4 Alternatives To Entrepreneurship In the Age Of COVID-19

“Don’t give up your day job”. Six little words that make you die a little inside. After all, your day job has placed a serious bottleneck on your income, your prospects, your job satisfaction and your mental wellbeing for far too long. For years you’ve dreamed of escaping the daily grind and going into business for yourself. Then COVID-19 happened. Suddenly businesses of all shapes and sizes seemed a lot more fragile. Many had to make huge operational changes to their business models just to keep going. Others suddenly found themselves almost irrelevant practically overnight. Even those lucky enough to stay afloat have had to fight to keep costs manageable and motivate their employees. Tragically, many have had to close their doors permanently. It’s made you think twice about leaving the relative safety of your current job to start a new life as an entrepreneur.

But does this mean that you’re forever condemned to ensure the frustrations and anxieties that go and in hand with your day job? Not at all! Here, we’ll look at some alternatives that provide you more autonomy, freedom and earning potential than you’re currently getting at work, yet with fewer risks than you might expect from becoming an entrepreneur…

Buy a franchise

One of the biggest challenges when starting a new business is that of establishing your brand. Engaging new clientele can be difficult. Especially with so many established brands operating in the same space as you. Every penny counts a whole lot more than it did in January at a time when consumer confidence is at its lowest in years. Fortunately, there is a way in which you can start a business and get all that heavy lifting done for you.

Head on over to Franchise Direct and see what franchises are available to buy in your area. Buying a franchise not only gives you the benefit of an established and well known brand, you also get a level of support and training that you simply can’t get when starting from scratch.

Invest in someone else’s startup

Another alternative to starting your own business is to invest in someone else’s. If there’s an ambitious new startup in your area, they may be amenable to taking on a partner in return for an investment / stake. This may be just a silent partnership (where you invest but have no say in the day to day operations of the business) or they may be willing to let you take a more active role in business operations. 

Either way, the cost of investment is usually a fraction of the cost of starting your own business from scratch. Not to mention assuming much less of the risk.

Take a look at intrapreneurship

Finally, what if you could enjoy the freedom and autonomy of an entrepreneur, but still enjoy a steady salary? That’s the life of an intrapreneur- an entrepreneur embedded within someone else’s organisation. These skilled professionals are valued for their outside the box thinking, and are often brought on to help develop innovative new products or revivify companies’ branding. 

As we can see, there are a number of alternatives to entrepreneurship that could prove much more appropriate in a climate where we’re all keen to avoid as much risk as possible.