Wednesday 29 December 2010

Ten Reasons You Should Never Get a Job

Even in our modern high technology world, there are still lots of things that need to be done.  Work needs to be done, and somebody has to do it.  The trouble is, most of us would prefer it if somebody else did the work so we can get on with what we really want to do.  This has been a big theme in history, though surprisingly not one that people talk about a lot.

The most notable example of people taking extreme measures to avoid working was the Spartans.  The Spartans were a tiny minority in the country they lived in.  The majority were Helots who were the descendants of a people the Spartans had conquered and subsequently made to do all the work.  The Spartans concentrated on their primary goals in which military supremacy and combing their hair figured highly. 

Although the Spartans took the idea of forcing people to do their stuff for them to an extreme, other cultures came up with similar schemes.  The Roman Empire was built on slavery.  It has been suggested that the growth of the empire was primarily motivated by the desire to acquire slaves.  We don't like to think about it too much but the modern world in which we live in has a large component of it that was built on slavery.  In the US it was explicitly a major issue in the politics of the nineteenth century, but both France and Britain relied heavily on the output of more distant slave labour to develop their economies over the same time period.

But morals develop as well, and we no longer consider it acceptable to simply force fellow human beings to work.  So now if something needs to be done we pay people to do it.  Jobs have taken over from slavery as the primary means by which necessary work gets done.  Its a big step forward from slavery. 

But as most of us who have one know, jobs aren't really all that fulfilling on the whole.  Despite a lot of waffle from Human Resources departments, the plain fact is that we are there being paid to do something because we wouldn't do it if we weren't.  Most of us realise this even if we don't always like to admit it to ourselves or others.  But our actions speak volumes.  Not many of us arrive at work hours before we are contracted to, and most of us get out as soon as we can at the end of the shift.

Steve comes along and blows the whole gaff.  Having a job is for mugs.  If we have a job then we must be creating enough profit to pay our wages and give the company a good return, so we must be getting paid less than our true value.  How generous we must by, Steve sneers.  And how do we have to behave at work?  Just like servants in effect.  And we have to put up with the company of hopeless cowards and wretches.  And it isn't even safe.  The boss can switch off your income stream at any point leaving you potentially destitute.

It is great knockabout stuff and written with verve and passion.  And you have to admit, he does make some pretty good points.  This is one of Steve's most acerbic posts.  He lays into the employed stripping them of any defences and leaving them robbed of any dignity and self respect.

It is a great read and very thought provoking.  A couple of his points are simply unanswerable.  Having a job does leave you open to the risk of losing your income if you get fired.  Anyone who wants to remain employed needs to bear in mind that there really is no such thing as a safe job and to keep their future employability in mind.  I loved the bit where he pointed out that a great deal of moans about ones place of work aren't expressed with any expectation or even hope that the problem will ever be solved.  I couldn't help but see myself in that one.


What is the solution?  Rather than think about selling your time by the hour, you should concentrate on creating value that can be turned into an income stream.  The example he gives is his own blog, which generates impressive monthly revenues.  As he points out, it is successful not because of the amount of time it takes him to write it but because of the value it offers to its visitors.  All we need to do is to come up with our own unique bit of value, work out how to turn it into money and we are good to go.  No ideas?  Look in a bookshop.  There are plenty out there that can be adapted. 

It all sounds great.  So why are we not all leaving our jobs in droves and joining Steve enjoying ourselves creating value?  Much as I love this article there are sadly some flaws in the case it makes.  I think Steve is well aware of them as well, but lets spell them out.

First off, having a job is a good deal for plenty of people.  Letting someone else have the responsibility of working out what needs to be done frees up plenty of people to concentrate on what they do best. And there are some things that really need people to have jobs to get done.  Long distance travel, late night shopping, policemen.  You can come up with your own list.

The post works because there is a lot of truth in the caricature, but caricature it is.  Some employers are pantomime villains, but most aren't.  They do generally look after their employees, or at least aren't deliberately trying to turn them into zombies.  And there are lots of things you might want to do in your life that would never form the basis of an income stream.  Getting a job and doing them in your spare time might be the only way you can achieve your goal.  And to be frank, some of us are happiest just following the well worn path.  A job does put food on the table, and that may be all you need to do.

But that doesn't detract from the value.  It is good to think things through from time to time.  Maybe the job option isn't the best for you.  And it is surprising how value can be turned into cash with some imagination.  A good example is a guy called Mike Duncan who for the last couple of years has been doing a weekly podcast on the History of Rome.  I highly recommend it.  You can find it on iTunes and subscribe to it for free.  He does promote Audible on it, but I suspect that this does not net him much.

But he has come up with a great way to turn his loyal followers into a source of income.  This coming  summer he has organised a cruise around the Mediterranean visiting sites of significance in Roman history.   I haven't troubled to do the maths, but I imagine he will be coming out of it in pocket.  And he gets a free holiday doing what he loves.  The limited number of places went very quickly so I imagine he can do the same again.

So my advice is don't give your job up on a whim.   But don't assume that you have to have one either.

You can find Steve's original article here.


http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2006/07/10-reasons-you-should-never-get-a-job/

Wednesday 22 December 2010

Abundance - Steve Pavlina and Marcus Aurelius

In 1814 Napoleon was in trouble.  He had been defeated in Russia in 1812 and was now facing the invasion of France itself by the allies.  He was forced to abdicate.  Was this because he had lost his spirit?  Hardly.  He was still the driven military genius he had always been.  He still had the command of large numbers of troops and was not short of equipment or ammunition.  And thanks to the Louisiana Purchase, he had plenty of money.  Everyone should have a large chunk of a continent to sell if you are a bit short of cash.  But there was one thing he was short of that nothing could replace quickly enough.

Sunday 19 December 2010

Releasing Copyright

A lot of people have written a lot of stuff about making money from intellectual property in general, and intellectual property on the internet in particular.  The intellectual property that attracts most attention is writing.  There is no doubt that the idea of making a living from writing is one that appeals to a lot of people.  After all we can all write.  And most of us find our own writing particularly compelling.  It does after all resonate very strongly with what we believe and hold dear.   And the idea of turning this stuff into an income stream is, well, how cool is that?

Some people take that idea one step further.  Dr Johnson famously said that nobody but a fool ever wrote anything except for money.  The idea that writing is purely a task one carries out for its monetary rewards is one end of the scale.  I suppose T.S.Eliot who wrote for no other reason than the beauty of his poetry and made a living from publishing other people's writing while living off a tidy sum made from banking would be the other.

Steve doesn't seem to fit into this scale at all conveniently.   His writing obviously comes from his heart and is not particularly designed to court popularity.  On the other hand he is quite aware of its commercial potential and openly makes clear that he expects to generate cash from what he writes.  And he has published a book following the absolutely standard publishing business model.  And now he has done something that is highly unconventional.  He has released a body of work that has a wide audience into the public domain for free.   What is he doing? 

I think the answer is that he doesn't know himself.  Will the extra interest generated by allowing people to use his stuff freely translate into extra book sales?  That seems like a good bet.  Will he achieve a higher profile and therefore be able to command higher speaking fees?  Again this is quite likely.  Will it lead to something that nobody could have predicted?  We can't know that (by definition) but I have a feeling that this is the outcome that is the real motivation behind the move.

Manifesto for this Blog

This blog is my personal commentary on the work of Steve Pavlina and what it means to me.  I have a very different perspective on life to Steve and I think it is fair to say that I disagree with him most of the time about most issues he writes about.  I won't go into the details here, because that will become apparent when I write about specific topics and posts.

But this isn't a critical blog in any way.   It's main intention is to help me work out what Steve is talking about and how I can put the good bits to use.  But it might also be helpful for people who find the less rational side of Steve and the jargon he has created off putting.  Even if you are like me a hard headed rationalist I think there is a lot of value in what Steve Pavlina writes.  It is also fun to look at what he comes up with and trace it back to its origins in other people's work.  


I have been thinking about doing this for some time but was spurred on to do it by Steve's recent release of all the copyrights on his online output.   That is a pretty interesting move and it will be interesting to see how it turns out.  I have a feeling it will help make Steve even more successful than he already is.  That will certainly be something I am going to keep an eye on.  In any case, in the same spirit I am only too happy to allow anyone who feels inclined to use anything they find on this blog for any purpose that takes their fancy as well.   This is not anywhere near as generous a gesture as Steve's because I don't intend to do more than a couple of hours work a week on it.  At the moment there is one and only one article available.  But I hope I will be able to produce some interesting angles that will appeal to somebody somewhere.