Entrepreneurship in the 2nd Half of Life

COVID-19 will push many of you into entrepreneurship in the 2nd half of life.

I wrote about this previously in the post The Necessity Entrepreneur – A Path to Freedom and on the podcast episode, Are You Prepared to be an ‘After the Age of 50’ Entrepreneur?

Many of you will be pushed into entrepreneurship just like Paul Tasner. Paul was laid off at the age of 66 with little prospect for a new job approximately ten years ago.

At 66, he created PulpWorks Inc., designers, and manufacturers of biodegradable packaging for consumer goods.

I interviewed Paul on the Repurpose Your Career podcast in the episode, Paul Tasner Became an Entrepreneur at Age 66.

Please watch his TED talk!

Entrepreneurship in the 2nd half of life is a possibility.

Building a Business is Not for Me

You are probably thinking that you need to hire staff, rent office or manufacturing space, and/or have a lot of money. Well, that belief has never been further from the truth.

There are just two employees at Pulpworks, Paul and his co-founder.

I run Career Pivot, which is really Marc Miller and Associates, LLC as a sole proprietor LLC. I have no employees but I do have a virtual assistant, book partner, book cover designer, a web development team, and I recently joined the Smart Passive Income Pro community to get help.

Listen to the most recent episode

What I am telling you is entrepreneurship in the 2nd half of life is different than what you may think.

Entrepreneurship in the 2nd Half of Life May Be Your Only Choice

The unemployment numbers are pretty grim for those of us who are over 55 years of age.

New research by The New SchoolSchwartz Center for Economic Policy Analysis says that 50% of older workers have been pushed into early retirement which accounts for about 3 million people and they expect another 1.5 million to follow them in the coming months.

The report states:

Since March 2020, 2.9 million workers ages 55-70 left the labor force, 50% more than the 1.9 million older workers who left the labor force three months after the Great Recession began in 2007. In percentage terms, 7% of older workers left the labor force in recent months, compared with 4.7% of older workers in the Great Recession.¹

The following chart is included:

For those of us who lived through the great recession, it looks like this will be much worse. Rather than find a job many will retire, but unfortunately, that was probably not the plan.

I predict this will get worse before it gets better. If you want to keep working, your only choice may be entering entrepreneurship in the 2nd half of life.

Remote Work will be the Great Equalizer

In less than six months working remotely has become common. This will make gig work or building a consulting business much easier as clients will be more likely to engage with people outside of their geographic region. As long as you can accommodate any time difference between you and your client then your client could be just about anywhere.

Do not be surprised that companies in the post-COVID-19 world rely on contractors and consultants to a greater degree as they will want to mitigate risk. Companies will not want to rapidly hire.

You will have to become adept at using a variety of remote tools, like Google Meet, Zoom, Skype, Google Drive, and DropBox. I have spent several years formulating my strategies for using these tools in low bandwidth environments.

Your ability to work remotely for just about anyone, anywhere in the world will make entrepreneurship in the 2nd half of life much easier.

I Have a Secure Job, Can I Wait?

Can you wait? Sure. Should you wait? Absolutely not.

There are no secure jobs anymore. Who predicted in December of 2019, that we would have depression-era unemployment rates by the summer of 2020? No one!

Now is the time to start something even if it is on the side. Do not wait.

Your next thought is, “Where do I start?”

I recommend you get the book, WISER: The Definitive Guide to Starting a Business after the Age of 50, by Wendy Mayhew. This book will not guide you on your entrepreneurial journey but it will help you determine whether an entrepreneurial journey is for you. It comes with a lot of online resources that, in my humble opinion, are more valuable than the book itself.

I interview Wendy on the Repurpose Your Career podcast in the Spring of 2020. You can listen to that episode in the post, Are You Prepared to be an ‘After the Age of 50’ Entrepreneur? [Podcast].

Have I Scared You?

As with Paul Tasner, many who enter entrepreneurship in the 2nd half of life, do it when they are pushed by outside forces. Paul was laid off. I was working for a sociopath and was sick of being abused.

If you have read this post this far, there is something pushing you to think about entrepreneurship in the 2nd half of life.

What is your next step?

Marc Miller

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