Thursday 3 April 2008

Welcome to our blog...
As part of The Career Key's mission to help people make the best career choices, we launched this career blog to provide a forum for:
- sharing news and high quality resources about careers,
- exchanging new ideas about how to choose a career, and
- talking about our life experiences with career choice.
Career Key's Vice President, Juliet Jones, with input from Career Key author Dr. Lawrence K. Jones, discuss these topics with seriousness and a touch of humor.
Pros and Cons of Self-Employment
On the occasion of our launch of the Self-Employment Key, I thought I might reminisce about my 5 years as a self-employed lawyer, how the Self-Employment Key could have helped - and the pros and cons of self-employment I experienced.
For me, my own practice was both a fantastic escape and scary jump out of a plane, feelings I'm sure others can sympathize with. I wish that at the time I left my first law firm job to go solo, that I could have taken something like the Self-Employment Key. I would have had more confidence about my decision. I would have known how compatible my personality was with law practice as a self-employed career and I would have known my scores for two personality dimensions, Openness to Experience and Conscientiousness, linked to successful self-employment. Perhaps I could have avoided some errors by knowing earlier how to compensate for my weak areas and concentrate on my strengths. But after several years, I did get along just fine and this is what I found:
Pros
* More flexibility in work hours (being my own boss)
* Sole responsibility for generating revenue

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