Starting up

I was in line at Starbucks yesterday, and the lone honey-glazed doughnut in the display shelf was jeering me. I hate it. Somehow, it knew I was on my no-to-evil-carbs diet again, and was laughing it's hole out at my helplessness.

Then this cute girl went in line behind me. I smile at her, made small talk, then offered to buy her a honey-glazed doughnut, which I did. Sayonara, honey-glazed douche-bag!

*****

I love my job. Wait, that should actually read: 'I love that I have a job'. Recent events have revealed to me the reality that jobs aren't as secure as people think they are. A buddy of mine got terminated, my brother-in-law deemed redundant, and my sister is getting into all sorts of trouble at the office because of her blog.

Don't get me wrong, I've always appreciated my job. The 8 years I've spent there since graduating from college is a testament that I enjoy what I do. However, it's so easy to forget that in the end, it's a business. These companies are there to earn money for the shareholders, not really to ensure that employees are all happy and looked out for. Only a fool would think that they're untouchable, no matter how high you get up the ladder, there's always the risk of falling off it.

In large part, this is the reason that I'm planning my grand 'exit strategy'. I'm currently at the first step, which is to be financially secure and not having to rely on my paycheck. I suspect that it gets easier after that, working with a passion instead of working because you have to make that payment on the mortgage. The next step is to plan investments, which in my case would be to start up a business of some sort. Ultimately of course, the goal is not having to work at all.

However, if there's one thing I've learned from my current 'mentor', it's that one never really stops working. To stop working means to be dead. He's probably right, he's 73 years old, and he's still as zealous in the business as when he started it more than 3 decades ago. The only reason that he's in his self-declared semi-retirement, he says, is to ensure that someone is gonna take over the reins of the business when he 'stops working'.

*****

A friend and I were downing some beers and we got to talking about our career choices. Why did we end up working where we did in the first place? When we look at where we are now, and think of the other people who followed the money and are now basking in it, he couldn't help but think that maybe he made the wrong choice.

The real goal, he says, is to create his own business. To do that, he first needs capital, which apparently, the people who followed the money have easily accumulated. If he were in their shoes, he'd be halfway towards his goal already, he comments.

I'm not sure I share his sentiment, I say. But then again, maybe it's just because were two different people in two different fields. In my case, I need this job to be able to prepare myself for eventually managing my own business. Over the years, I've learned a ton of stuff that I wouldn't have realized had I worked in a cubicle all day and stared at a computer. Sure, there's still a lot to learn, but there's really no easy way to prepare oneself for that anyway. As for capital, well, I'm almost certain that the problem will always be that you don't have enough, so why bother worrying about it?

*****

My 'mentor' once told me, the biggest hurdle in starting anything is that mental one, the feeling that you can't do it. There will always be a reason, in the case of starting a business, it's almost always capital. What many fail to realize is that the main goal of any business is to increase the value of whatever resources you have, meaning that it doesn't matter if you start with a peso or 10 million pesos. As long as you are able to increase the value of what you started out with, then you're in business. The only real challenge is, starting it.

Taking on this challenge in my job's context, I've recently signed a contract to lease an office down south. I haven't really figured out how I'm gonna make it work, but since it's there already, I've kinda forced myself that it's gotta. The official plan is that it's gonna be an extension of our office, and that were gonna get clients from the many industries that are starting up in the region. However, I've a feeling that this isn't really such a sound idea.

Nevertheless, I've committed to starting it. No business plans, no clients, no staff. Just the gut feeling that there's gotta be something that we could do there to make money. Ballsy, I know, and the repercussions? Well, one could say that whatever the outcome of this venture has a very direct reflection on my employment. In any case, I consider this a valuable opportunity to learn something, anything. Let's just hope my mentor was right.