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Bongiwe Nkomazana

As your own boss, you need not worry about being discriminated against because of who you are outside your job. The frustration of gender issues just does not exist. There is no harassment, no climbing of a slimy corporate ladder because you are at the top of it — basically no gender issues. So that is another reason why we should be our own managing directors; to eliminate the pay and opportunity gap that we face under formal employment before our spirits are killed and we are left with no ambition

Women have been self-employed for years and a housewife is not just that anymore. Today, women do not just sit at home but they always find ways to bring in a supporting income.

The phenomenon has grown over the years with more women opting to run their own businesses versus being employed. If you are a woman wondering whether to leave the corporate world and create an enterprise of your own then this article serves to nudge you towards taking the leap to self-employment.

If you have a job be grateful for it and do it diligently but do you realise how being employed just means someone is telling you what to do to make them richer from a certain time to a certain time and this period is just, say, most of the day?

Think about it. I know a job is a safe haven with medical aid, paid vacation and a pension but think about how you suppress everything else that you have wanted to do like travel or get a second degree or just go to your child’s play simply because you have a boss to whom you are accountable to.

Go to your Instagram and look at that person who posts pictures of their globetrotting adventures. It is either they get really good vacation days or they are an employer themselves.

Having no time sheet that accounts for the time spent under an employer’s watch means you can manage your own hours, days, months — freely. The flexibility is amazing.

You set your own schedule and set your own working conditions. So if you have to jet off to the next city for a church conference or you want to see your child off to university, you can. The best part of being self-employed is that you do not have to explain yourself to anybody but yourself.

It allows you to make money while you focus on the other things that matter to you which is what life is all about. I know a lot of women who retire and realise that they have not really lived life.

They have missed milestones in their children’s lives and did not pay attention to what was really happening around them because they had to keep their salaries by devoting themselves to a job. Now all they have is a meagre pension, a ticking clock and back pains.

One of the biggest reasons women should jump onto the self-employment wagon is the opportunity to make more money than at fixed job. I know all women are all about their money and are constantly trying to come up with ways of making more of it as costs of living continue to rise.

Money makes the world and women go round. It is a driving force behind more and more women leaving formal structures for entrepreneurship. To be an employee is to sign a contract that basically stops you from working for or on any other project because there would be conflict of interests.

As your own boss, however, you enjoy the luxury of variety. Not only are you not working with the same people for years at a time but you also get to enjoy working in different environments and on different ideas.

As a result, it is 100 percent legal to work with different partners for your business and get simultaneous incomes. Your earnings are limitless when you work for yourself. Whether or not you double your last month’s income is mostly dependent on you and how much effort you are putting into your venture.

With traditional employment, whether you perform at your best and inject exceptional ideas to the company or not, your salary remains the same, you are lucky if you smell a bonus and some job positions have a salary cap anyway.

The truth is an employer can and will value you but only until they do not need you. With formal employment, we are all dispensable and there is always another candidate ready to take up your post. Conversely, nobody understands and values your skills and vision more than you do so why not hire yourself?

Fair and fine, today more than ever, efforts towards women inclusion are evident and most appreciated. However, there are still factors at an 8AM to 5PM job that work better for men than women like dedicating your life to a job in order to climb up the corporate ladder.

I watched a movie titled The single moms club the past weekend. One of the characters was a woman who had worked hard at a publishing house for 17 years and when she finally had a child she stopped working long overtime hours because she was now a mother.

Her young male protégé got a promotion that she was eyeing just based on the fact that he was unmarried with no kids.

The moral of the story was that as women, we are often overlooked for better positions because of our other responsibilities yet the evolution of a woman encompasses changed priorities.

As your own boss, you need not worry about being discriminated against because of who you are outside your job. The frustration of gender issues just does not exist. There is no harassment, no climbing of a slimy corporate ladder because you are at the top of it — basically no gender issues. So that is another reason why we should be our own managing directors; to eliminate the pay and opportunity gap that we face under formal employment before our spirits are killed and we are left with no ambition.

The best part of being self-employed is that if you play your cards right and your business booms you get to hire people to do the work for you. The belief of having to sweat for a good life is not always the case.

Definitely a lot of work and effort goes into every success story but the more you read on the wealthy the more you realise that they did not necessarily work harder than everybody else but they sure did work smarter.

We are the weaker specie but I strongly believe we are the smarter and more resourceful specie. As the chief executive officer of your own organisation you would only have to work your mind off and have other people, who have not got this epiphany of “self-employed boss lady” to do the hard labour. Now what is left to do is to do your research to find out how you can grow your idea and all the other resources you would need to make your concept a success.
Do it.