On the scarcity of jobs!

(the picture is a portrait of my mom drawn by @larryinkportraits)

Jobs are not scarce. They are actually plenty of jobs available. This is because there are so many problems to solve and opportunities to exploit. The challenge is that many jobs don’t pay anything at all. The trick lies in finding a job that doesn’t pay anything and doing it so well. Eventually, someone will see what you’re doing and offer to pay you for your services.

The problem is in looking for only jobs which pay decently. These jobs are few and far between. It’s the jobs that don’t pay at all where the most opportunity lies.

Case study 1: I run The Money Engineer blog which hardly pays me anything. This job is a labor of love that combines my experience and my unique viewpoints on personal finances and investments. I have been able to express my knowledge and competence and some people have actually paid me to provide financial advisory services. No one hired me to do this job. I don’t have an appointment letter or job description. I have no office. I simply saw a need and used my knowledge and skills to do something about it!

Case study 2: My younger brother is a talented artist and Software Engineer. I encouraged him to seriously monetize his artistic endeavors. He started by doing simple animations and graphics for The Money Engineer platform. He then did several free portraits (like the image here of my mom) and posted them on Facebook. I didn’t pay him anything for this work. Eventually, people reached out and he is now doing paid work. You can check out some of his work here Larryinkportraits

So the opportunities are all around us. It’s not that jobs are scarce. It’s that we are not properly deploying our unique talents, skills, and experiences to solve the problems or exploit the opportunities available.