The Gig is Up! At Least for Now...

"There's numerous ways you can choose to earn funds."  -- Prodigy, Mobb Deep

So for the past few years I've had a bit of an unconventional work situation.

I didn't plan it this way.

As you might know if you read this blog, or know me from Real Life, I started a business during business school.  It went sideways (no shame in my game, I learned from it!), but along the way I picked up a few side jobs that I knew I'd need to support myself & family with cash flow while trying to launch the business.

So even after the business went tapioca, I found myself still doing some things that I loved (Adjunct teaching at three different schools, plus Army Reserve), and something that I sometimes loved but sometimes didn't love (tutoring).  If you added up all the money I made annually, it basically worked out to what you'd expect from a Sloan MBA a couple years out.  So it wasn't all bad, for sure.

But the Gig Economy ain't all about glamour and freedom!

When you sort of "string it together" with a part-time job medley, you do have some nice upsides:

• You're not going to the same office everyday, in the same way, with the same people 
• You've got a lot of so-called "anti-fragility" built in to your employment situation; that is to say, one particular job could ebb, or flow, and the system is robust enough to handle that (this is important, underrated, and not something that people with 'just one' job might realize)
• Your income isn't really 'capped' in the way a salaried income is...I guess that cuts both ways, but I'll just say that some months (October and April, usually) can be really, really lucrative, with the work (and the dollars!) flowing handsomely.  
• In theory at least, you could carve out time in your day for creative pursuits, like writing.  At a more traditional job, I feel like that'd be harder to pull off, as you're on someone else's clock.

However, in come the downsides:

• No benefits.  If you're lucky enough that one of your 'gigs' covers health insurance for you and your dependents, then that's a big win.  But things like paid leave, 401(k) matching, etc.?  Don't expect it...but I guess if you really made it big, money-wise, you could sort of build a DIY bennie package...
• You're sort of 'always working.'  THIS is the part that's hardest to explain/convey to someone who does the regular 'punch-in/punch-out' sort of thing.  Let's say you're teaching a class in Boston at 9:30 a.m., tutoring a kid in Harvard Square at 2, and then teaching near Kenmore from 6:00 p.m. to 8:30 p.m.  That day starts with a train leaving Lowell before 8, and it ends with a train getting BACK into Lowell at 10:30-ish.  Admittedly, there are gaps in that schedule.  It's not fair or accurate to call that day "15 hours of work."  But here's the rub -- that's not entirely inaccurate, either.  Teaching and tutoring both involve preparation beforehand, not to mention travel time.  On top of that, there's the 'buffer time' -- if I'm meeting you at Starbucks or ABP at 2:00 p.m., that doesn't say "show up at 2 p.m." to me -- it says get there beforehand, settle in, etc.  
• There can be a not-so-nice degree of uncertainty.  Around the holidays, or in early June? Tutoring can slow to a halt.  During peak?  It could break $2k/wk, multiple weeks in a row.  
• Taxes can be nasty when you're earning those big bucks on 1099-MISC.  

All that laid out there, no one who voluntarily casts their lot into Gig-Town should deserve your sympathy.  

Someone who complains all day about Adjunct teaching pay & predictability but "just loves to teach?"  Tell them there are openings in the public schools, and watch how quickly they change the subject.  

I've wondered on many occasions whether I should 'give it up' and start shaving, wearing a suit, and knocking on some doors in vicinity of Atlantic, State, and Devonshire with some resumes in hand. 

Thankfully, I didn't have to -- a full-time opportunity to do some uniformed work out of Devens, (with some occasional travel to Dix and Totten), stumbled upon me, and I'm going to do it, effective the first of July.  

So for a while, anyway, I'll get to feel normal.  I've got some evening teaching commitments through mid-August, but once those are done, I'll drive to work in the morning at a normal time, like a normal person...and then do the same thing in reverse at the end of the day.    

The only downside?  The duration is unknown.  It might be three months, or it might be three years. 

And whenever that train runs out of steam, it's either back to the gigs, or it's the shave-and-a-suit option, which the would-be entrepreneur in me always seems to want to resist.    

Either way, I'll be grateful.  

Before this new thing and its start date became official, I felt quite a bit of stress -- and this stress was far different, and far worse than anything I ever felt during some never-ending workday with a FILO (first-in, last-out) train schedule.  This was the stress of uncertainty, and even feeling it for that brief period of time was a great reminder that while we can argue all day about whether it's better to have 5 jobs or 1 job, one thing should be ironclad -- either number is far, far better than zero.