Well, this is an observation or conclusion that has come forth after talking to lots of professionals, corporate employees and start-uppers in general and sometimes specifically about their future plans.
The first observation is that almost everyone (almost!) in the IT industry wants to be an entrepreneur.
The second one is that every entrepreneur dreams of becoming a farmer (clarification will follow).
Now, why would I say that?
Well, there are many reasons for most of the IT professionals to want to do something on their own and being their own boss. Being an entrepreneur comes quickly with IT professionals as technology-based start-ups supported through an online presence is becoming quite an easy exercise. Running a website for products/services relatively involves lesser infrastructure and investment in the initial stages. Apart from the ease, there are many related issues that IT professionals experience:
- IT industry requires 24-hours commitment from employees as the need could arise at any time. Due to global demands and timings, employees may need to compulsively work over-time. Though, this is taken care of by providing compensation, but still there is lesser freedom for the employees to be with their family and enjoy!
- As an IT professional moves up in his/her career graph, the role turns out to be more of managing the projects, teams and groups, instead of simply doing the coding, testing part. This gives them a good experience of handling a team and they become confident that they can have their independent team where they can work directly for clients.
- Due to internal politics and competition, IT professionals start thinking of moving out and starting something on their own.
After 5-7 years, a lot of IT professionals tend to think that they should have something of their own and they should not remain just an employee. I have worked in IT companies and large media houses and I have seen a lot of people saying that I am working towards opening my own company. The ratio of looking to open and actually open still remains small but still their is this growing wish to turn to an entrepreneur among many.
Now, we come to our second part.
A lot of entrepreneurs want to end up becoming farmers. (!)
Well, as we have observed that after 5-7 years of employment, a lot of professionals want to turn up to be entrepreneurs, similarly, after 5-7 years of entrepreneurship, a lot of them want to become farmers. How?
Let’s see.
I have talked to many of them as how the business is going and what they foresee about their future plans. A lot of tend to give the answer that they want to achieve certain level of growth and then to buy a farmhouse where they could relax and enjoy life.
Now, owning a farm-house is not that difficult. Farmers in rural India tend to have them without any difficulty. Then, why take the route of expensive education, fiercely competitive employment and then valiant efforts to make sure the startup succeeds? Simply, buy a land somewhere and build a farmhouse. It sometimes looks so funny that after all the luxuries of life that we tend to enjoy in big cities, our inner being still wants a peaceful life with natural elements.
At the same time, there are lots of opportunities in entrepreneurship to explore such vocations on business level that include natural living and peaceful activities.
I am sure somebody would like to explore the possibility of living as a farmer and entrepreneur at the same time.
