ESPN laid off 100 employees today, most of them have been with the company for more than 5 years ( some over 15), and all for the most part made very good salaries.
There’s a new sheriff at the ESPN accounting dept., and he decided to make changes.
The only way to secure your family financially is to go into business for yourself…the business world is changing, I hope that you adapt and change with it.
No matter what you do, i believe your goal should be to eventually work for yourself, don’t get too comfortable working for someone else, because its just a matter of time, before he/she calls your number. In today’s age, job security is out the window.
Everybody depends on others in a society. It’s one thing to depend on your own ability to provide a service or product that others are willing to pay you for. It’s something else entirely to depend on some other person or company to continue to employ you.
So to this point I am a Full Time project manager and part time Inspector. Some weeks especially this time of year I am full time with both.
I got very sick this year and if it wasn’t for the understanding of my employer I would have been in bad shape financially. I had to turn down inspections for nearly 3 months as I was physically unable to do them.
I am a young enough guy at 34 that this was a eye opening experience. I was actually contemplating making my own thread on this to see what others have done. Had I not maintained both jobs (which is great for the bank and the IRS) I am not sure what my family would have done as we would have badgered our savings which the medical bills are already doing. We have a nanny that I would have had to let go and so my illness could have affected others as well.
I agree that having your own business can lead to financial freedom, I will own the company I work for within 10 years as well as my inspection business that I have no intention of stopping. If something goes down hill after I move into a dual role managing both I could be on the hook for my livelihood and over 100 others. As an employee you can’t control what happens to you but you can work hard and build a great resume. As an owner you can try to control what happens but lots of times things are outside of your control and can just as easily collapse.
50% of businesses fail in 1 year. That is a staggering number. I wonder if all of those people took jobs working for someone else, how many would be fired/layed off within 1 year?
Perhaps not 50%, but how many would be stuck in a dead end job that would eventually lay them off at a future date?
The rate of business failure is of course, attributed to many, many, many things. Many of are shell companies of other business interests.
But I’m really believing most fail because they severely under estimate how much work it is, and/or just give up at the first sign of adversity.
We see that almost daily on this board with new inspectors asking the same ole’ questions over and over again because they can’t be bothered to take 30 seconds to research and see if the question has already been asked and answered. And then they run off never to seen again.
I’ve lost count of how many people have contacted me about helping them get off the ground, and when I say let’s meet for coffee or whatever, they either never write back or suddenly have some excuse as to why they can’t.
