ON THE BOOK SHELF: THE END OF JOBS (Freedom Without the 9-5)
Taylor Pearson is the author of THE END OF JOBS (Freedom Without the 9-5).
The book tells how to be an entrepreneur to “create freedom, meaning and wealth in their lives.”
Taylor Pearson spent 3 years meeting with hundreds of entrepreneurs from Los Angeles to Vietnam, Brazil to New York. He worked with dozens of them in industries. He found one commonality: “entrepreneurship was more accessible, profitable and safer…while jobs were riskier and less profitable.
The jobs are spin-offs of the internet, such as online marketing, content editing, travel gear sales, freelance software development and web designing.
Pearson attended a conference in Bangkok with 300 entrepreneurs with college degrees. They were from Argentina, Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Russia, Saudi Arabia, and South Africa. With modern communication technology, more people around the world have access to college degrees. This makes entrepreneurship possible around the globe.
What is the mindset that makes entrepreneurship possible? According to Steve Jobs it is this: “Everything around you that you call life was made up by people that were no smarter than you. You can change the life around you. You can influence it. You can build your own things that other people can use. Once you learn that you’ll never be the same again.”
What is the difference between a job and entrepreneurship? “Entrepreneurship is connecting, creating and inventing systems be they businesses, people, ideas or processes. A job is the act of following the operating system someone else created.”
Pearson believes that we are at peak jobs and approaching the end of jobs. Many reasons account for this: communication technology, higher education more readily available, machine/robotics software.
A technology job in the U.S. with a salary of $82,000 per year can be handled by a college-degreed person in Vietnam or Philippines for $12,000 per year. That explains the outsourcing of white collar jobs.
The Internet and mobile phones have changed everything. With 2 billion smart phones in the world, we compete globally. Within the next decade 5 billion people worldwide will own smartphones. Think of those possibilities, especially in education. People in Africa went from communicating with drums to communicating with the cell phone. They never had the infrastructure for the land line.
Consider the past economies:
Agriculture Economy (1300-1700) used natural resources as the basis of wealth. You counted your wealth in land.
Industrial Economy (1700-1900) was the Rise of the Rothschilds, moving from agricultural to industrial jobs. You counted your wealth in capital. Banks were developed to provide the capital.
Knowledge Economy (1900-2000) moved from capital to knowledge, from banker to CEO and the corporation. IBM was the big player.
Ascendance of Entrepreneur–2000…. moves from the corporation to the individual. We now have more capital and more knowledge than ever before. What’s needed is entrepreneurship. It takes a while for society to catch up to the new economy. On earth there are all four economies present, but the Age of the Entrepreneur is rising.
Pearson says we are not living in a safe and predictable world any longer. Vast empires are brought down by a single event. A career that was safe for the past forty years will not be safe for the next forty years.
You will read how new markets are created every day. Apprenticeships are the method to learn new skills.
However, Pearson reminds us that this future will not create itself. He explains, “The opportunity is real. But, it’s one of many possible futures.” Pearson believes we live in a society of indefinite optimism. But you must step up to seize it.
Pearson provides many free resources: the interviews with the ten entrepreneurs, 67 business books to fuel your entrepreneurial career, 49 Tools and Templates to launch a business, and a 90-day goal setting worksheet to help you take the first step, the second step and the next.
This is a very practical book with lots of good advice and help. We can all use his optimism!