During the last couple of lockdown months, I’ve been on more webinars and Zoom meetings than ever before in my life. Will this be the new trend for the future?
Working from home
I recently read an article in Die Burger that asked the question if working from home is here to stay. According to the article only about 10% of people worked from home before the lockdown, but during lockdown it jumped to as high as 75% for many companies.
According to the article,
this trend is not easily going to reverse when the lockdown is ended.
Even before the lockdown, it was a growing trend for employees to work from home more frequently. This seem to be a long-term shift in work trends that will last longer than the pandemic, as it has many benefits in terms of staff flexibility, improved efficiency and lower property costs.
Students not on campus
Also universities moved as many of their lectures as possible to online learning. Universities will only allow one third of their students back on campus for the rest of the year, while the majority will keep on studying online.
So, what will be the consequences of all these? With students not returning, they cancel their rental agreements for the rest of this year. This is a huge blow to the landlords in towns where universities are situated. The same holds true for rented office space.
Far reaching consequences
This in turn leads to fewer people driving to work which have spin-offs like less fuel and vehicle maintenance impacting the whole vehicle and transport industry; and this is just one facet of the economy. What about the tourism and hospitality industry as well as many others.
What are we to do in a situation where we have such a carnage of jobs?
# Can’t find a job
Because there are now far less job opportunities and thousands, perhaps millions, more looking for jobs,
finding a job has just become much harder than ever before.
Mind shift
Years ago during my years as an Entrepreneurship and Business Management teacher and lecturer, I realized that one of the most difficult paradigm shifts for people to make, is to change their minds from “where can I find a job?” to
“what can I do for myself?”
Once you can get a person to start thinking along the lines of not working for someone else, but for oneself, half the battle is won. The next step is to decide what kind of product or service you can produce and sell.
Learn to sell
Many people say that you cannot start a business unless you have ample money to do so, but that is not true. Many business owners started working for themselves by working as salespeople.
When you look for a job, the most important thing you do is to sell your labour to an employer who is willing to pay you for it. If you are a salesperson the only difference is that you now need to sell to many people to earn an income. That is the basic premise of any business.
Opportunities await
If you can identify a need that you can supply, you can make a business of it and if you buy a product which you think you can improve on the quality, you can probably make a business of it.
We need to change our thinking and look for opportunities where business is still allowed and pursue them. If you think you are beaten you are; think that you can, and you will; it’s all in the state of the mind.
Do you feel like a square peg in a round hole in your job or business and you don’t know why? If that is you, a Career Direct Assessment (available online) will help you understand. It will not only show who you are, but will also point you in the right direction.
