When Robert E. Kahn and Vint Cerf invented a prototype for the internet in the 1970s, it would have been hard for them to imagine the way that this global network would turn the world upside-down. In the early twenty-first century, people can now communicate across the world at the click of a button and a vast amount of published knowledge is available at the fingertips of internet users.
In the world of business, this global network has made it less and less necessary for employees and contractors to leave their front doors and head in to an office to work. After all, the internet allows you to access the same information at home that you would in the office and send it in for free via email or a cloud-storage service.
So how has this change affected millennials, and why are more and more of them choosing to work from home?
Children born from the early 1980s to the mid-1990s—known as “millennials”—grew up in the era of computers and mobile phones, and most became acquainted with the internet as children or teenagers. With this worldwide knowledge bank at their disposal, school projects and college assignments suddenly became easier and faster than ever before, and this expectation of convenience and speed was translated into the workplace.
As millennials have entered the workforce over the last twenty years, more and more of them have found ways to leverage the internet for commercial purposes and conduct business from home. In fact, now that we are well and truly into the 21st Century, estimates predict that over 50% of the U.S. workforce will consist of freelancers by 2027.
So, why are millennials choosing to work from home, and what are the advantages?
When you work in an office, you have set hours and are tied to the one company (along with the benefits of sick leave and health insurance, in some cases). By working at home, young professionals can work for as many companies as they like (or have as many businesses as they like) and can seek out novel ways to advance or grow their own income.
With no one looking over your shoulder and telling you how to do your job, the hours you work and the methods you use are up to you. What matters most to clients and employers is that you get the job done! While this way of working does require more self-motivation and discipline, it can also be extremely liberating.
With each generation that passes, we are becoming more and more mobile. Living in one house for your entire life is a thing of the past, with the average millennial planning to live in their current home for five years or less. Furthermore, travel has become much more accessible with lower airfares and higher disposable incomes.
With all of this geographical movement, maintaining a steady job in one place becomes difficult and opportunities for transfer are not always available. By working remotely on a laptop computer with a connection to the internet, employees and freelancers can do their jobs from anywhere in the world.
Another advantage of “working from anywhere” is that millennials can be close to their loved ones all day. This makes working from home an attractive proposition for parents, homeschoolers, and couples or friends who enjoy working side-by-side on their online projects. In times past, you could only choose your friends; now, you can also choose your coworkers!
Of course, if you run your work-from-home enterprise from a coffee shop, the cost of food might be even higher!
By working from home, time spent commuting in peak-hour traffic can instead be spent on achieving a better work-life balance: sleeping, exercising, and hanging out with family.
Just like any business, it can take time to build up a client portfolio and make a decent living from your work-at-home endeavor, but the flexibility and freedom that working at home can provide makes it well worth the effort.
For more ideas about where to start, you can find tips and ideas in the blogs about The 7 Fastest-Growing Remote Jobs of 2019 and Work from Home Sales Opportunities.