Barrie Hopkins & Katie Ledger
Authors of And What Do You Do? 10 Steps to Creating a Portfolio Career
Barrie Hopson is a serial portfolio careerist. He is currently
blending roles as a psychologist, entrepreneur, author, blogger,
non-exec director, presenter, husband, father, grandfather and cricket
fanatic.
Katie Ledger’s work/life blend includes being a
communications consultant, conference host & producer, presentation
& media coach, author, blogger, presenter, mother (2 young
children) and wife (1 husband also with portfolio career).
Here is an article by the authors about portfolio careers:
The Attractions of a Portfolio Career
By Barrie Hopson and Katie Ledger
Do you dread that question? And how do you answer? ‘I’m a plumber’, ‘I’m an accountant’, ‘I’m a teacher’ – simple explanations. But what if you don’t want to be defined by just one label?
It’s increasingly common for people to say things like:
‘I have three jobs. I’m a lawyer for several small companies, a professional cook and a food writer.’
‘I work in a restaurant four nights a week, run a small shop three days a week and bake products for my husband’s shop one day a week.’
‘I am a lighting designer, professional photographer and Reiki practitioner’.
These are real examples of people who have portfolio careers. The term essentially refers to a person doing two or more different jobs for different employers.
What they have in common is that they’ve all had difficulty in finding a single job or even a career that used all of their skills and allowed them to tap into all of their passions. They’ve all found, as indeed have the other people we’ve interviewed for our book, that there is an alternative to the 20th-century dream of finding ‘the one job that is right for you’. For many people that dream has become a nightmare as every job is now temporary.
People who opt for this work style like it because it gives them variety. Also, they don’t have all their career ‘eggs’ in one basket. If one job gets boring, they can focus more on the other ones or indeed even ditch the boring one. If they lose one job, they have other revenue streams to rely on.
We’ve discovered that maybe a million plus people have been and are developing portfolio careers without being aware that this style of working is becoming more popular or indeed has a name. It is a growing career pattern. In our book, Trish takes the prize for the most jobs – 8.
For many, the attraction is that you largely have your independence even if you’re working for a number of different organisations. Plus you have relative freedom from corporate agendas and politics. You can use your unique combination of strengths. You can follow multiple passions. It’s often easier to say ‘no’ to a request or demand. You constantly develop and learn new skills.
There can also be more leisure time. You might even want to add an existing hobby or passion to your portfolio. Michelle is a city events organiser who discovered Pilates after having bad back problems and decided to train to teach it. She says she enjoys the blend of two very different jobs, allowing her to express who she really is. She also earns more than she would by doing her city job full time.
So, who’s doing it? Young people starting out on a career; those who want their own business but not yet ready to give up their jobs; those who have other responsibilities and need a work/life blend; people over 50 who still want to work but do not more of the same; and those with disabilities. It’s not a career pattern for everyone but those who have embraced it rarely go back to a traditional career.
So - where to start?
It helps if you are an excellent time manager and organiser, able to work well under pressure, comfortable with little separation between your work and the rest of your life, a risk taker, self directed, high energy, assertive, comfortable being your own boss, not hung up on financial security, a networker and marketer, someone who can work to deadlines and who learns from their mistakes. You need to be a self-starter and preferably not a perfectionist. Breathless? Welcome to the world of portfolio careers.
The book and our website promote portfolio careers as a very real option today with many pluses for organisations, as well as for individuals. We’ve written this because we’re excited about helping people to realise ‘there is another way’ to earn money, derive meaning and hey, even to sprinkle a little magic into our working lives. You can and should be the architect of your own future.
And how do we answer the dreaded question, ‘And what do you do?’
Simple. We say, ‘I have a portfolio career’, then step back and wait for the questions that follow...
Barrie then says “ I am an author, part time Chairman of Axia Interactive Media, non exec director of Three Albion Place – the successor to the old Leeds Club, I present on portfolio careers and the pluses of being 50 plus, I blog on both these subjects and am currently writing my first ebook”.
Katie says “I am an author, communications consultant, conference host and producer, presentation and media coach, reporter for BBC Click, voice overs for TV programmes, blogger and presenter.”
If you have a portfolio career or want to know more about it look at Barrie and Katie's website: www.portfoliocareers.net.
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