New paradigm of working?

Earlier this week I finished up with the job I’ve been doing for the past 19 months.

I’ll spend the next few weeks/ months doing not too much on the work front and soon start thinking more consciously about “what’s next”.

In the brief conversations I’ve had so far, I’ve realised I need to update my paradigm of “how work works”.

Minimise time, not maximise income

The thought process I’m exploring is that I’ll optimise for time rather than income.

Since I can remember, my paradigm for how work works are that there are 40-50 hours/ week to maximise the benefits (income, purpose etc) one can get.

Now that I’ve developed skills to personally be the one to generate revenue (my job was in sales) I’m looking at how to modify the equation, whereby rather than convince an employer to pay me money, I just go out and ask the world directly.

In theory, I’d set a fixed level of income to earn each month, and then optimise to reduce the costs (time), etc.

Practically this could be servicing some clients to generate £4k/ month that requires 5-20 hours/ week of my time.

A “company”, rather than freelancing

As it seems to have more flexibility and upside potential I’m looking to take the route of building a business where I work with others, rather than take the route of becoming a highly skilled freelancer.

Whilst the former can (ideally) be made to reduce involvement overtime/ do more things, the latter has a much tighter correlation of putting in hours to earn money and seems at least a derivative of the current paradigm. 

Freelancers I know have really enjoyed the diversity of work/ projects, and flexibility that comes with the lifestyle, but still feel they’re working from an equation of needing to put in X hours to achieve Y outcome.

Is there a blueprint on this?

As the idea of decoupling income generation from a regular paycheck requires a real shift in thinking (for me at least) I’m really interested to read up more on the subject.

I’m aware of a few books about setting up lifestyle businesses (e.g. Four Hour Work Week) and also those on working in remote teams (e.g. the Basecamp book). 

What would be great to read up on more is how people run businesses that don’t require 40-50 hours/ week, and ideally through hiring others who don’t either. In looking to work with others, it would be good to share a common world view on this topic.

I’m hopeful that such material exists, however, thus far have been able to filter out through the noise for something hitting the spot.

If any of the above sparks thoughts/ ideas on good video/ podcast/ reading material, then I’d appreciate anything you could send over!

Once I’ve done some proper research/ thinking on the matter, I’ll share the results.

In other news…

Moving right away from the work stuff, I’m now in Nice, in the south of France (“nice”, I know).

I’ll be here for the long weekend before a few days back in London and then another European weekend away…