborated on a project and found we work really well together. to work for ourselves, but also because we both wanted something bigger. That's why we do pro-bono work for charities and not-for-profits along with our client work. When the tsunami hit Japan, I couldn't write a big check to help out and I couldn't volunteer to go over there and shut down a nuclear reactor myself, so what could I do? Well, I can write and I can help with marketing. There are not-for-profits out there who need marketing just as badly as any other company, but they can't afford it.  It's how we can give back.

So now, instead of job hunting being hard, I've run into a new problem: running a business is hard. Finding clients is hard. Paying the bills is hard. And all of those things should be. I'm not asking for it to be easy. But I do want one thing: it's up to me whether I sink or swim.