What I love most about the concept of Workstyling is the idea of styling your work to suit your lifestyle. We’re not talking about styling your work outfits, in case you’re wondering. But styling your actual work.
We are used to thinking about a job as something we need to find. What if we could create it and design it instead? What if we could have the freedom and independence to design our own life?
Because even if you are not a workaholic, it’s very likely that your job influences many other decisions you make in your life.
Think about it:
- Have you ever moved because of a job?
- Have you ever chosen a fitness course because of its convenient time after work?
- Have you ever shopped your outfits thinking about what your colleagues and boss would think?
- Have you ever adapted your hair or make-up style to your job?
- Have you ever given up on a hobby because you couldn’t fit it into your work schedule?
- Have you ever been forced to organize a trip during peak season because you couldn’t choose your days off?
- Have you ever taken personal and family decisions that were not optimal for you depending on your work?
- Have you ever had to take days off work and use up your holidays to care for a sick child or another family member?
- Have you ever wished you could sleep longer and work in the evening when you are more productive?
- …
I could go on and on, these are just a few examples of how work influences our life and how often people organize their life around their jobs.
Does it have to be this way? For many jobs yes, it does. But thanks to technology, many of the so-called knowledge economy jobs are now moving away from this old paradigm. Many companies are realizing the importance of flexibility and remote work and see this as a way to attract the best talents on the market. Many people are now realizing how we should start designing our lives and then find (or create) a job that fits into our optimal lifestyle.
There are obviously different levels of freedom even when talking about online careers. The revolutionary aspect is that you can choose. You have the possibility to style your work in a way that makes you feel good, with the level of risk and freedom you are willing to accept. As we’ve already talked about in another post, location independence is not only for backpackers.
Here at Workstyling we identify four main types of online workstyles, that you can mix and match to find your ideal one. You are also free to move from one to the other depending on your current situation.
Digital Nomads are people who are willing to take on very high risks and they are rewarded with a great amount of freedom. Their main priority is traveling, they are willing to bootstrap and take on short-term, unstable gigs. They value time over money or career and they very much prefer going out, adventuring and exploring, instead of building a long-term sustainable income. For now.
Online Entrepreneurs, per definition, are willing to risk even more. They invest all of their time and money into building a business (or many businesses). They want to be their own bosses, don’t take orders from anyone, work hard and hustle to create something they can be proud of. What differentiates them from “standard” entrepreneurs is that they use technology to build a business that runs completely online, so that they can be location independent and live wherever they please, without being tied down to a place.
Freelancers have the freedom even in their name. They have the freedom to choose their own working times, areas of work, clients and specialization. On the other hand, they risk not having financial stability if they can’t find enough clients and they depend on the decisions of their clients to keep working with them. They work from anywhere, just with their laptop and decide at any time how much they want to work, depending both on their financial situation and the priorities they have at the moment.
Remote workers are the ones who have the highest security, they work for a company and have a fixed salary and job role. They obviously still enjoy the location independence of an online job, but they often have working hours. The perks of staying at home, maybe to care for their kids, and avoiding the commute are the biggest reasons why they choose a remote job against a traditional one.
If you are not sure which profile is yours (or if you already know and want to see if we agree with you) take our free test “What is your Workstyle?” and let us know the results in the comments!
Whatever profile you choose (or combination of profiles), you have the freedom to choose it. Start from here, and choose all the other aspects of your work to fit your preferences, priorities, passions, and lifestyle. Sign up below for our free course to help you do exactly this!