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Few will deny that the little, almost invisible mass of chemicals that travelled from Wuhan to the rest of the world in December, 2020 has done to us what nothing else could. It has toppled the world’s apple cart in every which manner – the way we work, live, move, eat, enjoy and sleep. There may not be any aspect of life hitherto untouched by the virus.

Our entire way of interacting with the world around us, people included, has changed substantially and some would say, even, irreversibly. Any which way you look at it, it’s going to take really long for us to expect any re-run of the pre-Corona life. We have seen (or rather, have been forced to) a drastic change in  our priorities as human beings and consumers. The stuff that looked indispensable yesterday – exhibitions, trips to the malls, multiplex movies, conferences, pubs, discos, gyms – looks no more “essential” in a world of social distancing. At a very basic level, these drastic changes not only expose the hollowness of human perception vis a vis day to day life, it also proves that humans are the real beasts – they can change, adapt and mould themselves endlessly in myriad ways, should the occasion arise. 

More importantly, COVID-19 is only symptomatic of even more planetary crises coming up. It only reflects a broader trend of more such planetary crises like climate change coming. Trying to navigate each new crisis using the same economic model which brought us here, will bring future shocks beyond the capacity of governments, institutions and crisis managers to handle. Indeed, the epidemic has tested and tragically exposed the woefully limited capacities of governments in making effective intervention to help save and run people’s lives. Many experts opine that human future will be defined not by a single emergency but by many of them; separate yet related ones coming from our failure to live a sustainable life. By over-milking the Earth’s resources faster than they can be restored, and by spoiling it faster than we can clean it up, we have long been readying ourselves for a disaster of this kind.

All sensible governments that have successfully contained epidemics swear by the mantra “Follow the science and prepare for the future.” But rather than simply reacting to disasters, we can actually use science to design economies that can help us mitigate the dangers of climate change, loss of biodiversity and pandemics. For that to happen, we need to invest in what really matters to lay the foundation for a green, circular economy rooted in natural solutions and designed for public good.

As we said earlier, the COVID-19 crisis has taught us that it’s possible to make transformational changes overnight. Suddenly, we have a different world with a different economy. While all governments are rushing to protect their citizens medically and economically, there is also a strong case for using this crisis to herald systemic global changes.

From here on, each business will take its own path, with some of reducing or retiring some specific activities. In contrast, others could re-scale themselves or could return to their pre-pandemic baselines.

Rebuild, Re-launch, Reignite

As a businessman, if you’re waiting for things to return to normal, you’re waiting to shut your business. You have to reset your business for the new reality, which means you need to understand the new problems your pre-corona customers now face, and rebuild your business to service them. To rebuild, re-launch, reignite our business, we need to thoroughly analyze the whats and whys of this phenomenon.  These strategies can be categorized into

1.     Red

To be used during a lockdown. They are all about resetting your business. For example, businesses in computing found there are not enough laptops in South Africa to meet the demand for remote working. So they can explore the possibility of bringing them in as new essential resources.

1.     Amber

The 3 to 6 months post-lockdown. In this period, you need to turn the learning into a rebuilt business.

For instance, an automobile dealer and a rubber maker can think of digitizing the outbound sales work to ensure a contactless transaction.

1.     Green

Once you understand what clicks, it’s time to reignite growth.

For example, a restaurateur can think of designing physical distancing solutions to be implemented.

In the entire process, being positive is crucial. Keeping up the right mindset, regardless of your circumstances, will give positive outcomes.

C for Crisis, C for Change

The point is hardly about escaping such crises- many of them are inevitable and beyond human control. Instead, we need to talk about using a crisis to reset a business to become relevant, rebuild and reignite it to accelerate growth by harnessing the change and the opportunities it brings in its wake.

Humans are, by nature, resilient. If we learn from our failures, we can build a future better than the one in store for us. We can embrace this tumultuous moment as an opportunity to invest in resilience, shared prosperity, well-being, and health.

Rebuild, Re-launch, Reignite -Simplified

A crisis means distress, dilemmas and devastation but it also means an opportunity to re-examine the way we have been running our lives thus far and to make a change, if required. And for a business owner, every change can actually translate into opportunity, if handled well. Well, we all know someone personally, who had to shut his shop, restaurant or factory thanks to COVID- 19. It may sound brutal to say that there’s nothing new about a crisis wiping out a business but it’s a hard reality. The pandemic has been more akin to the loss of a prominent client, a war breaking out or one’s product losing market relevance.

In a crisis, we always have two options – step forward and take it by the horns to pioneer the inescapable change it brings or retreat into safety, waiting for its impact to unfold on you. In the next few paragraphs, we’ll talk about some practical, actionable insights and tactics to help you tackle any such business crisis.

1. When you would like to reopen a business lying temporarily closed for any reason, you need to do a bit of careful planning. Now if you had to shut your business as it had failed, it’s always advisable to look at not repeating the mistakes, which had led to its closure in the first place.

The business could have faced a closure owing to multiple causes e.g. a badly designed product, poor pricing strategies, faulty business location, poor customer service etc. etc. Now is the time to bring your entire business under the microscope and look for possible reasons why it had to shut down.

Stage 1: Identifying the business model

We can begin by identifying the core customer base essential to our business and then expand it to value propositions, capabilities and financial models. As a case in point, think of

1. Customers

Who are our key customers and what are their major demographic characteristics e.g. age, disposable incomes, aspirations, lifestyle etc.? Obviously, if you are aiming to launch a new car in the market for a certain age group, it would be of immense help to know the kind of customers you are targeting. Designing a car for successful top executives is going to be a task entirely different from conceptualizing a car for a first-time, young car driver.

2. Value

What can we offer them in fulfillment of their major needs? Alternatively, what are the benefits our product/ service offering them? Taking the car example further, do we plan to focus on the safety element (you do when are selling family cars) or the thrill factor (young drivers value it) or the fuel economy angle?

3. Competencies

Ensuring that we have an ecosystem sufficiently competent to deliver the value proposition can be of utmost importance. Launching a smartphone that drains out in hours in an area where power supply is a constant problem can be a poor value idea. Similarly, thinking of launching an electric vehicle in an area where there are no charging stations available, can be a non-starter.  

4. Financial Models

What are the kinds of revenue models we use for our core customers? 

5. Re-entry

Re-entering the market with a redone business plan to address the problems previously encountered and how we will overcome them. Did we learn anything from our mistakes?

The process of a restart can be dicey and expensive, too. Many of our customers may have moved on, our vendors may refuse to offer credit facilities, and our bankers may not be as helpful this time if the first business had failed. We need to reignite our network and rebuild our relationship with the business fraternity.

Consider the alternative scene: Suppose your business was doing great before. In this case, too, you just can’t simply jump into it. In the meantime it was closed, your customers may have found another product/ service supplier. Now how you approach this restart will depend on how for long your business was shut and how your market has evolved. For instance, if your re-launch is happening after a short break and you had told your customers of your return, you might hope to resume your business rather fast. But to be on the safer side, if it was closed for more than a few months, it’s better to think of your business as a startup.

The 4 Old Ps

Every business’s four P’s are paramount i.e. Product, Price, Promotion, and Placement. We need to tabulate how our competitors are handling each of them and where we would like to see ourselves in the market. And in the process, we may have to make substantial changes in the original business plan to compete well in the market. After all, a market is an extremely dynamic place and we need to know many things e.g. Do sufficient numbers of consumers exist now for our products? How do we plan to reach them? Informing former customers about our return to business through e-mails, Casebook posts, WhatsApp messages etc is a given.

In nutshell, the most important thing to do while restarting a closed business is looking at the entire operation with a fresh viewpoint. Of course, the fact that many businessmen faced  multiple failures and closures before finding success, will help you firm up your steps.

The Pandemic Response

Experts see the pandemic response in three phases, with their duration varying by country, industry and business or even product and service. These phases are defined mainly by what happens at each stage:

Response in the Short Run

Immediate activities centered on ensuring people’s safety and continuation of essential business functions. The period is marked by tremendous efforts and chaotic activity. Some of the relevant activities can be:

1. Temporary solutions to stop financial bleeding
2. Recovery from the shock
3. Organized efforts to stabilize operations.

Response in the Medium Run

Some relevant activities here can be:

1. Create a plan to restore a scalable state.
2. Pinpoint the capabilities you may want to consolidate i.e. re-opening, re-hiring, re-budgeting

Renewal Post the Pandemic

1. Long period marked by strategic, durable execution in the organization.

Some relevant activities can be:

1. Learning to conduct processes in new, scalable ways.
2. Using the lessons learnt and emerging patterns from prior phases to gather around a new foundation to move forward.

Until the entire global population is fully vaccinated, any rebound in business could be followed by another round of response, recover and renew. Hence, the imperative need to absorb lessons learnt quickly to build sustainable changes in business models.

But before it happens, we need to find out exactly where and how the crisis began and broke our existing business models and where the consequent risks and opportunities lie.

Though the Indian middle class has typically been averse to the idea of entrepreneurship, things took a turn in the 90s in the wake of big bang economic reforms. The reforms helped unleash the hitherto hidden entrepreneurial spark among sizeable sections of people. The trend became more common especially after the start-up boom thanks to the IT revolution, which has opened the floodgates of many new businesses, which were unheard of before. Today, we have freshly-minted tech graduates opting out of college placements in favour of doing their own thing. Though many such new generation ventures like Oyo, Zomato, Flipkart, Makemytrip and Lenskart have gone on to become raging successes, a significant number among them have fallen by the wayside. Do you know that in the later 90s in India, there was one baazi.com, a gaming website or one letsbuyelectronics.com? They simply sank or had to be rescued by others.

As per a Harvard Business Review study, 60% of all new businesses fail within the first three years of being set up. The reasons are not difficult to understand.  Businesses across the entire world are getting more and more intricate, thanks to a changing business environment, invasion of technology, globalization and changing consumer mindsets. The business environment today is far more complex, the technology far more pervasive and the consumers fickle and more demanding. Accordingly, corporate counselling has to address more and more the question of entrepreneur skill development.

Entrepreneurship is, undoubtedly, a very exciting idea. Of course, having none to report to (though one can never escape that ultimate boss – the consumer, from reporting to), freedom of work, leading a bunch of co-workers and monetary rewards entice many with dreams in their eyes. But it’s easier said than done.

In my corporate counseling, I often get many questions regarding how entrepreneurial dreams can be fulfilled. I often say that being an entrepreneur is quite like getting pregnant – you need a mother-like patience and the ability to brave odds in order to emerge successful.

You need to cultivate several essential skills to improve the chances of your entrepreneurial success. Not only are hard skills i.e. technical and financial skill extremely important, but soft skills like communication and leadership also play a critical role.

Entrepreneurial Skills

They cover a whole range – technical skills, leadership and business management skills and creative thinking. As entrepreneurial skills can be applied to many different roles and industries, developing them can mean cultivating several skill sets.

“Leap and the net will appear”

• John Burroughs

Traditionally, economists used to regard men, money and materials as essential factors of production. But of late, entrepreneurship or risk-taking behaviour is being regarded as the fourth important factor of production. You must be courageous enough to act on your ideas. I remember Jatin Pushkar, a young IT engineer, who had sought advice on entrepreneurship “Mrs. Ritu, after having been in the hot seat for a decade and a half, do you believe I should jump into it without giving too much thought?”

I told him from my experience “See Jatin, researching your ideas extensively before taking a plunge is important but the courage to chart an unknown path and something unfamiliar is also important. So once you are clear about an idea, don’t spend too much time on thinking about it, but clarity is paramount.”

Ambition

Most successful entrepreneurs are blessed with an ambitious nature. They lust for success and enjoy achieving small milestones as the stepping stones to their destination. A highly ambitious person has an internal drive to work hard and is committed to doing whatever is needed to make his idea a success. Such people never seek shortcuts and are ready to go the extra mile to do the right thing.

Learning Mindset

“In today’s world, tomorrow happened yesterday “

Corporate counseling places great stock in the importance of continuous learning. A wannabe entrepreneur must stay connected with the latest – in products, technology, delivery and consumer mindset. Network, read, watch, talk – do anything you can to learn constantly. Such people look for successful people in their field and seek to learn from their experiences and advice. Remember, a constantly flowing river never stinks.

Listening

For effective communication, you must heed others’ ideas, motivations and interests, besides their body language. Being egotistic or vainglorious does no good here. Rather, you must listen to naysayers especially carefully as they are the people who have the courage to pinpoints your faults. I always respect their views and try to show that I pay them attention.  It can promote collaboration and get others excited about your goals.

Creativity

Love to do experiments. While trying to develop the light bulb, facing failure 10000 times didn’t deter Edison, for, in his own words, he learnt the 10000 ways a light bulb didn’t work successfully.  Talk to new people and seek new experiences, which can foster new opportunities hitherto not available to you.

Confidence

Listening is important but you must know when you need to control the conversation and assert yourself.  Learning to say no in certain situations is important. Be consistent so as to earn others’ respect and trust. But you also need to know yourself and stand up for your beliefs, should the need arise.

Perseverance

Despite suffering devastating failures, most successful entrepreneurs look at them as lessons. We, too, have got somewhere because we persisted in what we were doing. I kept up optimism, perseverance and made calculated changes in our efforts. You don’t fail until you stop trying.

Customer Orientation 

David Ogilvy’s famous quote “The consumer is not a moron, she is your wife” needs to be tweaked now to reflect the more demanding contemporary realities.  In a liberalized, hyper-competitive world, the consumer has almost unlimited choice. Therefore, earning a customer and making him a client for life, is the real challenge. In corporate counselling lingo, trying to ensure customer delight is the key. Knowing your customer and developing effective customer service skills can help you serve market needs better.

Organizational Skills

Time management and organizational skills are a must-have for entrepreneurs. Develop the skill sets to break down tasks into manageable to-do lists, fix deadlines and achievable goals for yourself and the team. Besides, technology can stand you in good stead while keeping your business files organized.

Marketing Skills

Implementing successful branding and marketing strategies is a critical to an entrepreneur’s work life. You may think of attending a course on branding and marketing and can also meet other entrepreneurs to get some help.

Business Growth

Everyone loves to grow in life. So do businesses. Business growth implies an expansion of a business in one or more ways. Many metrics can be used to show that a business is growing like revenues, sales, company value, profits, no. of employees, no. of customers etc. But defining business growth can be tricky as businesses can grow in terms of some metrics but not others e.g. revenues may surge without any increase in the no. of customers if the existing ones buy more. Interestingly, it’s possible for one metric to go up and another one to slide e.g. if the sales growth owes itself to a lower price, the revenue could go down.

Importance of Business Growth

Though all companies need to grow, the type of growth sought depends on the stage the business is in. Typically, start-ups need to grow fast to acquire a size large enough to bring in enough revenue to cover costs and make a profit. Contrarily, mature companies don’t need to grow as fast, notwithstanding that they, too, would love to see their metrics in the right direction.  Increased profitability due to lower costs or sales process efficiencies, can help a stable business build liquidity to protect itself against future shocks, despite that the revenue and sales are unchanged.

Major Drivers of Business Growth

Businesses have to be made to grow; they don’t grow on their own. A business looking to grow organically will have to put in place systems to drive growth:

1. People

Having people intent on growing the business is crucial. Of course, a growth-focused promoter has to be the major driving force behind a company’s expansion. But other employees also need to have the motivation and the expertise to push it ahead.

2. Strategy

The best of people without a strategy cannot drive growth. They need to be backed by a carefully crafted strategy to take the business forward. The strategy could be earning new customers, launching new products, entering new markets or improving market share.

3. Processes and Infrastructure

Once a business has the right people and the right strategy, it needs to have processes to facilitate expansion. It may include implementing software to improve process efficiency or upsizing its warehouses to store the stock in view of expansion.

4. Funding

All the above require funding for implementation. If enough money is not available for the hires, the product or the processes, the business will find it hard to grow.

Conflict Resolution

Conflicts are as old the human civilization itself. You’ll find very few offices where all the employees get along with one another and their bosses and vice versa. Therefore, in view of their inevitability in a corporate set-up, resolving them is an imperative the leadership must recognize.

Unresolved conflicts can affect corporate productivity and teamwork. But it requires specific leadership skills, problem-solving abilities and decision-making skills. Recognizing conflicts and a willingness to resolve them compassionately can lead to creative problem solving, team building, and stronger relationships.

Causes of Business Conflicts

Conflicts emanate from differences among people differ in terms of values, motivations, perceptions, ideas, or desires. They might look trivial, but a conflict can trigger really strong feelings, at the root of which lies a deep personal need. Such a need may be for safety, security, respect, value, closeness or intimacy. Differing needs may result in failed deals, lower profits, and lost jobs.

Business Conflict Resolution Techniques

Just Do It

Once you’ve recognized that there is a conflict, try to take it on immediately. Else, it could escalate into a crisis and could imply significant negative consequences. But while quick action is certainly in order, make sure not to jump into it recklessly without careful consideration, as it can have even mote adverse results. Get to the root of the issue, analyze it and then go ahead.

Doing It Together

Being in a leadership position, you’ll have to meet all the parties involved, separately first to discuss the issue. Let everyone get a chance to speak. This way, you’ll get to hear all sides and get a more holistic, fuller understanding of the problem. Subsequently, having a group meeting to thrash it out may expedite its resolution.

Listen

The first and the most important step in resolving a conflict is to just listen to an employee’s problems. Simply listen to all parties concerned to have a complete grasp of the conflict and then look for troubleshooting.

Impartiality

As a leader, you aren’t expected to take sides or express an opinion favoring one person over the other. If you really believe that you find a particular person guilty, access the situation from all angles to find a fair and reasonable solution.

Saying Something Nice  

It may sound clichéd but I can’t help reiterating that encouragement and motivation are really powerful motivational tools. I keep reminding my staff of all the successful projects,  which involved teamwork to complete. Well, that’s one of the most effective conflict resolution techniques and can make your employees think about the importance of team work.

Finding Good in Others

As I said earlier, encouragement multiplies itself many times when it is given to recognize your employees. Try to give suitable models in such cases because behavior modeling can be risky if there are undesirable elements.

Business Coaching

Like a sports coach, a business coach guides a business by enabling it to develop a clear business vision and implementing it to achieve its goals. Business coaching aims at taking a business where it wants it to. The idea of business coaching appluis to all kinds of businesses- small, local businesses to global companies.

It may surprise you to know that some of the most famous and successful business owners and entrepreneurs have taken recourse to business coaches to help them with their goals. Even Eric Schmidt, the former CEO of Google, took a business coaching course despite being a successful executive

Plentiful online resources are available on building and growing a business, but we need to remember that every business is unique and such plain vanilla advice can hardly match personalized business coaching.

Business coaches are veteran entrepreneurs and business owners who work with business managers and owners to help them define goals, polish their vision and formulate strategies to help the business. We all know that learning from great mentors can be a quick route to success but the logic is often overlooked while running a business. The coach can help navigate the most complex business issues effectively. It’s akin to having a veteran partner with you, who brings immense value to business.

The Job of a Business Coach

Business coaches begin by learning all that they can about your brand, its value propositions, target customers and the challenges it faces. Next, he would like to know about your company vision and goals.

The coach would like to map your expectations – whether you want to have your business turn into a source of income or a billion dollar company. A business coach can also help businesses that have hit a growth plateau and are desirous of taking it to the next level. He will collaborate with you to set attainable business goals that you need to focus on to grow and achieve the vision laid out.

Once the goals are in place, the coach helps you meet them by working with you in devising strategies and action plans to push your business to achieve your goals and help you face the challenges that come up.

A startup is something we have all dreamt of establishing. At some point in time, we have had some killer startup ideas, but no clue how to follow them. There are many reasons why people shift to business or startups. They can either be bored of their regular 9-5 jobs, or they might have a passion to build something.

Being a business coach, many people come to me for startup idea coaching. They have creative ideas but no plan. No matter what’s the reason behind creating a business of their own, I coach each individual passionately. It brings immense satisfaction to help someone do something they always wanted to do. 

I remember the time when one of my friends visited me. We were chatting over a cup of tea when my friend in a very casual way told me about a business idea she had in mind.

She told me how she loved painting fabrics and how she would love it if she could do it professionally. She thought it was a very basic idea, and nothing could be created out of such a small idea. 

I asked her, “Why do you want to work for someone else if you have the talent, then why not start your own business?”

She replied, “I give it a thought some days, but some days I feel I need the right guidance.”

I immediately understood what was stopping her from conquering her dreams. It was her fear of thinking she was not enough to handle the workload. She was hesitating as she was not sure if things would work. Also, being a housewife and mother, she did not want to risk money or feel distracted. I had seen her work, and she was really talented.

I decided to offer her my startup coaching to build the mindset of an entrepreneur in her. I wanted to help her see potential and passion in her business. I happily said, “We will start your counseling tomorrow, and I will provide you with efficient startup guidance.”

She created social media pages and started showcasing her work to the world. Within a few months, she started getting inter-state and international orders. From that day till now, she owns two workshops with nearly a hundred artisans working for her. She fulfilled her dream of bringing her designs to life.

The Mindset of an Entrepreneur

Do you have what it takes to become an entrepreneur? Do you think you do? Are you prepared? 

First, entrepreneurs never ever want to belong to a group or be part of the herd. They don’t want to be just like the majority of individuals. They do great things for the majority of individuals but never want to be among them.

Second, most successful entrepreneurs have unique personalities. They keep learning new things and improving their craft.

Next, entrepreneurs have resilience. They face challenges, but they look for opportunities even in failure. It is because they know that failure in the future is not a fatal hit to their career. On the contrary, entrepreneurs are able to look for opportunities even in failure.

Last but not least, entrepreneurs have the ability to challenge themselves. They are able to persevere despite the fear and failure they encounter. If you want to have an excellent and impressive resume, impressive cover letter, and impressive achievements, you need to develop self-confidence, motivation, vision, and an entrepreneurial mindset. These traits will help you overcome the obstacles you will meet along the way.

Do you think these traits described above are the only reasons why successful entrepreneurs are so dominant? Of course not! There are many other contributing factors. However, these are some of the most significant ones. To summarize, every successful entrepreneur is driven by one thing: passion.

When it comes to succeeding in business, it is very important to identify your own personal characteristics that work towards helping you succeed. Remember that these characteristics do not only apply to physical attributes. In fact, some entrepreneurs do not possess any entrepreneurial skills at all. However, their persistence, tenacity, vision, and resilience are working towards their goals day after day. It is how they get past obstacles and make it to where they are now.

In order to identify your own personal characteristics, take a look around. What are the common characteristics that most successful entrepreneurs have? Here are some examples: They believe in what they are doing (even if others do not) and have a strong commitment to their goals. They are persistent, even when things are not going as well as they would like. They keep looking for solutions and are continuously willing to adopt new technologies and systems when necessary.

Startup ideas with low investment

Every new startup initiates by having an uncommon idea, an innovation that does not have any ready competition or few comparable competitors in the industry. Here are a few Startup ideas with low investment. 

• Food Startup 

Food Startup Ideas With Low Investment is generally small but highly profitable businesses. Food startups are very convenient and easy. With mobile food trucks, you don’t even have to rent a space or room to serve delicious food items.

• Social Media Marketing Plans

Another type of startup idea with low investment in social media marketing plans. Like other forms of marketing strategies, social media requires an investment in time and money, but it has a long runway. In terms of social media, the most common platforms include Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and YouTube. However, any innovative startup business ideas require low investment because they are generally ‘startup’ companies. They will need funds only for promotion and marketing their business and will not require much in the way of product development or infrastructure.

• Event /Wedding Planner 

When you are thinking of starting your own business, wedding planners may come into the picture as a startup idea since they have become quite a successful company already. The wedding industry is growing and a lot of people would like to have their own wedding and reception planning company to work on their wedding. A wedding planner as a startup idea is one of the best niches for you to enter if you want to start your own business in this sector. Wedding planners can find many clients and lots of work if you are able to do well with it because the wedding industry is a very competitive place, and they need a lot of help when it comes to planning weddings. A wedding planner as a startup idea can be very easy and profitable for you.

• Computer Training 

Starting your own business in the Information Technology field can be a challenging decision. One of the most important things to think about is the type of business you will have – a home-based or office-based one. With many businesses today going international, there is a need for people with IT skills. Starting a computer training center as a startup idea can be the perfect way to build a business that can grow and flourish. By starting a business like this, your time and money will be well spent – and you will not be working for someone else but earning money on your own terms.

• Custom gift store

Many people start up their own business or work for an existing company that may be considering purchasing a custom gift store, but it’s a good idea to have an open mind and look into other options. You may not be the next Starbucks, but you may be able to start up a specialty store that offers unique gifts to your customers for any occasion.

• Interior designer

Interior Design is one of the most successful niches in the commercial world today. In fact, it is one of the few that has steady growth and profit without a major technological change. A lot of people think that if you want to start your own business that you have to be an engineer, a computer specialist, or even a computer programmer. However, there are many interior designer job openings in the private sector today that don’t require these things. All you need is a passion to revamp and beautify interiors.

• Yoga class

Yoga classes are one of the best ways to improve your health and well-being. Since yoga has been around for thousands of years, it’s a proven method for improving physical and psychological health. If you are good at yoga and want to teach others then it is a great startup idea. You can always help people in improving their health.

• Blogging 

If you want to be successful at blogging, remember that there are some things that you must keep in mind. You should always create high-quality content. Your blog’s theme should be related to your audience. You should also link back to other sites and leave a signature link at the end of each of your posts. Finally, make sure that you participate in the online community and help to build the blogs and businesses of others.

• Stock market trading

Many investors and entrepreneurs, when first deciding to enter the world of stock market investing, believe that they would make better use of existing resources to excel in their business endeavors. Others do not even realize the benefits that stock market trading has to offer as a start-up business. The reality is that stock market trading can be the best way to make a profit in almost any type of business. However, those who have not thoroughly considered the options inherent in stock market investing may be surprised by some of the benefits associated with stock-market trading as a start-up business.

• Set Up a Co-Working Space

With COVID-19 and lockdown around, most companies have shifted to remote work. People have been working from home for a long time now. However, not everyone has the right space and services to work remotely. A coworking space is a new startup idea that is accelerating really fast. Many people look for cafes or such spaces where they can work comfortably on their desks with a stable internet connection. Also, people who are bored of sitting and working from home can also enjoy a change of environment by utilizing such coworking spaces. It is a great startup idea with minimal investment. If you have some space, it can be a cherry on the top. 

10 Steps to turn ideas to action for startups

• Do your market research 

Do your market research for a startup business before you decide to run a business. You should consider the type of business you are planning on starting, the amount of money you have to invest, and the time you have to devote to your new business. The best business opportunities are not found overnight, so make sure that your idea is not one that will just be another victim in the long string of failed businesses. Think long and hard about why your business needs to become profitable before you make a decision as to which business opportunity is the best.

• Secure intellectual property

Securing intellectual property for startup businesses is one of the most important things to remember if you are planning to establish a company. This protects the idea, the product, and the company that you have worked so hard to create. It is also important to do this because you will be protecting it from people who may want to steal it from you. Stealing ideas can be a costly thing, but stealing a company’s intellectual property is even more costly. Thus, protecting this is very important.

• Decide on branding 

If you are planning to open up an online business or a brick-and-mortar business, then you must take the time to learn how to decide on branding for a startup business. The right branding will help in not only helping you gain more traffic to your site but will also help in getting potential customers to your site. In fact, if you want to ensure a successful business, then it would be advisable to make sure that you give the branding for startup business some serious thought. This way, you can come up with a plan that will ensure you put the right amount of effort into the branding for a startup business.

• Incorporate 

Incorporating your startup business is an ideal way to ensure that you will have longevity in the industry and provide for your family for many years to come. 

• Choose a co-founder 

Choosing a co-founder for your startup business is extremely important. I am not talking about financial speaking here, but I am talking about the business aspect of things and how your business will run if you don’t have someone to run it. When you are choosing a co-founder, you need to look at their skills, their track record, and their experience. 

• Write a business plan

The importance of writing a business plan for your startup business cannot be understated. If you do not include one, then you may be missing out on opportunities that could lead to a successful business. A business plan is very important because it can help to provide a map or game plan for your business. It will give you a sense of direction and what steps you need to take to achieve certain goals that you have laid out in your plan. Without a plan, there are a lot of things that you will be guessing about, which can lead to a lot of wasted time and money.

• Pick a workplace

The importance of the workplace in the life of a company cannot be disregarded. It is where your employees work, and it is the place where you get to spend some quality time with them. When it comes to working, there is no one more important than you. You are the leader, and you determine the fate of the company or your employees. It means that having an inspiring workplace is crucial for the success of your business.

• Find a mentor 

It is vitally important for you to find a mentor because it will save you a lot of time. When you are just starting out, you are going to learn a lot just by reading. However, to truly understand something, you must have hands-on experience with it. By having a mentor you can learn from their mistakes and use that knowledge to help you create your success and make a dent in the billion-dollar markets that exist today.

• Apply for an accelerator program 

Startup business loans have become the hot finance tools that are being offered to budding entrepreneurs. It is because there are many borrowers who are looking forward to investing their money in this type of program. However, you need to understand that you need to be smart about using this program for the reason that it is one of the most expensive investment tools available in the market today. You should therefore not consider it as an expense but an investment opportunity that will greatly help you make your venture successful and money-generating business plan a reality in no time.

• Raise capital 

In every new start-up that seeks capital for its business, it is mandatory to raise money for its future growth. Raising capital is necessary in order to purchase all necessary equipment for business operations. Proper capitalization of a startup business is highly important for its survival in the long run. Business startups need a large number of funds for their successful operation.

Conclusion

I have given business mentoring to many people. Most of them are now doing great with their startups. In my experience, I have seen that it is just the first step that is hardest to take. However, when you step out of your comfort zone, something big is bound to happen.

Nothing will change unless you decide to change yourself. Startups are flourishing now like never before. If you have some creative ideas in your mind, don’t shy away from sharing them with the world. 

Do you miss deadlines?

 Do you often forget meetings? 

Are you staying unproductive the whole day? Or Do you keep on looking at the watch to see the clock tick 5?

Well, time passes slowly when you’re doing something you don’t like. However, when you have tonnes of responsibilities in your head, even 24 hours a day seems less.

A workplace can be a tiring and challenging place. You can do so many tasks in so little time. The only way you can manage your office tasks is by efficient time management techniques. 

In 1998, I was married and had one daughter. I was a housewife back then and would do all the household chores. I used to plan many things, but would not fulfill them and think to myself that I do not have enough time. 

Once, my friend and I were having a cup of coffee when I jokingly said, “ 24 hours are too little to accomplish all my tasks. There should be 36 hours in a day.”

She laughed and replied, “ It is not only you, the time is the same for everyone. The president of America or Prime-minister of India, all get the same 24 hours. It is on us how we make the most of those 24 hours. You first need to check where you waste your time the most.”

It was in 2004 when I went for a spiritual training course, one of the people from the group asked, how should she manage her time. She was a working woman and had to manage family, work, house, and other chores. 

The coach there taught us a beautiful life lesson. He asked us to think that we have three rabbits and we need to catch them. Now, when you’ll try to catch the first one, the second rabbit will run away when you’ll try to catch the second one, the third one will escape, and you’ll be wasting the entire day. You will end up being tired and unsuccessful.

But, how can you fulfill this task? He suggested simple planning and management can help you catch all of them. He said if we could put some carrots in, all the rabbits will come to eat them, and you’ll get hold of three of them easily and quickly. 

The moral of the lesson is that planning, wisdom, and execution can change your perspective about not having enough time. If you pre-plan things, you’ll execute your plan and get results quickly. However, if you start working without a plan, you’ll end up getting late or missing a deadline.

The lesson was indeed useful, but I didn’t know where to execute it. In 2007, when I lost my husband, I had to take charge of everything from family to business. From managing home, raising my daughters, and taking care of our business, I had to manage all single-handedly. At that moment, I realized these are the three rabbits that I need to catch, and it is my planning and determination that can help me do so. 

Today, when clients ask me why they are unable to get the results of their efforts even after working for so long on a project, I don’t get surprised. There’s one common reason for all these complaints, and it is that most people today do not give their 100% to a task. 

I believe that when we are 100% involved in one task, we perform it efficiently. When we try to jump our minds from one task to another, we end up getting tired without even achieving our goals. When you start giving your 100% to each task, you’ll take less than the required time to finish that task.

What are Time Management Skills?

Time management is the process of planning and executing control over your time. In simple words, it is the process of spending your time consciously by meditating each time slot to specific tasks. It is a simple act of working smarter and attaining more.

Time management is the way you juggle various activities of your day to increase efficiency and form a better work-life balance. Time management skills can improve your work at the office and enhance the performance of a worker. Moreover, it helps you achieve your desired goals with minimum effort and effective strategies. 

What if you do not manage time at the workplace?

Time management is a very useful skill for every person. However, when it comes to the workplace, time management becomes even more critical. If you do not manage your time well at the office, someone else will overtake you. Today, the corporate world is very competitive. Only the person who can manage their tasks and time well on time can sustain and succeed.

You cannot afford to lag behind in today’s superfast work culture. If you fail to manage your time or you show poor time management skills at work, it can result in the following problems:

• You will miss deadlines and appointments. It can degrade your impression and work performance. No one likes an employee who is not responsible enough to submit work on time.

• You will lose focus and miss on details. As I said, it is crucial to be completely present at the moment, when accomplishing a task Distraction or procrastination can decline the quality of the work.

• If you do not manage your time efficiently, then your work will lack the required professional touch. It is better to give professionally best in all your tasks.

• Even if one person is inefficient in managing time, the entire workflow of the office is disrupted. In a workplace, most tasks are interdependent. 

• We all know how stressful situations get when we leave our work at the last minute. Poor time management causes unwanted stress to a person as they reach deadlines or miss completing tasks.

• An employee’s reputation highly depends on his working style. An employee who hardly finishes tasks on time or even attends meetings on time will not be given bigger responsibilities.

• Moreover, workplace relationships often strain when an employee remains irresponsible about managing time. Your manager or supervisor will soon start getting angry at you.

• The worst part about poor time management is that it does not let you form a work-life balance. It is crucial to managing your professional and personal life equally. However, when you don’t complete your tasks on time, you have to work extra and overtime. It disrupts your personal life.

10 Tips for Time Management Techniques in Workplace

Time management can completely change your working style. Once you learn how to manage your time efficiently, you can ace your work and stand ahead of other employees. We have collected some tips for you to manage your time.

• Evaluate Your Schedule

As I said earlier, the first thing that you need to do is evaluate your current schedule. Most of the time, we create a new schedule before evaluating what we’re doing wrong currently. We then perform the same mistakes again unintentionally. 

So, you first need to evaluate how you are currently spending your time. You need to find where your most time goes. You can track your daily activities for a week and note down your observations. It will give you a pattern of your time management behavior. You can also determine how much time you utilize efficiently and how much of your time is wasted in other activities. Through this method, you can also focus on the activities that provide the greatest returns.

This time audit will make it clear how much of your time is spent on conversations, unproductive activities, and phones. Also, you’ll understand how much time a specific type of task takes. This time audit will also determine when you are the most productive and when your creativity is at a low. 

• Create a Daily Plan

It is the most crucial aspect of time management. If you’re a beginner, you should always start by writing a to-do list. It is the simplest and most satisfying way of managing the day efficiently. 

You can use the ‘Eat the frog’ method for creating to-do lists. First, you need to complete the tasks that you feel are boring or will take the most time. Once you eat the frog or complete the hardest task then you can complete your other tasks. 

At the workplace, before leaving your home, create a list of things you need to do during that day. If you do so, you’ll get going as soon as you reach the office. Also, you may put it on paper or create a digital task list. If you create the list at night, you can sleep peacefully without stress. You may also write it early in the morning if you don’t have time at night. When you’ll do so, you’ll see how much time it will save.

• Set Priorities

As I said earlier, time management is all about setting priorities. Even when you are preparing the to-do list, you should know how to prioritize your work. One ancient method is the ‘Eat the Frog’ method. You should first think of the tasks that you do not need to do on an urgent basis. We all always have three to four major tasks that are to complete first. Make them your priority and finish those tasks.

Once you complete those tasks, you can complete one or two smaller tasks in the remaining time. At the workplace, important responsibilities need more attention, but urgent responsibilities need to be the priority. As you create the to-do list, you should arrange the priority of the task wise. The most important tasks need to be done first, followed by less crucial tasks. 

You can take help from a time management matrix. It has four quadrants:

• Important and urgent: These are the tasks with crucial deadlines and high urgency. You need to complete these tasks right away. 

• Important but not urgent: These are crucial tasks but have no deadlines. It means you can spend time working on these tasks and ensure good quality work.

• Urgent but not important: As the name suggests, these tasks are urgent but not important. So, you can delegate, minimize, or eliminate them because they do not affect your overall output.

• Urgent and unimportant: You should eliminate these tasks from your to-do list immediately as they hold no value.

As you figure prioritization, your time management reaches a whole new level. You’ll be more focused on your time throughout the day.

• Group Similar Tasks

Grouping similar tasks together are the best way of saving your time. I have always followed this time management technique. It has helped me a lot in my personal and professional life. Grouping similar tasks also saves your physical and mental energy. For instance, I answer all my emails or phone calls while I commute. I do not respond to each mail as I receive them. 

When I’m sure I have replied to people, I am not distracted by my phone time and again. Similarly, when you go to a department to ask some query, you can also complete some other tasks if you are there. When you create a to-do list, you’ll get an idea of how many times you need to go to a particular department.

• Avoid Multitasking Always

Many people think multitasking is the most effective way of time management. However, I believe multitasking is hyped and generally does not provide good results. Many people multitask to finish many tasks at once but end up not completing even a single task with efficiency. 

With so many devices and gadgets around us, it is quite easy to get distracted. We must focus on one task and block all other distractions. While multitasking, you lose both productivity and accuracy. A lot of time is wasted in switching from one task to another. If you have a to-do list, then try completing it on time. However, you should stay stressed over completing it will only hurt your health. 

All you have to do is take one task at a time and complete it efficiently.

• Assign Time Slots

One very effective way of accomplishing tasks on time or even before time is, assigning time limits to tasks. You can set time limits on tasks instead of just working and completing them. To-do lists are wonderful, but you might spend too much time on a task that requires only a few minutes. 

At the workplace, it is critical to complete tasks within the given time limits or time frames. You can use the Pomodoro Technique. It helps by checking off the to-do list every 25-minutes to mark your progress. You can also take short breaks between each stint and a long break after completing four hours. You get a narrow focus through this time management technique and also get breaks to reduce mental strain.

• Give Scheduled Breaks

One of the very critical and often neglected aspects of time management is taking frequent breaks. In the urge to complete all our tasks on time, we forget or avoid taking breaks. However, avoiding breaks only reduces your quality of work.

At the workplace, with time, your energy declines, and you get less productive. If you take frequent short breaks, it will reduce mental strain and refresh your mind. Breaks should always be a part of your schedule. As you finish a task, give yourself some time to breathe. Mini-breaks help you recharge your body for the next task. 

You can go for a short walk, meditate, breathe, or play your favorite game in the break to reduce stress. However, do not let your work breaks get too long that you lose track of time.

• Do as much as you can

One thing that I have observed in many people is the inability to say no. Many employees have the charisma to say yes to every task they are allocated. No one really likes taking extra workload. It is just their personality to please everyone that they are unable to say no to work.

However, It is very very wrong. If you have a to-do list prepared, you’ll hardly have time for new tasks to be adjusted. You will never learn to manage time at the workplace if you do not learn to say no. It is only you who knows how many tasks you have and what you’ve come so far. If you feel you have some other important task needing your attention, you should not be afraid to say no and let it go.

Have you heard of the 80/20 rule? It states that 80% of your output comes from 20% of your inputs. It is your efforts that make all the difference. Many times, we do not have the option to say no to a task. In such cases, you can delegate the work to someone free. Delegating tasks works wonders for personal time management.

• Get More Organized

Time management is not only about arranging tasks according to time. It is much more than that. Time management is about organizing your tasks and work. The first stage of organizing time is organizing your desk. You cannot work with concentration on a desk that has paper scattered all over it. If you need to find one paper out of them, it will become a daunting task. There is nothing worse than wasting time on tasks like finding a document or Pendrive. Also, a cluttered table is the biggest distraction. A cluttered table clutters your mind. It gets really hard to focus in such situations. 

You should always keep your desk clear and clean. It will enhance focus, boost productivity, and keep you stress-free. You can create a simple filing system for all the documents. You may even unsubscribe to the emails you no longer need. These simple ideas of organizations do not consume much of your time but yield promising results.

• Remove All Distractions

When we talk about distractions, it is not only the clutter on your table. Social media, OTT platforms, messaging, e-mailing, and many more can be very distracting while working. At the workplace, web browsing, chatty co-workers, and text messages can be highly distracting. 

One of the best tips for time management is being proactive about getting rid of these sources. For instance, you can close your room door when you’re working, as it will limit interruptions. When working on the laptop, you can close all the tabs that you are not working on currently. Similarly, you can turn off notifications and leave your personal phone calls on hold while you’re working.

Many people do not even realize how they are getting distracted. You might pick up your phone to look for something but end up spending 40 minutes on social media. You cannot transform in one day. You need to take small steps to eliminate distractions.

To start with, you need to identify your top two distractions. For the first two weeks, you should work on those distractions and conquer them. Also, eating, sleeping, and drinking enough water is very crucial.   

Overall Outlook

Time management in the workplace is critical. A person who does not know the value of time will end up wasting all the time they have on this earth. As Charles Buxton quotes, 

“You will never find time for anything. If you want time, you must make it.”

We hope our selected time management skills and techniques help you, and become the best employee of your company. 

When it comes to making career choices, we all get confused. It might seem or feel like I’m the only one who does not know what to do with life. However, each one of us goes through such phases in life.

Life is unpredictable. We might feel everything is going well one day, and the other day, things might change. My point here is that it is not always necessary to have a career plan ready. It is great to have one, but even if you don’t have one, there’s nothing to feel guilty about.

We all learn through experiences, and we might not know when life takes a different turn, and things change. When I was young, I wanted to become a lawyer. I had a passion to follow the career, and so I did. As I was graduating, I decided to prepare for the Civil services exam and shift towards that career.

However, as I said, not everything goes as you plan. As soon as I graduated, my husband proposed to me to marry him. At that moment, it felt right, my family agreed, and I gave up the IAS dream to get married. My husband was an established businessman, and I decided to stay at home.

When my daughters were born, I gave all my time and attention to their growth and career. I would devote most of my time to make sure they do well in academics and co-curricular. No matter what plans I had for my life did not match what I was actually doing, but I never felt guilty or sad. I took responsibility for my daughters and home with a full heart. 

As soon as I started feeling my life was going well, and maybe that’s it, that’s how I’ll spend the rest of my life, something devastating happened. My daughters were still young when my husband committed suicide. Our business was not doing well, and my husband could not take the failure and decided to give up.

I became a single mother to my two daughters at a very young age. Our family business was in debt and colossal loans. There were many court cases and issues that needed to be resolved. It was at that time that I decided to take over our family business myself. 

Not everyone supported or liked my decision as a women entrepreneur in a male-dominated industry was a rare sight back then. However, I did not let my confidence shake with such thoughts or people. Soon, I joined the family business and decided to bring it back on track. I worked hard day and night, managed business, home, and my daughters. It was a challenging time, but I worked with grit and determination. 

Not only we repaid all the loans of banks, but also, fought and won court cases. Today, my business is flourishing, and so is my family. So you see, sometimes things don’t go as you plan, but it doesn’t mean you don’t need a plan.

Having a career plan is very important. It heads you in the right direction, however changing plans with time is also essential. You should not give up if things don’t go the way you plan. 

Being a life coach and an entrepreneur, I know the necessity of having a career plan and finding your passion. I have counseled many people to help them find passion and follow a career they love. Working or learning something that doesn’t excite you will bore you in some time. You need to find a career that makes you happy.

Finding your passion for career plans 

It is very important to follow a career that you are passionate about. If you do not love the work you do, it will not bring the best of you. Many people casually ask you to follow your passion. However, the question is how to know what your passion is. You can work hard with commitment and persistence, but you need to know where to put your energy.

Many times in life, we feel stuck. We may feel stuck in our jobs, our homes, or college. We doubt if what we are doing makes us happy or not. If you are going through the same situation, here are some ways you can use it to find your passion.

• Find the right perspective

It is very important to find the right perspective to find your next move. If you go to a restaurant without feeling hungry, the menu will not look good no matter what. You may order something from the menu, but you won’t enjoy the dish. So, when you look out to find passion while thinking finding passion is hard, you won’t find it. 

When we restrict ourselves by believing something is hard, we do not find it in the simplest places. You need to remain open to possibilities. As you’ll stay open to options, many pulls, blockages, and nudges will get out of your way. Keep a simple thought that you can do what you love with your life. You can look around for people who are following their passion seamlessly. It will motivate you and give you direction.

• Attract what you like

Once you’ve formed a welcoming attitude towards your passion, you can start looking for it around you. You just need to sit and think about the tasks that you love to do. For instance, you love teaching children, or maybe you love teaching a specific subject. It can be because that subject excites you. 

You don’t have to go far away or explore every option. All you need to do is sit and think about the things you genuinely care about. Once you know what brings you happiness, be it cooking, painting, coding, or writing, you’ll have your list of passions that you can consider. 

• Collect what you need

You cannot just sit and decide, “Oh! I love to paint, I must follow my passion.” If you want to use your passion as a hobby, then it’s fine. However, if you want to build a career plan on that passion, then you need to consider certain other factors. 

Firstly, you need to form an umbrella and bring all your interests and requirements under it. You need to evaluate various factors and then form a practical list.

• Turn a hobby into a profitable passion

As I said, your hobby won’t pay your bills. You need to convert that hobby into a profitable passion to earn money. You might love painting, but painting for your home will not carry your expenses. You need a complete plan to turn a hobby into a passionate career. 

Most of the time, when people realize they have to follow their passion to earn money, it becomes boring to them. It changes from “love to do” to “have to do.” You might love writing journals, but when you write professionally for clients, it might not bring the same joy. You may have to get professional training or education to earn from a profession. 

For this, you should contact people with similar interests. You can talk to them and ask how they managed to earn profits from their passion. They might give you some real-life advice.

• Prepare for setbacks

Now, no matter what type of work you’re doing, there will be setbacks and obstacles in your path. As I said earlier, things might not always go the way you plan them to. First, it takes courage to follow a passion. There are fears, doubts, and complexities in leaving a secure career to follow passion.

There will be phases where you’ll feel regretful and rebellious. However, these are a part of growing and evolving. This vulnerability to failure, success, or visibility is natural, and you need to be prepared for it. 

If you believe in yourself, your dreams, and your passion, then such setbacks can be easily overcome. I had overcome many such obstacles and setbacks to become the Women Entrepreneur of the year 2011. 

• Backup Plans

We all know it is not a movie or TV show! Everything never goes well, and I always suggest to my clients to have a backup plan. I believe it is critical to have a backup plan. It gives you a sense of security during tough times.

I have seen many people feel devastated when they could not achieve what they wanted. In such situations, if you have a backup, you feel composed. However, it does not mean you do not put your best effort into thinking you have a backup plan.

The point is to give your best shot to your passion, but keep a safe option until you succeed. For instance, do not leave your job until you find a stable career in your hobby. When you feel you have enough work and savings to take the big leap, take it. 

Learn With The Art of Ikigai

Ikigai means “ a reason for being.” It simply illustrates your mission on the planet. It gives you a reason to get out of your bed and work each morning. 

The Ikigai framework is critical to understand what one truly wants in life. The Ikigai framework is divided into four main sections.

1. What you love?

This question is about finding out what you find fun and interesting in life. You need to ask yourself what you’d like to do without worrying about money. It should be the thing that excites you and you can talk about it for hours.

2. What the world needs?

The second question is what you can give to the world, your family or culture. It basically means how you can solve the problems of society. It is your way of returning to the community by helping them.

You also need to consider this question while doing business. You need to ask if people are willing to buy the products that you’re selling. Also, if your work will still be relevant  after a decade from now.

3. What you can be paid for?

As I said, money is an essential part of our lives. No matter what you love to do, it should bring enough funds to put bread on your table. Think of ways you can be paid for something that you love to do.

4. What you are good at?

We all are born with one or more skills. We just need to find what we’re good at. This question means the same. You need to figure out things that you can do without even making an effort. Also, you need to check if you can enhance this skill of yours to become umatchable.

It is how the Ikigai career chart helps you find the right career for yourself. 

12 Creative Career Options to Follow in Today’s Time 

Today, young people are shifting their interests towards creative career fields. Gone are the days when people would run after boring desk jobs. People today are more inclined towards honing their skills and sharpening their careers in unique fields.

Well, it isn’t that these jobs do not require qualifications or hard work. In fact, they require a more advanced skill set than other regular jobs. We have collected some creative career options to explore various career prospects driven by creativity.

• Designing

Design is everywhere, from digital to physical, designing is a bright career option. You can find many respected job opportunities in the field of design. It includes fashion, interior, technology, and many more. So, if you love to create designs in any way, then designing can be a great career for you. You may decide to be a fashion designer, tattoo artist, digital designer, fabric, furniture, or crockery designer.

• Baking

Baking has become very common today as compared to older times. People used to bake as a hobby before, but today most people do professional baking. You can opt for a course in baking to sharpen your skills and create your bakery. It is great to work from home jobs. You can open a home bakery and work at the convenience of your home. Once you learn baking and market your services well, you can boost your business in many ways.

• Photography

Photography is not only a skill or talent but also a great profession. Today, photographers are everywhere, thanks to social media. You can choose any photography that interests you, from wildlife photography and portrait photography to landscape photography. Fashion photography and photojournalism are also great career opportunities for young people. You can easily change your hobby of photography to a full-time profession.

• Writing

There was a time when people used to write journals and diaries as a hobby and leisure. However, writers today are making more money than many other professions. With digitization and technology, the demand for content writers has increased tremendously. If you love writing, it is time you make it a profession and not just a hobby. Moreover, the writing field is not limited to one type. You can be a freelance writer, scriptwriter, editor, screenwriter, or content writer. 

• Fashion

The fashion industry is booming worldwide. Fashion is a very stable industry that hardly suffers any problems. Now, with influencers and YouTubers, fashion has taken a new turn. It has reached newer heights. One thing great about this career field is that it is all about creativity. The fashion industry has a vast scope for people with a passion for fashion. From influencers, designers to fashion writers, you can specialize in the field you want.

• Videography

Videography or filmmaking is one of the most evolving career options. With OTT platforms and other video content, a new arena for video makers has opened. Although videography requires proper training and experience, it is a perfect career option for people who are passionate about visual storytelling. You can work and land a job as a director, video editor, visual effects artist, film critic, and many more. 

• Advertising

What is any business without right advertising? We all know the value of marketing and advertising in every industry. With the change in times, marketing is shifting more towards digital platforms. Today, more and more companies are investing in digital marketing than the traditional forms of marketing. If you have a thing to market services, then many brands will be happy to have you. You may choose self-employment or get immense jobs in digital marketing and advertising.

• Social Media Marketing

People today live by social media trends. Every person is using one or the other social media platform to engage and connect with new people. However, social media is much more than fun and games. It can be a great platform to earn and hone your skills. Social media is extensively used by startups and Fortune 500 companies to boost their audience. SM has made it very easy for companies to reach their target audience. Once you know the target audience, you can directly pitch your services. Moreover, social media marketing is a creative career opportunity for work from home or office jobs. All you need is the right knowledge and skills. 

• Makeup Artists

Makeup artists have not only grown in number but are also doing extremely well in their work. A makeup artist has a wide range of options to choose from. You can be a celebrity makeup artist, a wedding makeup artist, a fashion magazine makeup artist, and many more. Once you get professional training on makeup skills, you can start your own company or work with brands.

• Web developers

A web developer is a person who develops websites. We all know how crucial it is for companies to have a website in today’s time. You need a website to take your company digital. With so many startups and companies, web developers are so much in demand these days. However, you need professional training and courses to be a web developer. Efficient computer knowledge is a must. There is a wide scope for web developers to work from home or work in a corporation.

• Interior designers

Interior designers are not only important but necessary in today’s time. Everyone hires interior designers to decorate their homes. Interior decoration is a very creative field. If you are someone who loves decorating homes and buildings, then interior designing can be a great option for you. You can pursue a degree or follow interior designing as a passion. You can collaborate with architects and firms to offer your services.

• Animation & Graphics

Animation and graphics are a sizzling career in today’s time. It is a very creative career field for youth. Many people with the gist to follow a career in computer graphics and animations take up a professional course or degree in the field. If you are very good at your skills, then this career option can bring good income and amount of work for you.

A Step-by-Step Career Guide

Now that you have many creative career options to choose from, here is a step-by-step guide to know what is right for you. It might feel daunting to choose your next career move, but it is essential. Here is a step-by-step guide to take your career ahead.

• Visualize what you want: The first thing you need to do is visualize yourself 5-6 years ahead. You need to plan your ideal day and how your life would look like. List down things you will like to do, people you’ll like to meet, the money you’ll like to make, and so on. It will give you an overview of what interests you. 

• Arrange activities to their level of happiness: Once you’ve listed what all you’ll like in a day, you need to rate these activities. Think to yourself what makes you most happy. It can be talking to customers, completing a book, or painting a picture, and so on. You’ll get an idea of the things that make you happy.

• Think what you don’t like: The next thing you need to do is note down what you don’t like doing. It is essential to pay attention to what you dislike. It can be one activity or your complete job. 

• Make Plans: When you have a list of your likes and dislikes, it gets easier to draw a plan. You just need to work more towards attaining the things that you like and get rid of things you don’t like. However, planning is important, and you shouldn’t just jump to conclusions.

• Plan your next 10 years: See, you cannot plan your entire life at once. However, you can set some attainable goals for the next 5-10 years of your life. It is always better to have a plan than simply following the crowd.

Final Takeaway

No one knows their next career move unless they sit and decide on that. If you think you’re the only one confused, then you’re wrong. There’s nothing to worry about! You can take your time, explore your options, and then find a career you’re passionate about.