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10 Career Questions for Creative Entrepreneurs (+ a Free Assessment) · The Daily Writer

• 0:17
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome everybody to the Born to Create Podcast.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: My name is Kent Sanders and I'm your host.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_00: I'm an author, musician, and teacher.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_00: But most importantly, I'm a husband and a dad.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_00: Here on the show we talk about practices, habits, and strategies that help us live out our creative calling.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: This is episode 45, and today we're going to be talking about 10 career questions for creative entrepreneurs.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: I also have a free assessment for you, which I'll talk about a little bit later in the episode.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_00: You can find the posts and the links that accompany this episode at Kent Sanders.net slash career questions.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_00: As a creative entrepreneur, you have an endless number of career choices available to you today.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: These options can be a real blessing or they can be a real curse.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: What do I mean by that?
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_00: Well, they can be a blessing because you can tailor fit your creative work to fit your passions, gifts, and interests.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: But they can also be a curse because it's easy to get paralyzed by all these options.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_00: Over the last couple of years, I've developed several small streams of income.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_00: These include book sales, writing podcast show notes, substitute teaching, which I've since abandoned, editing and formatting books, selling stuff on Amazon, which was a total bust, developing websites, and a few other things here and there.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: And I've been truly grateful for every one of these income sources.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: However, I've also reached a point where I want to start being more intentional by focusing on the most fulfilling and sustainable streams of income.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_00: Now, I'm still a full-time college professor, and I don't have any plans to leave that position anytime soon.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_00: I truly enjoy my work at St.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_00: Louis Christian College.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: The school has been very generous in allowing me to develop courses in writing, film, the creative arts, and other topics.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_00: And I probably wouldn't have the opportunity to teach those courses at a bigger school where I would have been locked into one specific department.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_00: So don't get the impression that I'm saying I don't love my day job because I truly do, and it's a great place to work.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_00: However, I do think it's naive to think that any single job opportunity will last forever.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, what if something happens to you?
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: What if something happens to the organization?
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_00: What if something happens to your position that you happen to occupy in the organization?
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_00: Now, none of those things is a statement about my workplace or about St.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_00: Louis Christian College.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_00: Rather, that's a statement about employment in general.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, let's face it, things happen in jobs.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: That's just the nature of employment.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_00: That's the nature of the economy.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes things happen that are beyond our control, and we always need to be prepared for those things.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: In addition, I think that we all understand the importance of paying off debt, building up our savings, and creating a more secure financial future for our families.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_00: So the question really comes down to this.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_00: As a creative entrepreneur, how do you decide what opportunities to focus on when you're trying to build a side income?
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_00: I recently sat down to explore this question in my own life.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: And to be honest, I've been kind of frustrated by my own lack of direction and clarity about creative opportunities over the last couple of years.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, should I focus on writing books?
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_00: Should I focus on doing freelance work?
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_00: Should I focus on creating online courses, on speaking, on teaching guitar or teaching music, on coaching people, on consulting for area businesses?
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_00: Should I focus on helping other authors?
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, there's a million different possibilities.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_00: Now, one of the problems in addition to all this is that I have a pretty broad skill set and I can do a lot of different things.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_00: I've done a lot of different things in my life, and I can fit in just about anywhere.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_00: Now, that's definitely a good thing.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_00: However, there's a downside to that as well.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_00: Whenever you mix that with an indecisive personality like I tend to have because I'm very analytical, that can be a bad combination.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_00: When you have a lot of options and when you have a hard time deciding because you're a perfectionist, like I tend to be, you can very easily feel paralyzed and you're unable to pick a direction because you don't want to make the wrong choice.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_00: So what I did a few weeks ago is I cleared all of those concerns from my mind and I thought about all the qualities that I want to have in my ideal creative work.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_00: So I sat down for a couple of hours and I thought and I revised and I thought some more and revised some more.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_00: And what ended up happening is I developed 10 questions that represent the type of life that I want to design for myself over the long term.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_00: This doesn't mean it's going to happen tomorrow or even necessarily in the next six months or year, but it does mean that this is ideally over the long term what I want to shoot for.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: Now, these 10 questions that I'm talking about are a little bit dangerous, to be honest with you, because they give you clarity about the work you're currently doing as well as any work that you're considering.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_00: And clarity can be a really dangerous thing.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_00: The reason clarity can be dangerous is because when you have clarity, you might realize that the life you're living is not the life that you want to live.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_00: So, what I'll do in just a moment is I'll list and explain what these questions are, and then I'll describe how to use those questions to evaluate what you're currently doing as well as the opportunities that you might have.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_00: I've created a handy assessment tool that you can use to evaluate your own creative opportunities, and this tool will give you clarity on which opportunities you should think about pursuing.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_00: There is a link in the show notes to download this.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_00: It is called the Creative Entrepreneur Career Assessment, and it's simply an Excel file that has some formulas in it and some things that I'll go into after I go through these questions.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_00: One more thing before we get into what the questions are.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_00: These are my questions.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_00: Now, it doesn't mean that you can't use them.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_00: What I mean by that is that these questions don't necessarily represent your values and what's important to you and your creative work.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_00: These are simply things that are important to me.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_00: And I hope that you'll just use these as a jumping off point to decide what's really important to you.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_00: So let's dive in here.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_00: These are 10 questions that will help you determine what creative work to pursue.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_00: Number one, do I enjoy this type of work?
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: Does it give me creative fulfillment?
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_00: So the idea here is do you enjoy what you're doing?
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_00: Do you look forward to doing it?
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_00: Does it make you happy or fulfilled?
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, after all, you only have one life, so why spend your life doing something that you don't enjoy?
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_00: Number two, can I become a leader in this field with enough time and good work?
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_00: Now I realize that this value is not important to everybody.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_00: You know, not everybody wants to be a leader in their field, but for me, it is important.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't mean I have to be the most popular person or the most well-paid person or the most notable person in my field, whatever that field is.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_00: But it does mean that I want to be a recognized authority and influencer in that field.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_00: I want to be seen as a competent leader.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_00: I want to influence other people and make an impact.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_00: Number three, is there a limited income potential in this type of work?
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_00: Now, this issue of income is the very reason why I stopped substitute teaching a few months ago.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_00: Now, sure, subbing brought in a little bit of extra income, but honestly, there is, well, and this is it's this way in most industries and most jobs, but particularly I'm thinking of substitute teaching.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_00: There's a cap on how much you can earn as a substitute teacher, and it's a pretty low cap.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, let's just be honest, you're a substitute teacher.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_00: Ideally, I want to engage in a type of work where there isn't a limit on how much I can earn.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_00: I want my income to be related to the value I bring to others, not by trading dollars for hours simply.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_00: I don't necessarily need to be a multimillionaire, not this is not that there's anything wrong with that.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_00: I just want to earn enough that I don't need to worry about money.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_00: And please don't get the idea that I'm like disparaging substitute teaching or any type of job that is paid hourly.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_00: I've done lots of those kind of jobs.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_00: I actually continue to do that in freelancing.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_00: But what I'm saying is that there is a cap on that type of work.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_00: And ideally, over the long haul, I want to pursue more types of work that don't have a cap that's based on value and not just on the number of hours that you worked, if that makes sense.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_00: Number four, is there a future for me in this type of work?
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_00: Is the market potential good?
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_00: This is an important question because market realities do change over time.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_00: For example, my wife used to work at a large bookstore chain here in our city.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_00: She was a manager there and did a bunch of different jobs over her 10 years there.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_00: But, you know, when you think about the bookstore industry, that market has shrunk a lot over the past decade because of Amazon and, you know, maybe ebooks and those kind of things.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_00: And a lot of bookstores have closed because that market is changing.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_00: So the purpose of this question is to make you think about what you do and whether you're in a market that is growing or declining.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_00: Now, it doesn't mean that you shouldn't stay in that market, but what it does mean if you're in a declining market is that you need to position yourself either to be successful in that market by standing out from the competition, or you need to be able to transfer those skills that you've gained in that declining market to a different market that is growing.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_00: And that's exactly what my wife did.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: A couple of years ago, she transitioned into an event planning role with a different organization.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_00: And the cool thing was that the skills that she developed working at the bookstore have served her very well in her current role in this different organization, even though the two industries aren't related.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_00: So just because you're in a declining industry doesn't mean you shouldn't have done it.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: What it does mean is that you need to have a plan moving forward and figure out how you're going to position yourself differently, or if at some point you can use those skills that you gained in that declining market in some other type of market that is growing or where there's better potential.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_00: Number five, have other people already affirmed me in this type of work?
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's important to stick with your strengths for the most part.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_00: If other people have affirmed you in this field, whatever field we're talking about, or some type of related field, then you can capitalize on your past success and experience.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_00: However, if you have zero experience in a field where you want to thrive, you have a lot of work ahead of you.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't mean that you shouldn't pursue that type of work or that industry or market, but it does mean that you're starting from scratch and you just have to realize that's going to be the case.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_00: Number six, is this type of work scalable?
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_00: Can I do it once and get paid multiple times?
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_00: Now, as I've already mentioned, not all of these questions will resonate with you.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, you might actively really disagree with me on some of these, which is totally fine.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_00: But these questions are important to me, especially this one.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_00: There are writers and influencers like uh Dan Miller, Michael Hyatt, Pat Flynn, James Alticher, Joanna Penn, and others who've really helped me understand the genius behind what's called passive income and doing work that scales.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_00: Most people look at work as you know, you spend X amount of time and you get paid X dollars for that time.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_00: But the idea behind passive income is that you create something once and get paid many times for it.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_00: Let me give you an example.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_00: Again, I'm not trying to bash on substitute teaching, but I'm just thinking about my own kind of recent experience.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_00: When you substitute teach, you spend a day at school and you get paid one time for those hours that you spend at school.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_00: There's no possible way you can get paid any more than the cap that is put on that day's worth of pay.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_00: But if you write a book or you build an online course, that's something that you create once and you can get paid theoretically an infinite amount of times for it if you can find people who want to keep buying it.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_00: And the same is true for many other types of creative content.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_00: In other words, I want to take the lid off of my potential to create income.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_00: And one of the best ways to do this is by creating more assets.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_00: In other words, more creative work that you can then sell and repurpose in other venues.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_00: And I highly recommend that you check out a really insightful article by the author Mark McGuinness.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_00: And the article is called Forget the Career Ladder, Start Creating Assets.
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_00: And there's a link to that article in the show notes.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_00: Number seven, do I feel a sense of divine calling toward this type of work?
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_00: I think in an ideal world, you want to do creative work that provides for your needs and meshes with your gifts and talents.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_00: But that's not the only important thing.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_00: It's also really important, I think, to fulfill God's calling for your life.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_00: When it comes to your divine calling, it's important to have an inner sense of calling as well as some external affirmation.
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_00: I believe that if you're truly called to do something, other mature people of faith will affirm you in that calling.
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_00: In other words, it's not just a you and God thing, it's a you and God and other mature people around you thing.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_00: It's not enough to make art or to make money.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_00: I think you also need to make a difference.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_00: And that's where the calling part comes in, because you're only gonna be willing to go through the obstacles and go through the hard times if you really feel a sense of calling to what you're doing.
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_00: Number eight, do I have time freedom in this type of work?
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_00: Can I set my own schedule?
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_00: For me, my most valuable asset is my time.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_00: And I want as much control over my time as humanly possible.
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_00: Now, I know it sounds like I hated substitute teaching, and again, I'm not intending to go back to that, but I guess I kind of am.
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't mean to be negative about it because I did not hate substitute teaching.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_00: Most of the time I actually enjoyed it quite a bit.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_00: There were a few times that were challenging and a few times that I just actively hated it because um, you know, it was just a bad class or uh crazy students or whatever the situation was.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_00: But most of the time I enjoyed it and it was it was just fine.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_00: But if I had to choose between doing freelance work at home or substitute teaching in a school system, I will choose freelance work every time.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_00: And the reason is because I don't want to be locked into somebody else's schedule.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_00: Now I know a lot of people listening to this will think that sounds unrealistic, that sounds selfish, that sounds very self-centered, but I'm just being really, really honest with you.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_00: All things being equal, wouldn't you rather have more control over how you spend your time rather than less?
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_00: Most of us would answer that we would rather have more control over our time.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_00: So, all things being equal, if I can get paid doing something in the comfort of my own home and on my own schedule versus getting paid for doing something on somebody else's schedule and in their setting, I'm always going to choose my own schedule and my own setting.
• 14:46
  SPEAKER_00: Number nine, does this type of work help grow my personal creative brand?
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_00: Now, this is a tricky question because every time you do excellent work, no matter what it is, it helps to grow your reputation.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_00: But what I'm really talking about here is the choice between doing freelance work that's not related to my industry versus freelance work that is related to my industry.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_00: For example, my industry, so to speak, is centered around creativity, writing, and the arts, that type of thing.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_00: And if I'm doing work that's totally unrelated to that, that doesn't really help to grow my brand.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_00: But if I'm doing work that isn't that industry and I can get paid for it, and it helps grow my brand and my, you know, reputation, then that's a good thing.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_00: All things be equal.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_00: At this point in my journey, which is still probably sort of early, you know, in my entrepreneurial journey, I am happy to do almost any type of freelance work that helps pay the bills.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_00: Um, as long as it's focused on writing and creativity and things like that.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I don't necessarily want to go out and dig dishes.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_00: Not that there's anything wrong with that.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_00: But as time goes on, I want to focus more and more on work that helps establish my expertise in my niche.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_00: So you probably sense a theme here that this is really a journey, and you know, there's certain things that you do early on that you don't want to do later on, but you know, again, it's a journey, and we can't have everything we want right now.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_00: And then number 10, does this type of work let me, quote unquote, make my own luck, or am I at the mercy of others?
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_00: One of my favorite movies is The Dark Knight that came out in 2008.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_00: The district attorney Harvey Dent, who later becomes the villain Two Face, is a major character in the movie, and Harvey Dent carries around a two-headed coin.
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_00: Whenever Harvey Dent flips the coin, the coin always lands heads up.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_00: And his motto is I make my own luck.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_00: And I've always loved that.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_00: As a creative entrepreneur, you make your own luck.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_00: If you've ever worked for a bad client or a mean-spirited employer, you know the stress of feeling like somebody else is holding the reins of your livelihood.
• 16:52
  SPEAKER_00: And unless you're independently wealthy, you're always going to depend on other people for your income.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_00: Because even if you're, you know, you have your own business or you're an entrepreneur, other people are going to have to buy your products and services.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_00: So there's always going to be interdependence unless you're like a billionaire and you know, independently wealthy and all that stuff.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_00: However, I think there is a difference between being in charge of your own destiny and giving control to someone else who can drop you in a heartbeat and do a lot of damage if they choose to.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_00: I once had a client who was kind of critical and demanding, and I didn't enjoy working for this guy.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_00: But I continued to work for him because I needed the money.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_00: But the honest truth is that I hated the constant feeling of being at his mercy.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_00: And I didn't enjoy being in the situation where I needed to work for him.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I would have rather been in a situation where I didn't, where I could have quit working for this guy if I'd wanted to.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_00: All I'm saying is that ideally, you want to diversify your income in such a way so that you're not at the mercy of any one employer or client.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_00: And in a volatile economy such as ours, things can shift in a heartbeat and your income source can be cut off quickly.
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not saying that everybody should work for themselves or be an entrepreneur or necessarily have their own business.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_00: I'm just saying that it seems like it's a smart approach to develop several income streams just in case something happens to any given one of those.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_00: So now that you have a handle on these 10 questions, let's explore how to use these.
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_00: And again, I want to direct you to this download that's in the show notes.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_00: And um, this is an Excel sheet that is uh titled The Creative Entrepreneur Career Assessment.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_00: But if you're driving, don't download that right now.
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_00: Um that could be kind of dangerous.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_00: So let me just walk through this and you can take a look at it when you get a chance, if you're listening to this.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_00: When you open the assessment, you're gonna see a few different things.
• 18:44
  SPEAKER_00: At the top of this spreadsheet, you're gonna see these 10 questions, um, and they're in a little bit of a condensed form.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_00: They're in yellow across the top of the sheet, and in a green column on the left-hand side of the sheet, you're going to see a bunch of spaces.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_00: And that's where you're going to list everything that you're currently doing or think that you might do to make money.
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_00: Let me give you some examples here.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_00: This is probably about 20 examples that I'm going to just list off.
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_00: These are the things that I listed on my sheet.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_00: These are things that I am either currently doing to make money or that I possibly could be doing.
• 19:18
  SPEAKER_00: In other words, I might be interested in doing some of these things.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_00: So I just listed them all.
• 19:23
  SPEAKER_00: Um Here's what I listed: writing podcast show notes, writing nonfiction books, writing fiction books, preaching, leading worship, freelance writing in my field, doing freelance writing for businesses, ghostwriting books, doing website development, editing books or articles, doing college teaching, being a college adjunct, that's a part-time teacher, doing online courses, webinars, or workshops, being a coach for podcasting or audio blogging, being a personal creative coach, doing live speaking workshops and training, doing book formatting, doing author coaching, graphic design, podcast or audiobook production, voiceover work, playing guitar or making music, teaching guitar, like doing guitar lessons, or doing guitar courses, and social media consulting.
• 20:18
  SPEAKER_00: So you can see that's quite a diverse list of things that I that I have there.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_00: Probably you're going to be in a similar situation where you're going to have all these different things listed.
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_00: So when you've done that, when you've listed all the things that you're currently doing or could possibly be doing to make money, then rate each one of those according to the 10 questions and give each column a number from zero, which is low, to five, which is high.
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_00: For example, take um take my category of editing.
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_00: For question number one, which is I enjoy this type of work, I would give that a one rating because I really don't enjoy editing, to be honest with you.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_00: But for question number eight, which is there's time freedom in this type of work, I would give that a five because with editing, you can set your own schedule and you can do it on your own time.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_00: Now, when you've rated every type of work from zero to five for all 10 questions, you're gonna have a raw score out of 50 points for each one of these.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_00: For example, you might have a score of, let's say, uh for two out of 50.
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_00: And then in the second to last column, it's going to double that score, so it's going to give you a score out of 100.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_00: That's kind of a more traditional grade.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_00: So if your original score was 42 raw points, it's going to double that and give you an 84 out of 100.
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_00: Then in the final column of the spreadsheet, it's going to automatically assign a letter grade based on a basic grade scale.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_00: So, in other words, if it's going to give you an 84, that's going to be like a like a B minus or something.
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_00: Here's why this assessment is worth your time and how this is really going to help you.
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_00: It's because I think you're going to be surprised at the results.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_00: If you honestly do this assessment, if you list all the things That you are doing or could be doing to make money, and you go through these 10 questions, answer them really gut honestly, I think you're going to be kind of surprised at the results.
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_00: I know when I completed this assessment the first time, I was kind of shocked.
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_00: I actually received a D or an F on several types of work that I've been doing for a while.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_00: But I also received an A or a B on several types of work where I haven't been focusing enough attention, where, but I should be.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_00: So the point here is that I've been spending time focusing on some things that are not truly important to me, and I've been ignoring some things that are truly important to me.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_00: Going through this process has been kind of a gut check for me, and I think it will be for you as well.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_00: Before we start to wrap up this episode, let me share a couple of quick tips to make this assessment process even more valuable.
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_00: The first thing is that when you're completing this assessment, don't overanalyze your responses.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_00: So don't answer in a way that you think is quote unquote correct, as if somebody's looking over your shoulder.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_00: Just be brutally honest with yourself, or the process is going to be basically meaningless.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_00: Let me give an example.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, so I can preach in churches.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, as I'm recording this, this is on a Wednesday.
• 23:11
  SPEAKER_00: This is going to go live tomorrow, which is Thursday, June the 1st.
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_00: This past Sunday, I preached at a church.
• 23:16
  SPEAKER_00: I can preach, but honestly, I don't enjoy preaching all that much.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_00: Even though I'm a Bible college professor, even though my undergraduate degree was in preaching, honestly, I don't get a lot of fulfillment out of preaching in churches.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_00: So I rated that type of work as a one under the question, under question number one, which is I enjoy this type of work.
• 23:37
  SPEAKER_00: So by the way, please hear me on this.
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_00: Just because you rate something low doesn't mean it has a low value or that it's not important work.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_00: You know, going back to the preaching example, preaching is very, very important.
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_00: It's you know vitally important to the life of the church, but it's not something that I personally enjoy doing all that much.
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_00: So with this, it's really important to not confuse the value of a particular type of work with your personal enjoyment of it.
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_00: Those are two completely different things.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_00: So that's one thing.
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_00: Number two is once you're done with the assessment, have a trusted friend look over your results.
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_00: I know when I completed my assessment for the first time, I sent it to a very good friend of mine who challenged me in a couple of areas where I had scored myself pretty low.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_00: And he pointed out how I could easily make some extra money by using a talent that I already have and making a couple tweaks and thinking about something differently.
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_00: And I hadn't really thought about the opportunity he mentioned, but it was brilliant.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_00: So I've adjusted my goals this year to include, or rather, to incorporate a couple of his suggestions and put myself in a better position to create assets that will then make income.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_00: So a trusted friend can alert you to possibilities that you haven't seen yet.
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_00: They can give you much needed perspective on your goals, your gifts, and your strengths.
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_00: As you look through these 10 questions that I've outlined in this assessment, it might seem like this approach is inherently selfish.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, after all, these questions are all about me, me, me, right?
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_00: Shouldn't it all be about serving other people?
• 25:08
  SPEAKER_00: Well, yes, it absolutely is all about serving other people.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_00: But, you know, if we're really honest with ourselves, it's hard to serve with excellence if you're constantly worried about money.
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_00: It's hard to serve with excellence if you're constantly shifting gears between different types of freelance jobs.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_00: It's hard to serve with excellence if you're doing work that you don't really enjoy.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_00: So I just work on the assumption in my life that I do my best work when I'm relaxed, happy, focused, and operating in my gifts and my strengths.
• 25:38
  SPEAKER_00: I also assume that God will not call me to a type of work for which I'm not gifted and for which I have no passion.
• 25:45
  SPEAKER_00: Now, that being said, that's like a big theological statement I realize.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_00: But that being said, I think we have to balance that truth with the fact that we all have to grow into our calling to some degree.
• 25:57
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, honestly, many times our passion grows simply from working hard at something.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_00: So it's not as if, well, I love this, I don't love this, so God's not going to have me do something that I don't love right now.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_00: You know, there is kind of a give and take to it, and there is the idea that God can call us to something that we can then grow to love.
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_00: So I think there's a balance in there, but by and large, I really do honestly believe that we're more effective for God's kingdom.
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_00: We're more effective in serving customers and clients, we're more effective in our lives whenever we're operating in the areas of our giftedness and in our strengths and in our passions.
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_00: So, no, I don't think this approach is selfish at all.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, I think it's the exact opposite.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_00: Whenever we are healthy, happy, and operating within our strengths and our gifts, we can give and serve more from a life that's overflowing with joy and abundance.
• 26:46
  SPEAKER_00: Now, I realize this has been a long episode, but I hope that these ten questions as well as this assessment are helpful to you.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_00: Feel free to ask any questions in the comments within the blog post, or let me know if I can help in any way.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_00: So I'd love to know what other questions would you add to this list in addition to the ten that I have mentioned?
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_00: I'd love to hear your thoughts.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_00: You can join the conversation and find the post and the links that accompany this episode at KentSanders.net slash career questions.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_00: When you visit my site, you'll find all kinds of great resources to inspire your creativity.
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_00: I'd also love to share a gift with you when you subscribe to my newsletter.
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_00: You can check it out and learn more about my books, writing, and services at KentSanders.net.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_00: I love to connect with you and you can tweet me at Kent Sanders or find me on Facebook and Instagram as Kent Sanders.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_00: I hope that you'll also check out our Born to Create Facebook group by visiting KentSanders.net slash Facebook group.
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_00: Until next time, remember that you were born to create and designs to make a difference.
• 27:49
  SPEAKER_00: What will you do with the time you have left?