Having your own Side Income Earner can massively boost your CV and give you the job you want.
There’s a lot of research which shows that taking on a side income hustle is for many people strictly a means to make more money. If they were paid more in their main employment then they wouldn’t be taking on the hustle.
While that’s completely understandable, in many cases it ignores many of the potentially significant intangible benefits of the hustle.
The truth is that a Side Income Earner can be a game changer on your CV making you more attractive to employers.
It demonstrates wider experience
Whatever skills your ‘normal’ employment history demonstrates will only ever be the sum of the parts of the jobs you have been involved in.
Having a side income line of work allows you to promote wider experiences you have gained. If the experiences you have gained from that hustle relate to the requirements of job you are now applying for then this is a positive bonus.
More than that, those experiences allow you to demonstrate that you have actually done things, which may give more confidence to a potential employer than somebody who can say they have studied but never applied those skills.
A wider understanding than your specific work field
There is a theory called “The Peter Principle”, that organisations promote people to their level of incompetence. Businesses are always looking for talent which has a greater capacity and understanding beyond the level they are currently operating at.
A side income earner gives you the real opportunity to explain how you have a wider view of business, leadership and delivering results. You are in effect managing a project with all that entails.
Knowing that you have done this can take away your employer’s concern that you are unsuited to the next promotion level. It may actually give them the belief that you will bring in additional skills and a refreshing direction.
Lets you demonstrate that you have senior leadership skills
Think about it. If you have only ever worked in accounts your business will know that you understand numbers but not necessarily know that you have an ability to bring multi skilled teams together.
Your side income may allow you to show how you have brought production, marketing and accounts together. Successful senior leaders are those who can inspire others, bring disparate teams together, deliver results and calm stakeholders. With a successful side income you have a good story to tell which dircetly relates to these skills.
It will make you stand out
About 30% of Brits work an additional 10 hours a week on a side hustle. The figure is slightly higher in the USA.
The point is that more people don’t attempt a side hustle. You on the other hand have actually gone and done something.
Your side hustle will give you the opportunity to tell a different story, something that will help you to stand out.
It will show you can manage your time
Busy people recognise the ability, or lack thereof, within others to manage their time.
Why is it that some people seem to be able to do more than others when we all have exactly the same 168 hours in any week?
Running your own side income hustle will demonstrate that you can manage your time, prioritise and, as critically, have the energy and drive to do it.
Ability to manage risk
In so many jobs the need to manage organisational risk rests with senior leaders. For the vast majority of people there is always someone else above them who can bail them out and take responsibility.
Not so in your side income earner. You may very well be investing your own money, literally risking your own home.
This gives you the ability to relate to the scale of risks your primary employer may be facing. It is likely to mean that you will have a diligence about supervising those risks and the stewardship of company resources.
It will help highlight your personality
There is a saying that people employ people. Once they have worked out whether they think you can do the job, they are looking at you as a person. Are you someone they can work with?
Personal projects act as a window to your personality and who you are outside of work. They can demonstrate what you care about, and how motivated and tenacious you are.
Your side income earner allows you to tell the story of what you have done, but most critically, why you did and how. You can explain why you have chosen to give up otherwise free time and committed it towards this endeavour and what it has given you, and potentially others.
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