Young people on the hopes, misconceptions and barriers of self-employment : Part 1

In this post, Sonia, our Community Advocate, shares our collective learnings of supporting young people to explore self-employment through our last programme, focusing on representation, money and exploration.

A handdrawn illustration of a person surrounded by flying stacks of paper on pink background. — Illustration by our alumni Jane

Through our talent programmes, we want to support and empower young people to trial different ways of working, such as self-employment. This route isn't often talked about as a valid career choice, and there are many misconceptions and barriers in the way.

We highlight the key themes we came across in this blogpost in hope that others supporting young people - whether you’re a mentor, parent, carer, colleague or employer - gain more understanding of what’s missing in the “you could just work for yourself“ conversation.

Throughout this two-part blog (read part two here), you’ll see many visuals, quotes and resources which were created by the six young people who were part of our last cohort. Instead of asking for CV’s*, to demonstrate their skills as part of the interview process for the programme, we asked them to work on something that they think will help other young people to engage with self-employment.

The cohort openly shared their perspectives and experiences with us which we’ve taken on board with the design of the programme. Below we share how we have supported our young people with their needs too but we’d also like to encourage you to think about ideas or conversations to take into your communities, families or teams where young people are present and struggling to find a path right for them.

*if you’re interested in this recruitment approach that prioritises strengths and skills, check out our upcoming recruitment workshops and resources

Representation

In his task blog, Blue says “To see others doing what we’re dreaming of, no matter how niche or unformed that idea may yet be, is a crucial way of encouraging people to take that first time.” The young people we have had the pleasure to work with have not been exposed to different types of employment simply because of where they come from and what respectable “work” looks like in their community. The lack of representation and exposure in not only present day but also our past was mentioned by Chantelle, who for their task created a graphic illustration of George Africanus (see below), Nottingham's first black entrepreneur, whose story is barely ever shared - discover more on his life here.

Digital rainbow line drawing of George Africanus on black background. Writing below - George Africanus, Entrepreneur, Nottingham, 17-1800's — Illustration by our alumni Chantelle

Digital white line drawing of George Africanus on blotted purple pink background. Writing below - George Africanus, Entrepreneur, Nottingham, 17-1800's — Illustration by our alumni Chantelle

Throughout the programme we organised for a range of different people who are self-employed to join our meet & greets with the young people, such as Siana Bangura (activist), Anna Rigby (graphic designer) and Ferzana Shan (multidisciplinary artist). This group of people generously shared their background, skills, knowledge and journey within self-employment through their own lens of being a black woman / a working mum / new to funding / juggling paid and freelance work. These hour-long chats were important for our cohort. “I appreciated.. having the conversations with different people, meet and greets, seeing people who are succeeding in what they are doing.” said Mika, when asked about which aspects of the programme helped her to gain more understanding and confidence about her skills and strengths. We found that sometimes all it takes is to see other people’s skills in action to help you discover your path. “It was unfamiliar as to how to do this [start freelancing] with my particular skillset whereas I understand now.” said Chantelle.

Money

“..when you’re surviving day to day, you’re focused on making money as fast as possible to cover immediate expenses and essentials. Self-employment often doesn’t bring in quick cash; there’s a myriad of start-up expenses, there’s taxes; there are clients to get and packaging and marketing and advertising and algorithms to learn/battle and editing and on and on and so it’s absolutely crucial to understand just how much support is needed and to offer it, consistently in the short and long term.” says Blue. Money plays a massive part in whether someone is able to persue their freelance career, and conversations about money are often brushed aside or done in a whisper.

On our programme, we ran workshops on self-employment, financial wellbeing and budgeting where voicing thoughts about money was a norm, and anyone could ask for guidance more specific to their situation. These were run by Emma Torrance and our accountant Michelle Williams - freelancers themselves. They talked our cohort through navigating self-employment when you’re also receiving benefits, how this impacts your payments and the support available to kickstart this (like New Enterprise Allowance). “.. I now know more about ko-fi, patreon and other different ways I can put myself out there that can generate income such as studio vlogs and ads.“ said Lucy at the end of the programme. We also paid our cohort a London living wage. This allowed them to take the next step with their practice - get a space, buy a client a coffee, buy equipment, pay off debt - more on this in our Impact Report.

Exploration

The society we live in creates pressure to narrow your path before you reach adulthood. “.. there is no opportunity given to actually learn how to do something that you might not be the absolute best at from the outset, but that with time and effort and support, you could become really, really good at; even master. there’s just this massive rush to live your life in as linear fashion as humanly possible and everything else, including your own desires, is basically shoved to the side.” says Blue. This begins very early, for example, as you choose options in secondary school, further narrowing down a “specialism” into college - the window for play and curiosity that’s allowed gets smaller and smaller.

Through our programme, young people experienced a variety of ways of flexible working (remote and in person), teams (sole freelancers and teams of 30) and structures (not for profits, cic’s, flat hierarchy workplaces). Additionally, they got to work on a variety of tasks and projects. As an example, one person in our 2021 cohort was able to explore working with animation, social media marketing, impact reporting, user research, data analysis, structures and processes in the workplace. Many of our cohort also didn’t think that part-time freelancing was a viable option alongside contracted part-time work. However, our flexibility allowed them to seek other contracted/freelance work alongside the programme. This experience would not be possible in any one contracted role, at least not within the world of work we live in currently, yet it makes so much sense for young people to have this time to explore and understand their needs and ways of working more.

Take me to part 2!

Thanks to Mika, Chantelle, Lucy, Blue, Taylor and Casey for their contributions. Find out more about this cohort through our Impact Report. If you’d like support on how you can support people with discovering the world of work that works for them, get in touch - we’re at hello@collaborativefuture.co.uk. Below are other ways we can work together.