{"id":1011,"date":"2020-10-07T14:58:40","date_gmt":"2020-10-07T21:58:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.hiringourheroes.org\/creating-your-own-meaningful-employment-opportunities-2\/"},"modified":"2021-03-19T11:31:19","modified_gmt":"2021-03-19T18:31:19","slug":"creating-your-own-meaningful-employment-opportunities-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hiringourheroes.org\/stories\/creating-your-own-meaningful-employment-opportunities-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Creating Your Own Meaningful Employment Opportunities"},"content":{"rendered":"

Some choose entrepreneurship out of passion; others choose it out of necessity.<\/p>\n

Hiring Our Heroes and Burning Glass, with support from Grow with Google and Google.org conducted a mixed methods study of barriers to and opportunities for military spouse employment. This project, \u201cExamining Entrepreneurship, Remote Work, and Upskilling as Drivers of Economic Success for Military Spouses<\/a>,\u201d focused on the current challenges to full-time employment and entrepreneurship faced by military spouses, and opportunities for economic mobility based on qualitative and quantitative data.<\/p>\n

Military spouse entrepreneurship was chosen as one of the research topics due to the lack of data on self-employment within this niche community. Also, Grow with Google representatives intuitively felt entrepreneurship may be a potential opportunity to increase economic opportunities for military spouses.<\/p>\n

We embarked on this research hoping to identify employment barriers and provide actionable findings where caring stakeholders could help empower military spouses in their entrepreneurial endeavors. Here\u2019s what we found<\/a>.<\/p>\n

About 1 in 4 Military Spouses Reported Being Self-Employed<\/h4>\n

A growing number of military spouses are pursuing self-employment and entrepreneurship because they believe the traditional labor market isn\u2019t compatible with the military lifestyle.<\/p>\n

About 1 in 4 military spouses surveyed report that they either currently or previously owned their own businesses or have been self-employed. This subset of the sample \u2013 360 military spouses who currently or previously owned a business \u2013 were asked a series of questions about their experiences. Most have pursued freelancing or independent contracting (61%), another 45% have owned small businesses without employees, and 28% were independent distributors\/multi-level marketers (e.g., Stella & Dot, LuLaRoe). About 1 in 10 (11%) had small businesses with employees.<\/p>\n

According to this research<\/a>, military spouses who start their own businesses or become self-employed do so primarily for either flexibility or because they feel unable to find a more traditional job. When asked to choose among four possible reasons for starting their own businesses, 37% point to the need for more flexibility in their work schedules; followed by 28% who say they have trouble finding a job suitable to their interests or skills, 17% want to earn more money, and 13% have an idea or product that they want to turn into a business.<\/p>\n

For those military spouses who have previously owned a business or have been self-employed, but are no longer self-employed, the majority said they were unable to continue their business due to a PCS (Permanent Change of Station).<\/p>\n

Fewer Than 6% of Military Spouses Relied on Loans to Start Their Businesses<\/h4>\n

According to our research, initial investments in their businesses were modest: most were below $1,000. The overwhelming majority rely on personal savings to fund their businesses followed distantly by credit card debt.<\/p>\n

Fewer than 6% of military spouses<\/a> say they relied on loans to start their businesses, even though they are eligible for Small Business Administration loans<\/a> and other funding opportunities that do not involve personal savings.<\/p>\n

A Need for Role Models<\/h4>\n

Along with a need for transparency regarding business funding opportunities, the white paper also recommends showcasing a range of military spouse entrepreneurs as role models. This includes military spouse freelancers and independent contractors who may not think of themselves as entrepreneurs.<\/p>\n

The research finds that military spouses who successfully started a business had an influence on a portion of other military spouses when they were considering self-employment. Twenty-six percent say it had \u201ca lot\u201d of influence on them and 32% say it had \u201ca little.\u201d<\/p>\n

Highlighting additional role models, not just entrepreneurs with large businesses and employees, may influence more military spouses to pursue self-employment and business ownership.<\/p>\n

Entrepreneurship is one career journey that provides military spouses with an opportunity to financially contribute to their households. The Military Spouse Career Journey Roadmap<\/a>, which was created based on this research, provides tools and resources to guide military spouses interested in pursuing self-employment and entrepreneurship.<\/h3>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Some choose entrepreneurship out of passion; others choose it out of necessity. Hiring Our Heroes and Burning<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":1012,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[25,70],"tags":[87,69,90],"service_role":[],"class_list":["post-1011","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-articles","category-research-findings","tag-entrepreneurship","tag-military-spouses","tag-surveys"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nCreating Your Own Meaningful Employment Opportunities - Hiring Our Heroes<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hiringourheroes.org\/stories\/creating-your-own-meaningful-employment-opportunities-2\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Creating Your Own Meaningful Employment Opportunities\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Some choose entrepreneurship out of passion; others choose it out of necessity. 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