One Job is Not Enough
We want more from a job besides a regular paycheck: we want a sense of identity and belonging, purpose and meaning, stability and upside, challenge and well-being. The problem is, such an ideal job does not exist. What if, instead of looking for one ideal job, we start expanding our career laterally, via side projects? Take 5 steps to define your portfolio of side projects and - most importantly - act on it.
Before anything else, I would like to make one important disclaimer. Current times are incredibly tough, and it is highly possible that those of us whose jobs or businesses have fallen victims to the pandemic are in survival mode. Survival mode means that the primary - if not the only - expectation from a job is to provide a regular paycheck. Survival mode needs survival strategies. Job search needs job search strategies. This article is not about survival strategies or job search. It addresses situations where we either have a job or are lucky not to need one immediately.
One Job Is Not Enough
There are 5 reasons why we need side projects.
Ideal jobs do not exist. Our expectations of a job are as high as our expectations of marriage. We want to have it all. In one. And forever. Esther Perel once said that "we ask one person (our partner) and one place (our workplace) to give us what our parents or grandparents received from an entire village. Where once we had strong community ties but very little freedom, now we have freedom, but very little community. It is easy to look to our careers and our partners to provide us with all the things that we used to get from a town square, a place of worship, or the cousins who lived next door." Miracles sometimes happen, but overall it is highly unlikely that we will get it all from just one job. (Disclaimer: lucky to be happily married, I am not advocating for side projects in marriage :))
Stability is overrated. If there is one lesson that the pandemic is teaching us, it is that stability - including job safety - does not exist. The job market now looks very different from what it was two months ago. And it will look very different again in one month, and in one, two, three years from now. We all have to get ready to navigate the change and the challenge. Our side projects can be our career insurance.
Complacency is no longer an option. It has never been. And now even less so. Even if we have considered ourselves successful, what got us here will not get us through the big shifts that are happening right in front of our eyes. We need to avoid the competency trap. We need to expand our comfort zone, learn new things and reassemble our existing and new skills in wonderful, unique - and maybe totally unexpected - new combinations.
Average is no longer an option. As Seth Godin writes in his recent blog post, "Average work for average people is going to be worth less than ever before. Typical employees doing typical work are going to be less respected and valued than ever before. And just as expectations are being shifted, new opportunities will arise. They always do. So what’s next? A commitment to learning and to possibility." We all need to expand our range of options, continue to learn and lookout for new opportunities, look out to reinvent ourselves under the new circumstances.
To reinvent ourselves, we need to act. To quote Herminia Ibarra's book "Working Identity: Unconventional Strategies for Reinventing Your Career", "It is nearly impossible to think out how to reinvent ourselves, and, therefore, it is equally hard to execute in a planned and orderly way. A successful outcome hinges less on knowing one’s inner, true self at the start than on starting a multistep process of envisioning and testing possible futures. No amount of self-reflection can substitute for the direct experience we need to evaluate alternatives according to criteria that change as we do." We need side projects to test and experiment with our new possible selves.
5 Actionable Steps to Find Side Projects
Step 1. Make a Wish List
At this stage, we do not need to think about how practical or feasible our ideas are. We give ourselves permission to dream and think outside of our day job. We don't exclude anything, even the things that right now seem utterly surreal. Right now, it is a wish list. It's not what we should do, but what we want to do. We just go ahead and make it. We take a batch of post-it notes and fill them in with our ideas.
Our list will likely come from the following possible categories:
© Arina Divo - Better Career Transitions
Side projects at work. Why not? Sometimes opportunities are closer than we think. We can volunteer to contribute to a transversal project, or go ahead and initiate one, seek options to collaborate with colleagues and solve a meaningful problem. The key idea here is that we can adopt an entrepreneurial mindset even in the most rigid corporate setting.
Alternative Corporate Careers. If there have been roles that we have been thinking of, both inside or outside of our current company or industry, we add them here.
Side Hustles. Popular ones are web design, writing and editing, catering, photography, computer maintenance, fitness and yoga, massage, teaching or coaching. Pamela Slim in her book "Body of Work: Finding the Thread That Ties Your Story Together" gives the following definition of a good side hustle:
“You enjoy doing it.
You are good at it.
You are very clear about who your market is.
You can generate a decent amount of quick cash in a short period of time.
You can generate a decent amount of quick cash in a short period of time.
It does not require an extensive website or ongoing brand-building efforts like a more substantial small business. But more substantial businesses can and do emerge from side hustles.
It will not get you thrown in jail (dealing crack, while profitable and possible from your home, is not recommended)."
Entrepreneurship. Maybe there has been a business idea we have always wanted to explore. Or if we do not want to become a full-time entrepreneur, we feel tempted by part-time entrepreneurship, by contributing either our capital (Angel) or our skills (Advisor) or both (Co-Founder). There is no better source on exploring part-time Entrepreneurship than "The 10% Entrepreneur: Live Your Startup Dream Without Quitting Your Day Job" book by Patrick J. McGinnis.
Continuous Education. Here we think about conventional and unconventional learning options, including learning by doing, apprenticeship type of opportunities.
Volunteering. Causes or organisations we want to support.
Hobbies. Something we want to spend more time on because we love it, even if we cannot see clear ways to monetise these pursuits.
Anything Else. Even the most surreal stuff that came to mind.
The side projects - our future possible selves - that we put on each post-it note can be as concrete or vague as they are. It's good to accompany each with a quick description why we think of this option.
Step 2. Rank the Options
After the first step, we have a random pile of ideas. Now, it is time to rank them. Maybe we already sense a clear favorite, however, the purpose at this stage is to go as wide as possible and not discard anything, even seemingly crazy stuff. Remember, we are still in the pure wish mode: not what we should do, but what we want to do. We think in terms of preferences, not priorities. We don't think about practicalities yet. For the moment, we assume there are none.
A good approach is pairwise comparison.
We arrange our stack of post-its in a row and start pairwise comparison, asking ourselves a question: if there was just one thing of these two that I could do, what would it be? We compare Option A pairwise with all other options. Whenever an option wins, it gets a point.
Once we have compared A with all other options, we remove it and start anew with option B, and so on. At the end of the exercise, we count the points each option has got, and rank them accordingly.
Pairwise Comparison of Preferences. © Arina Divo - Better Career Transitions Blog
If our list is quite long, we can use this online tool.
Step 3. Screen Each Option
Now that we have a 'love ranked’ list, comes the time of practicalities.
First, we need to remove any options with red flags. We screen out any options that go against the law. Also, if our current job is our Plan A, we cannot jeopardize it. So we screen out any option that goes against the terms of our employment contract or local regulation. For example, if you work in a foreign country, your employment status may prevent you from taking on any other salaried activity. In such cases, we may want not to remove the option completely, because the red flag may disappear one day.
Second, we need to ask ourselves individually for each option the following question: Do we have the resources this option immediately needs? Possible answers: "Yes" if we do have the required resource/ "No" if we don't / "N/A" if the resource is irrelevant for this side project. It's good to write not only the answer but a quick commentary. We ask these questions for the 4 groups of resources:
Time. We think about the time we will need to pursue this project - in the short term. Do we have this time? Can we carve it out?
Financial Capital. We think about whether the option immediately requires our financial capital and if yes, do we have it? Some side projects will bring money in. Then, we need to consider the net outcome. For example, if it's a side hustle that will require some initial investments, but they will quickly pay off, we answer "Yes".
Intellectual Capital: Here we assess if we immediately have skills required for each option and ask ourselves: Do we immediately have the skills required for this option? Here we can give 2 answers: "Yes" and list those that we have and "No" and list those that we currently missing.
Network: Here we ask ourselves: Do we have someone in our network who can help us? If the answer is "Yes", write the name of the person(s) next to it.
Screening Our Options. © Arina Divo - Better Career Transitions Blog
At the end of the screening, we can clearly see that our various options have very different resource needs. For example, for a side project at work or an exploration of an alternative corporate career path financial capital might be irrelevant, however, we may need some extra time and skills, as well as activation of our extended networks (as illustrated by Option A). An educational project may require an investment of our time and money, but the immediate availability of skills is irrelevant (as illustrated by Option D). Financial Capital is irrelevant for the Board Member, Volunteering, or Advisor role, however, we will need to consider whether we have time and/or skills to do it (as illustrated by Option C).
Step 4. Define Next Actions
Defining the next action is a critical step if we want this exercise not to be a waste of time. So far, we have been in self-reflection mode. Now it’s time to move from self-reflection to action, from preferences to real priorities.
For each option, we write one immediate and concrete next action. The Next-Action Principle comes from the "Getting Things Done" framework. We ask ourselves a question: What is the next thing that we need to do to move our project forward?
Defining Next Action. © Arina Divo - Better Career Transitions Blog
The key thing here is that our answer has to be actionable and specific. For example, if one of our side projects is to explore an alternative career path and move from pharmaceuticals to the luxury industry, "learn about the luxury industry" is not a good next action, because it is not specific enough. However, "Call Jenny to ask about her contacts in the luxury industry, I remember she was talking to me the other day about her friend working at Cartier" is both concrete and actionable.
Step 5. Act
In this step, we select the side project(s) on which we can immediately act. Our real priorities will reveal themselves through our actions.
Three important thoughts:
Adopt Portfolio Approach. Some side projects are not mutually exclusive. Instead of focusing on just one side project, we will go for more if our resources allow us to do that. For example, on the figure below, we have no excuses to start acting on Option A (example - side project at work) and can also go for Option C (for example - Volunteer, Advisor, or Board member role) where the next action will likely focus on expanding our network. We might put on hold Option D (for example, a formal education program) unless our next action will lead to finding financing for this option.
Get started. It is important to act and have some quick wins. Once we start with one project, pursuing others will be less daunting, we will be encouraged by the progress and will start seeing opportunities everywhere. Therefore, we don't delay our next actions and start with one.
Manage Side Projects As a Portfolio. Our side project portfolio is a work in progress. Same as the portfolio manager monitors her portfolio performance, we will return to our portfolio:
Every time we have accomplished action and need to define the next
Every time a new side project comes to mind
Regularly, for example, every 3 months, to see if our preferences and/or our resources have evolved.
Taking Action on our selected portfolio of side projects. ©Arina Divo - Better Career Transitions Blog
I hope this actionable framework will help you define your portfolio of side projects and, most importantly, start acting on them and explore your new possible selves. Good luck! I would love to hear from you on your successes, your challenges, and your suggestions. You can subscribe to my weekly Better Career Newsletter to receive ideas and inspiration for a better career.
THumbnail image: Unsplash