My inspiring trip to Istanbul has encouraged me to make a few important decisions about my self-employment idea - I'm going to have a serious stab at setting up my architecture practice. Apart from this, I've also come up with a few interesting theories about the idea of self-employment.
Istanbul has made me think about the differences between the proportion of self-employed vs employed in emerging economies in comparison with developed nations. Common sense dictates that a higher proportion of people in developed nations are employed because of the better employment opportunities on offer. Plus, with fairer employment laws and greater employee rights, employment is a much easier option for most people. This is the different in less-developed nations where there are fewer employment opportunities and being self-employed is in many cases the only option.
Many businesses in old Istanbul are established more than 50 years ago. For instance, the oldest Turkish delight shop in Istanbul is 232 years old (est. 1777). What's the formula for their business longevity? Apart from low operating costs and uncompromising product quality, I think it might be because there is a strong culture of self-employment there.
Being employed is a relatively new idea compared to self-employment, only becoming widespread beginning with the industrial revolution and the rise of division of labour.
People thinking of self-employment and starting up are often reminded that 80% of new businesses don't survive for more than 5 years. It conjures an image of businesses going bankrupt but I think people give up self-employment because they find after a few years that it so much easier to be employed, and not because their self-employment idea is a dead end. Therefore, do not be deterred by this statistic.
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