Hi Ho, Hi Ho: Working a Second Job

I’ve mentioned before that I am a very busy person. When I say this, please know that I am not complaining (most of the time). The fact of the matter is that I am busy because I choose to be. Part of this goes back to the fact that I’m a goal-oriented person: if I have something I want to accomplish, I will do what it takes to make it happen. In my current financial life, this means that I am working a second job.

What I do

As you may know, my “real job” is to teach high school. That’s right, in addition to providing you with all kinds of information on how you can get into better physical and financial shape, I spend the majority of every day teaching teenagers how to speak French and German. For me, this is a very rewarding job; I enjoy what I do and plan on doing it for quite a number of years.

The problem, of course, is that high school teachers don’t make as much as some people in other fields. Don’t worry, I’m not going to go into a rant about how teachers need to be paid more. I believe that that personal benefits of my job make almost any perceived inadequacy in pay worth it. However, I have found that the salary I currently earn teaching just doesn’t quite allow me to meet my short or long-term financial goals.

The result

It's off to work I go...

So, for the past 16 months, I have been working a second job. This second job is not glamorous. You see, I answer phone calls. No, not for a telemarketing company or anything, but I do answer phone calls for a large corporation. If someone is having an issue with one of the products the company offers, they call me and I help them to resolve the issue.

For most of the last year, I have been working at this job on a part-time basis. A few times per week, I would go into the office in the evenings or on weekends and try to make the most of my down time by grading papers or doing my own homework.

More recently, however, the company offered me the opportunity to work this job from home. While the immediate thought was one of excitement, there was a catch; I would need to meet the company’s minimum standards for full time work. This meant working at least 30 hours per week! I wasn’t sure that I would be able to handle this on top of everything else I do.

Considering my options

At this point, I had to weigh my options. Being the logical person I am, it came down to comparing lists of the pros and cons of accepting the position. The cons were pretty obvious: the time commitment and apparent change in my sleep schedule would be difficult to handle. The pros, however, took a little more thinking: I would make more money, some of the time commitment would be counterbalanced by the fact that I would have a 30 second commute, it would better allow me to meet my short and long term financial goals.

In the end, I accepted the position and have been working this second job full time for a few months now. I’ll be honest, it has not been an easy transition. I have had to get even better at prioritizing my time and have had to find new and creative ways to multi-task. Let’s be honest here: Working this second job is meaning that I work about 90 hours every week!

What keeps me going

I’m not sure if you’ve noticed, but taking 90 hours out of your week puts a pretty big damper on your free time. The only way I am able to do this is by knowing that it is temporary. This second job is the tool I am using to get out of debt and get on a good financial footing for the rest of my life. Once I find a way to replace the money I make from this job, I fully plan on saying goodbye to my employer, grateful for the opportunity they have provided for me.

This replacement could come from several sources: I could get a raise in my teaching job, acquire income-producing assets, or even find another job I could do on the side that paid more. Just think, if I could manage to make 50% more per hour doing something else, I only have to work 2/3 of the hours! If I made twice as much, I could work half as much.

Additionally, as my debt level is reduced and my budget becomes more and more refined, my need for so much income will also go down. When I get to keep more of every paycheck in my own bank account instead of handing it over to someone else, that will reduce the amount of time I have to spend working more to earn more money.

In the meantime…

For now, however, I find myself working… a lot. Sure, it’s difficult, but, with the goal in mind, I will press on.

Have you ever worked a second job? Do you think I’m crazy? Any pieces of advice you could offer to others (or to me!) regarding ways to make extra money?

Photo by drugfreedave.