I have nuanced thoughts on this, but broadly, I think it is healthier to approach work with the mindset that the reason you’re there is it provides you things you couldn’t do yourself and that you always have a BATNA of doing it yourself.
One nuanced thought which exercising the BATNA will demonstrate in a level of detail we socially attempt to protect people from: some people are adequately valued or overvalued by the formal labor market, insofar as they would not be higher producing outside current firm/role.
Two interesting consequences of increasingly liquid labor markets:
“Work at someone else’s business or run your own business” are not lifelong commitments or even very restrictive career paths these days. I have many colleagues who did a business before; many likely will after.
“Work at someone else’s business or run your own business” are not lifelong commitments or even very restrictive career paths these days. I have many colleagues who did a business before; many likely will after.
The increasingly legible options for doing your own thing are going to feedback loop into various labor markets much more than they have historically.
No employer of mid list journalists can avoid the brute facts of the Substack leaderboard, for example.
No employer of mid list journalists can avoid the brute facts of the Substack leaderboard, for example.
Third bonus observation: software, platforms, networks, and markets increasingly provide accessible and often adequate substitutions for the goods and services which historically have been provided by firms, in the Theory of the Firm sense.
