Work: A non conventional professional life, by choice and design
Originally published at www.shipoffools.com.au on August 6, 2017.
What happens when you choose an unconventional professional life, and does it disadvantage you career-wise?
A professional life…by choice…and design…
What happens when you choose an unconventional professional life, and does it disadvantage you career-wise?
I remember a conversation I had about my professional life with a colleague when I worked for a period in a permanent role at a major tertiary institution.
Also studying at the time, I worked this permanent part-time role to provide some income stability, while also working another casual job in the Arts and doing occasional professional acting work.
This was at a time when I also slowly began taking on freelance work as a writer and editor.
Both lovers of AFL (Australian Rules Football), every Monday morning this workmate and I would dissect the weekend’s action and discuss our team’s prospects that year. One Monday after he had enquired about my weekend, and learned I’d worked and studied for most of it, he marvelled at my life and said he wouldn’t swap it for his for love or money. He much preferred the 7.30–4.30, Monday to Friday job that paid him a regular salary, had predictable hours and in which he felt safe and secure when considered up against my non-conventional professional life…whereas, despite respecting his choices, I viewed his life as restrictive and predictable.
Years later, my professional life remains enjoyable, if still unpredictable, and with not much financial security. I still take on some work that I’d rather not but do it because it pays the bills today so I can keep chasing the work I’d rather be doing tomorrow (well, later today preferably, but tomorrow will do).
This week, just as I was about to head off on a cheeky week up north to escape a chilly Melbourne winter, I was offered a lucrative writing gig that would have almost paid for the entire trip. Assessing the nature of the work and what else I had on, and not wanting to let the client down, I declined the gig initially, but with a little hopeful prodding from the client negotiated to share it with someone else.
After I knocked off the component of the project I took on much quicker than I thought I would, I regretted not having had more faith in myself, but it was a great lesson in underestimating what I’m capable of for the next time I’m in a similar situation.
And, as I sit on a warm, breezy day in far North Queensland writing this post, listening to the football, enjoying a long black, but most of ALL enjoying my life, I realise that this unconventional professional life that I’ve chosen has its challenges and yet many benefits.
It means your income is up and down.
It means no guarantees, probably not enough superannuation and having to ride the good times with the not so good.
It means maybe being overlooked for more permanent work when it comes along because you have only ever been a contractor or worked for yourself and so prospective permanent employers maybe see you as something of a risk.
Not so much as unreliable — just an unknown quantity they’re not sure will stay around that long.
(Did someone say commitment phobic? No! I’d like to think of it as ‘free spirited’.)
But it also has its advantages, with freedom and choice over how you manage your life being the most compelling.
It all just comes down to the kind of person you are.
If you need to work for someone, go for it
If a professional life where you being you’re own boss is the only way to go, just do it.
Neither disadvantages you career wise — the only thing that truly disadvantages you is living a professional life that makes you unhappy.
A happy, if sometimes not-so-financially-rich professional life, is, in fact, a truly RICH professional life.
