How to Stop Being an Employee

By Paul Piotrowski

Most employees think that when they work for a company, the reason they work there is because the company pays them a certain amount per month and they need that amount to pay their bills. This is only partly true.

In reality, the real reason employees continue to be employees is because of something I call the “Uncertainty Factor”. What does that mean? Well, basically what it means is that when you work for someone else, you make an agreement with them to exchange a certain amount of value for a certain wage. However, in most cases it is not the wage that you’re truly going after but rather the CERTAINTY that you will get that wage.

For example, lets say that you are a top notch computer graphics artist. You have the ability to create amazing computer graphics that you know are valuable in the industry. You hear about freelancers getting paid top dollar for such work. However, you find yourself working at a “stable job” making a stable but not so exciting salary. Why? In the majority of cases, it is because you are addicted to the CERTAINTY of knowing that you’re going to get a steady paycheck at the end of the month. It’s not the size of the paycheck, but rather it’s stability. You’re addicted to guarantees.

Here is the main difference between an employee, and an entrepreneur.

Employee:

1. INPUT (Do what you’re asked to do.)
2. OUTPUT (You get a paycheck.)

Entrepreneur:

1. INPUT (You follow your dream.)
2. UNCERTAINTY
3. OUTPUT (You get paid.)

Essentially, as an employee you just have to make sure you show up to work, do what you’re asked to do, and then collect a paycheck. As an entrepreneur, however, you have to first figure out what you want to do, then figure out how that’s going to make money, then do that thing, and then there is a level of uncertainty in the middle of whether it will work and whether the value you create will be converted to cash, and then there’s the output which is you getting paid.

That middle part, the uncertainty is what kills most people’s ambitions of being an entrepreneur. Everyone wants the “Employee” benefits inside the “Entrepreneur” model and it just doesn’t work that way. There are no guarantees.

Do you guys realize that when I started Blogging two years ago, I had absolutely no guarantees that I would ever make money doing this? Nobody offered me any kind of pay to Blog. Nobody told me that if I do A, B, C, D etc. that I would be guaranteed to make money. Nobody said this would work. In fact, most people say that this doesn’t work. Interent Marketing, just like any other entrepreneurial venture is full of risk. There are no guarantees.

So how the heck did I stick to this and kept at it, researching, tweaking, learning, studying and adjusting my strategy for over two years before ever making more than a few dollars a month? The reason I was able to do it is because I have a much higher tolerence for UNCERTAINTY than most people. Why? Because this isn’t my first venture. I’ve been running businesses since I left highschool. I’ve failed many times and each time I put a lot of work and in most cases money into my projects, only to see them “fail”. However, each time I did this I learned something, so I didn’t classify them as “failures” in my mind, I classified them as learning experiences.

If you want to ever stop being an employee and move into being in business for yourself, you need to start embracing uncertainty instead of avoiding or running away from it. I know it’s not easy, and I still do it as well to a degree in some parts of my life, but you need to start getting comfortable with it. You can start small and work your way up. You don’t need to “stake the farm” on a single business idea, but you need to start taking more risks. If you don’t have money, just start risking your time.

I think the reason most “employee minded” people won’t even try entrepreneurship is because they have no idea how much higher the payouts can be. Here’s what they think the formulas is:

Either be an employee and get this:

1. Do what you’re asked to do.
2. Get paid $40,000/year guaranteed.

or be an Entrepreneur and get this:

1. Figure out what you need to do and do it.
2. Uncertainty whether it will work.
3. If it does work, you may make $40,000/year or maybe $45,000/year for doing same work as employee.

In reality, the Entrepreneur model is more like this:

1. Figure out what you need to do and do it.
2. Uncertainty whether it will work.
3. If it doesn’t work, you either make $0, or you lose money and perhaps even bankrupt the business. If it works out poorly, you may make $20,000/year. If it works out average, you may make $60,000/year. If it works out nicely you might make $240,000/year. If it really works out of you, you may make $750,000 per MONTH or more.

I know that to most people figures like that are beyond the realm of possibility. Meaning, most “normal” people laugh if you were to even propose that they could make $750,000 per month or more. They just don’t believe it. However, entrepreneurs out there are doing this right now and they’re probably not any smarter than you are…they’re just more able to handle risk and uncertainty. There are also a whole bunch of entrepreneurs right now filing for bankruptcy. That’s the UNCERTAINTY that keeps people employed as employees working for someone else. They don’t want to take that kind of risk themselves so they offload that responsibility onto their boss who takes that risk on their behalf and in exchange ends up making a profit for providing such “security” to the employee.

I’m not saying this is good or bad. That’s just the way it is. I’ve been in situations before where I worked for businesses where I didn’t want to participate in sharing the risk with the owner of the business so I demanded a salary to work there. I’ve also been in situations where I traded in my salary for a pure performance based compensation structure. I’ve also been in the situations where I was the owner of a business where I took all the risk personally and removed that uncertainty for my employees. I’ve been in situations where I’ve had to borrow large sums of money (basically the size of a second mortgage) against my house personally, just so that I could have enough money to cover payroll for my employees who had no idea I had to do that in order to provide them that “secure” place of having no uncertainty.

When I see people making six or even seven figure incomes, I look at them and think “There’s someone who’s probably taken some big risks in life and is comfortable with uncertainty”, while most employee minded people are probably thinking “Man that dude is grossly overpaid… he doesn’t even do anything more than I do at work… I work way harder than that guy, why does he get to make so much money?!”

So, how do you stop being an employee? You need to develop the courage necessary to deal with uncertainty. You need to be able to start taking calculated risks, start believing in yourself and your ability to not only survive but to also thrive on your own. You need to start embracing uncertainty and become comfortable with making mistakes and failing a little bit in order to learn from your mistakes.

The payoffs if you succeed are huge, and the journey is much more exciting, but it’s not for everyone.

I’ve met Bloggers who make four times the yearly income of a police officer or a fireman. I’ve seen affiliate marketers with monthly revenues about three times the yearly salary of what the President of the United States gets paid.

So many people want to make this type of money as entrepreneurs, but they don’t want to risk anything. They want no uncertainty and everything to be guaranteed and handed to them on a silver platter.

I read this in a forum once. (Paraphrased)

“Person1: I want to make money as a Blogger. Like those $25k/m Bloggers out there. What’s the first step?”
“Person2: Figure out your name, go to GoDaddy.com and register a domain name.”
“Person1: Thanks! …. ….. oh wait, it says here I have to pay $9 for the domain name.”
“Person2: Yeah…so?”
“Person1: Oh…this costs money? What if it doesn’t work out? Nevermind then…”

See what I mean? No risk tolerence. No willingness to tolerate any uncertainty. You can go and return pop bottles to go make $9 to afford a domain, but most people are too lazy to do it. If you want to stop being an employee, then learn to tolerate some uncertainty grow some balls. Learn to handle some uncertainty and take some calculated risks. Or, if you don’t want to then just accept that you’re choosing to be an employee and that’s ok too. Go find something you enjoy doing for a decent wage and stop complaining about it.