After a six month career break, it’s time to go back to work.
This time off work has been one of the best periods of my life. I’ve achieved a lot that I am proud of in this time:
- Transformed my home and created an office space I love
- Trained for and ran a 10km race
- Started my consulting business
- Shared my writing online
That said, I do need to get back to work. While I could continue to take time off, the time feels right to get back to the real world and start earning some money again. Plus I don’t want my skill set to get rusty!
I wanted to write about why I’m going back to work, and what I believe my future looks like. So let’s get into it.
The Job
I received a call out of the blue from a recruiter who believed I would be a good fit for one of their roles.
After a quick interview process, I got the job.
I’ll be working as part of a small project team, who are supporting a business during their launch of a new system in my area of expertise.
It’s a great opportunity to learn more about the systems within my domain. I don’t have direct experience in this system, but I’m an expert in one of the vendor’s other products. I can use my prior experience (and the support of the team) to deliver quality training to end users of the software.
I’m very lucky to have gotten the call about this role. I applied for a role through this recruiter years ago, so they had my phone number on file. The recruiter checked my up-to-date work history on LinkedIn. The client needs an immediate start, which wouldn’t have been possible if I was already employed.
If any of those weren’t true, I wouldn’t have gotten the call.
Creating ways to become lucky (and doing everything in your power to have the ability to be lucky is essential.
I keep my LinkedIn profile up to date so that recruiters can contact me about opportunities. And I wouldn’t have been able to have this time off if not for intentionally saving towards Financial Independence and creating a life I love now.
While it is a little sad that my six months of total freedom are over, it’s not the end of the world. I knew this was coming eventually! This is a six-month contract, so I’m sure I will be back on break once this is up.
This Wasn’t Forever
My career break wasn’t going to last forever. And neither will my new contract.
As you may know from reading this blog, I haven’t achieved Financial Independence yet. Going back to work (in whatever form that took) was an inevitability and a necessity.
I am still required to trade my time for money. This time off allowed me to assess how I wanted to do that.
Through my career, I’ve acquired specialist skills that are in high demand and have low supply. I previously worked at a consultancy firm, where I used those skills to optimise implementations of a specific software product.
My time off has taught me that I want to continue doing the work I used to, but I just want to do less of it. The extreme workload of my previous role put pressures on me and my life outside of work that I do not want to repeat.
As a result, I won’t be repeating them.
I wrote about my career break and thoughts on work here.
Leveraging My Time Effectively
Working at a consulting firm helped me understand the employee-employer relationship better, and helped me learn about business (including sales, project contract structure, and the value of our services).
As I wrote about previously, your employer wouldn’t hire you if the value of your outputs was less than what it costs to keep you employed.
Being employed as a consultant allows you to see first-hand how valuable this work is to your employer.
I began to think about my life as a business. When considering my circumstances objectively, I realised that I could perform the same duties I did in my role, but work for myself instead.
I could use my contacts within the industry to find leads, and take on short-term sub-contracting in quiet periods. By cutting out the traditional employer relationship, I was able to earn a much larger slice of the pie.
By earning a higher rate of pay, it also meant that I could work less while still maintaining my savings goals. Win-win.
On paper the plan made sense. So I got to work.
Launching The Business
I acquired a domain, built my own website, and wrote some basic copy outlining my services.
The business had been registered with the appropriate government bodies.
I was ready to start business. Or so I thought.
I got the call. The interviews went well. I got the contract.
But due to some regulations I hadn’t planned for, I couldn’t take the contract through my business. I had planned for this to be my first business client for my consulting business. That wasn’t possible at the time.
As a result, I would be going back to work as an employee instead.
I didn’t want to decline the work due to this reason alone. The opportunity is great, the pay is fantastic, and I negotiated a four day work week. Joining as an employee also allows me to build goodwill now to create a business relationship in the future.
I was planning to publicly launch my business after taking on this piece of work. But since I took the contract as an employee, now wasn’t the appropriate time.
The plan to launch my business had failed before it had gotten started.
I don’t see this as a full failure, though. I have the framework in place to restart and launch in a few months’ time. And with the new financial year fast approaching, it’s perfect timing to get the ducks in a row to try again.
Most importantly, I know that there’s work out there that I can do and that I can get my hands on it. While I don’t expect to do a lot of direct work it’s still a possibility. But working as a subcontractor will definitely allow me to choose work I love and control how I do it.
What’s Next?
By the time you’re reading this, I will be working hard as an employee.
It will be good to be back in the office and working on something new.
I’m just glad I’ve also been able to work on things while not employed.
Like I mentioned, I’m planning on refreshing my business, completing some different registrations, and launching again later this year.
As for the blog, I don’t plan on slowing down – even with four days a week of work. You can still expect two articles per week while I figure out how to be an employee again (at least through the end of March).
I’m committed to completing the Scott On Fire Philosophy series before the end of the year. So I want to keep the same pace as I build out the content on my blog.
The result should be a comprehensive breakdown of my personal philosophy and why I make the decisions that I do. And I’m sure my newfound employment won’t impact that.
I very much hope that you enjoyed this piece. If you’d like to read more, check out previous posts on the blog, and follow me on X @ScottOnFire.