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Previously, I’ve written about being a Permissionless Student, and why it is important to master the skill of learning as a young person in the 2020s. One of the ways I mentioned to become an expert at a subject was through work experience and putting amounts of reps at a skill.
Building this work experience can be a true game-changer for your career. The reps you will put in now will explode the trajectory of your growth in the next five years, and will open completely unimaginable doors to your career.
How to Build Work Experience
If you’re a student or a drop-out who is looking to build your work experience, you have three ways to get started.
First, you can apply for an internship at a startup or established company. Working in a business will give you tons of lessons on what it takes to build revenue streams and work with a team. Interning at large companies also offers several perks of comfort, such as a heavy stipend, company merch, and other benefits.
Second, you can apply for an apprenticeship under an accomplished creator or subject expert. This is best for you if you’re looking for close mentorship, and will give you a chance to prove yourself to an industry expert who will bat for you long after your work for them ends.
The third and most powerful way to build work experience is to start a side hustle. Think of side hustles as mini entrepreneurial ventures, with a solopreneur managing a steady stream of recurring revenue.
Why Start a Side Hustle
When you start a side hustle, you take significant risks, while individually owning the deliverables of your work. This forces you to learn several disparate but important skills at once. Further, working under tight deadlines and under the pressure of the risks you take will accelerate your learning while polishing your skills into the best in the business.
I started my side hustles when I was a teenager, and the skills they forced me to learn pretty much shaped the trajectory of my career, including two career pivots and eventually finding my life’s calling. Ten years ago, the digital economy was barely starting, and I didn’t have many options to run a successful side hustle without putting in copious amounts of travel and monetary investment.
Building a successful side hustle is also an excellent way to build expertise in your domains to be accepted as an apprentice under successful mentors, or for internships at prestigious companies.
How to Start a Side Hustle
Today, with the creator economy in its full boom, you have countless options to create successful businesses from the comfort of your home or dorm room. If you’re a young person looking to develop skills, earn your income, and build a reputation for your work, here’s how to get started.
Notion Templates
Notion-based products and services have an incredibly large market, and if you’re looking for every way you can monetize your Notion skills, check out my post on it here. But one of the easiest ways to get started with a Notion side hustle is to create Notion templates and list them for sale on digital marketplaces such as Gumroad, Etsy, and Lemonsqueezy.
Popular Notion template creators are earning thousands of dollars every month from their side hustles.
No-Code Consulting
No-code skills are suddenly in high demand at fast-growing startups and companies, and you can build a side hustle as a no-code consultant. This includes building websites, apps, and automations for a wide range of business processes with an eye of efficiency and speed.
No-code consultants have expertise in tools such as Webflow, Bubble, Notion, Airtable, Zapier, etc, and can confidently advise companies on their infrastructure and workflow strategies.
Web Development
Businesses are always looking for experts to help them with website design and development, and landing page optimization. Web developers are able to successfully monetize their skills in website development, UI/UX design, and brand design.
Web development as a side hustle requires expertise in tools such as Webflow, Wordpress, Framer, and other no-code tools that help you design beautiful websites.
Social Media Marketing
Communication strategy is always evergreen, and businesses always need advisors to reach out to their customers better. Social media marketing can be a very lucrative side hustle, especially if you have expert skills for specific platforms.
Twitter growth requires a different approach than building a base on Linkedin, and Instagram’s visual demands require a very different set of skills. And Youtube is a separate monster altogether.
Successful social media marketers command high monthly retainers while being sought-after by the biggest influencers and celebrities for their skills. If you want to be a holistic brand manager, learn copywriting, graphic design, video editing, newsletter and podcast management, Youtube growth strategies, etc.
Graphic Designer
Graphic designers help clients with assignments ranging from web design to marketing collateral design to social media post design. Logo and brand guidelines design is also a very popular service that graphic designers get highly compensated for.
If you’re just getting started, learn skills related to illustration, branding, and tools such as Canva, Figma, and Adobe Photoshop. You can start by offering simple services such as social media post design for marketing requirements but quickly upgrade to designing websites and apps, promotional materials, and Youtube thumbnails.
Get Started
I run Build Academy, with several successful properties such as No Code Weekend, Block Party, and a host of other exciting projects. I’m always happy to work with young people, and I have a team of school and college students who I closely mentor. If you’re interested in joining the team, please apply here for open positions.
