Looking For Alternative Ways Of Making A Living In A Recession – Ways To Distinguish Between Good And Bad Opportunities

The current global crisis calls to mind the situation in the period 1980-85, a time of equally high levels of job losses as in 2009-10. In the early 80s recession the economy suffered from a marked retrenchment in traditional industries, so that a high number of engineering and similar jobs disappeared or were very hard to find. I find it fascinating to observe the similarities between that earlier recession, and current conditions, in terms of the kinds of dodgy vacancies that I saw advertised, and are offered once more today, a high proportion of these in door to door sales jobs, which nobody would have any interest in, if employment opportunities were not in such short supply.

And yet, there are contrasts between the early eighties and now, as a result of the development of Internet business and a variety of genuine online jobs in existence at the current time, which did not exist 25 years ago. While the idea that people can work from home existed before, the Internet has greatly widened the possibilities for setting up your own home office.

I do not doubt that there are lucrative jobs selling things or working for yourself, however it is important to distinguish good from bad jobs, and steer clear of jobs promoting a fairly dubious product. Once in the eighties I was invited for interview with a company promoting a new business directory. I was supposed to go to businesses asking them to buy an entry in this. I suspected that this supposed directory had little chance of coming into being, and declined the position. The directory never appeared, so anyone who bought an entry in it would have wasted their money.

Once I enquired about a position marketing financial investments, and was requested to turn up at a hotel for an interview. It is quite normal for companies to rent rooms in hotels in order to hold interviews. However, when I arrived there, I found this outfit in fact used the hotel as an office. Before they agreed to hire me, I was expected to to sell 5 investment plans, to my friends and family. In other words, I was simply being used as a way of getting leads from my circle of contacts. You will not be surprised to learn that I have that one a wide berth.

Then there were the commission-only door-to-door sales roles I put my hand to. A lot of people find doorstep salemen to be a pest, and it turned out to be a markedly discouraging episode. Householders will think of a variety of unpleasant ways of informing you they have no interest in your product. I also tried my hand at telesales, which was better in once sense since it enabled me to work from home, yet that if anything was worse. People find it a lot easier to put the phone down on somebody than to shut a door in their face.

The sales jobs are less plentiful now as a lot of areas have been designated as ‘no cold calling’ areas, and most of the telephone selling jobs have gone to India. Nevertheless, recently I went for a vacancy in telephone research, which I assumed would be more suitable as I was not asking people to buy something. Unfortunately, I discovered that very few people were interested in answering my questions, and some simply put down the phone straight away. I threw in the towel after a day.

Therefore, given that normal jobs are continuing to be scarce, are there any alternatives that are genuine opportunities? After trying out various dead-ends I finally found out about Internet business opportunities. There are some publicized on various online jobs boards, but you can also find websites specialising in the topic of Internet business itself. Jobs like these enable people to work from home, therefore there is no need to travel to work. Many such jobs may involve a reasonable investment, but I can speak from my own experience that online jobs are infinitely better than trying to sell stuff door-to-door or by phone. After entering this area a while ago, I haven’t personally regretted it.