The Next Generation

Did you become a freelancer by choice or were you ‘pushed’? And, now that you work this way, is it a career path you’d encourage your children to follow? In a recent survey commissioned by Capital One Aspire, the results show that parents and children are pretty much on the same page when it comes to what they believe is the best career choice. In fact, eight of the 10 top career choices were the same, though not necessarily in the same order.

A key finding included;
- both children (ranked at no 4) and parents (at no 6) put being an entrepreneur in their top 10 career choices – that’s 52% of parents who would encourage their children to start their own businesses/be their own boss.

As a freelance journalist who is watching her 22-year-old son embark on a career as a freelancer in film production, how do I feel about him joining me in the freelance ranks? Honestly?

I feel mixed about it. On the one hand, I can see that it’s pretty much the only way to go in the industry he wants to work in and, also, it gives him a lot of flexibility to pursue creative output of his own – for instance, he’s making his own short, so he has time to work on that (ie, he’s not getting paid work every day [yet?!]). But I also think he’s missing out on the community and camaraderie you get from working with the same group of people day in, day out. When you’re young especially, I think you need that.

What’s good though, is that I’m able to help him with things like how to keep his accounts and how to invoice, things like that. And, also, that I know it’s perfectly possible to build a good living on the freelance track.

And what does my son, Alex, think about carrying on the family tradition?

“Maybe because you’ve been freelance all my life, it’s had some impact on me on an unconscious level, but that’s not why I got into working freelance – it’s just how the industry I’m getting into works.”
How would you feel if your offspring followed you into freelance working? We’d love to hear.

By Liz Granirer