Is Being Self-Employed Easy?

The idea of being self employed is often an appealing one. No boss hovering nearby while you work. No office politics that become divisive or horrific to work in. The added freedom of building a business based on your own goals and interests – it’s all very appealing and sounds excellent on paper, right? But is it actually easy?

The honest answer isn’t as straightforward as a yes or no unfortunately. It can be challenging and rewarding, frustrating and exhilarating all at once. It comes with a range of responsibilities that many people don’t fully appreciate until they are running the business themselves. One of the most important responsibilities that you have is to stay organised with your taxes and financial records. This includes looking into Making Tax Digital for self assessment. Managing the administrative side of the business is just as important as delivering products or services to customers. While paperwork may not be the most exciting part of any business, it’s a must. Staying on top of it? It’s a must if you don’t want the admin headaches or fines that come with missing out. 

For some? Flexibility means that self employment is easier than any other way of working. In fact, it can be life changing to not be chained to the 9-5 work day. 

However, flexibility doesn’t mean less work, it just means that you have the time to do it when it suits you instead. Most self-employed people work more hours because they are building something real and that level of building takes a lot of time. Another challenge is the uncertainty of income that comes with self employment. You can do all the work and be hanging around for weeks waiting for your client to pay you. As an employee, you usually know when you’re going to be paid and how much because it’s pretty consistent. When you do it for yourself it’s a lot more chasing and a lot more planning to make sure that you don’t fall behind on your bills.

This is the uncertainty that makes for budgeting and financial planning being the most important thing that you can do as a self employed individual. You need a lot of self discipline to be self employed and there’s no doubt about that. In fact, when people thrive as self-employed it’s because they have a level of discipline that others wish they had! Customer acquisition, problem solving and staying on top of the requirements of a self employed business are all things that you have to consider day to day.

Self employment can be incredibly satisfying. You get to learn more about yourself and build something that hasn’t been done before – not by you, anyway. You get to feel like you are directly contributing to something great and this sense of success allows you to feel like you’re achieving something amazing. Is it easy? Nah, we don’t think so. But it’s worth giving it a go at least once so that you can say you tried!

---

Also published on Medium.