Optimizing Opting Out

By Kadzi Mutizwa

In so many ways, on so many levels, the traditional full-time workforce kind of sucks. And by kind of, I mean really. From the cronyism to the bureaucracies to the monotony to those employee ID badges, the whole set-up can be spirit-crushing. Like most set-ups, it’s so not for everyone.

American women seem to get fed up with this scene more conspicuously than men.
Forbes magazine reports that 30 percent of working women will opt out of the workplace at some point during their career. Lisa Belkin’s much-cited 2003 New York Times Magazine article examines the “opt-out revolution” among uber-educated female professionals who have said goodbye to their climbing-that-bloody-career-ladder frustrations to become stay-at-home moms. According to Newsweek’s March 12, 2012 issue, when it comes to women’s global workforce participation the U.S. ranks 60th.

But, to help reduce the amount of wasted talent in this world, women who are financially able to opt out of the workforce don’t have to opt out of working altogether. People who have a lot to offer should never completely cease doing so.

When you’re finally released from the 9-to-5 (or 8:30-to-7:30) grind, it’s as good a time as any to move on to bigger, better things. Home in on (ideally, while in your own home) a particular, previously shelved passion, interest, or craft. Develop a small business or a service or a product or a foundation or a publication or a consultancy. Design. Innovate. Personalize. Break ground and make waves. Come up with your own rules and policies. Mint a meritocracy. Take whatever competencies you did pick up in the workplace and apply them more creatively, productively, and fairly. Get paid for your time and talent your own way, on your own terms.

Even women who semi-desperately want to opt out but can’t afford to, which is almost all of us, should seriously think about planting the seeds of a viable escape route while they’re still shackled to their enervating employment establishments. Start laying the groundwork for your future empire. Spend as much down time as possible under the tutelage of people you admire who can mentor you (and a woman who has successfully neutralized the type of obstacles that you’re about to face is likely to be your most valuable advisor); save and solicit money; draft a business plan (or school yourself on what a business plan actually entails); assemble a crack crew of other enterprising, results-minded A-players; use social media as a platform and a branding tool; and get exceptionally knowledgeable about and good at the substantive and procedural intricacies it’ll take to get your desired venture off the ground and into the economic conversation.

Whatever it is you choose to do, don’t let those brains, skills, and drives atrophy. In the interest of progress, and in furtherance of the fight against inertia and the status quo, this land needs all the interesting, original, well-executed tangible contributions it can get.