Aug
Planning For Crises: What To Do When Your Dream Lifestyle Becomes A Nightmare, Part 2
Photo by fatboyke
The first part of this post focused on what to do if you get on the road and find you hate it. In this part we’ll look at what to do if you love your nomadic, location independent lifestyle but your money runs out and you can’t keep going…
Scenario 1
Your pipeline of clients/customers slows down and business starts to dry up. What should you do?
Firstly, you need to stem the flow and identify the causes. Why is your pipeline of prospects and customers slowing down? Have you taken your eye off the ball, distracted by the excitement of your new lifestyle (this is not uncommon)? Is your marketing strategy out of date?
Immediate action: Identify why your business is slowing down and take the required actions to reverse the trend.
Secondly in order to prevent this situation from happening again, you should take a look at the strategy and planning side of your business, including the marketing strategy. A nifty tool to use for high level business planning is an OGSM.
It stands for:
O - Objective: defining a clear objective or “vision” for the business.
G - Goals: a few larger, strategic goals that help the business achieve the objective.
S - Strategies: what choices will be made to achieve the goals? Where should you focus your efforts?
M - Measures: measuring the progress of every strategy to ensure they’re on target.
If your business is struggling then taking time out to review your strategy, create a new plan of action and take some immediate actions will not only help you feel more in control, it can often help stimulate new ideas and strategies which you’ve never tried before.
If all else fails and it appears that your existing business in unviable, then see below for ideas on how to make some money to tide yourself over whilst you set up a new one.
[If it seems flippant talking about setting up a new business "just like that", since leaving the UK I've changed the focus of my business at least twice and have been up and running with a new stream of income within 2 months - there's a process I've used for doing this which I've summarised here].
How to avoid this happening in the first place:
Do the upfront strategy and planning for your business before you leave or before it’s in trouble. Strategic planning is one of the most common areas most small (and large) businesses are poor at; the second area is in the implementation of the plan.
Get one right and the other wrong and you’ll still run into trouble…if one is a strength and not the other, get some help in your area of weakness - it will pay dividends in the long term.
Scenario 2
Your pot of money is running low and you have no means of earning any more income. What can you do?
Firstly it’s worth noting that unless you have entered a country with the relevant work visa or permit, you are unlikely to be able to get a job (temporary or permanent) where you are. However, don’t despair…there are still plenty of ways you can earn yourself some cash (some ideas here, here and here) as well as making the money you have stretch further.
Immediate action: First things first, here is what you need to do instantly:
- Work out how much longer you can survive with the money you have (assuming you were to earn no further money).
- Then set yourself a daily budget which you must be strict about sticking to; if this means cutting down on some of life’s little luxuries, then do so.
- Consider also setting aside some of your remaining money to use to generate more income; whilst the internet makes it possible to generate income without spending much cash, unless you have all the skills you need to do everything yourself you will need to pay for some help.
Assuming you’ve caught yourself before it’s way too late, then you should have enough time to figure out a way to generate some cash; if not, then you need to get your thinking cap on fast and evaluate what your most viable options are (borrow cash, get a work permit, use a credit card, dip into saving) - only you can decide what makes the most sense in the short, medium and long term for you.
You may also want to consider changing your location before it’s too late - i.e. if the cost of living in your current location is too high and forces you to live beyond your means, then consider whether it would be more cost effective (even including the flights) to move to a cheaper country - it may well be.
How to avoid this happening in the first place:
Before you leave, be realistic about your budget and do the research to find out information about the cost of living in the places you plan to visit. You’ll find some information in our own destinations guides but you should also do the rounds on the travel forums for up-to-date costs.
As experienced travellers we know how easy it is to get carried away at the beginning of your trip, thinking you’ve got lots of money to burn and you can start to budget later. This is a sure-fire way to run out of cash and find yourself in dire straits at a later date.
If you are financing your dream life with a finite pot of money, then make sure you set and stick to a budget within your means right from the start. It also doesn’t hurt to have a plan for earning an income in your back pocket should you ever need to put it into action.
Running out of money whilst living your dream lifestyle should be something you never allow to happen; in reality we know how easy it is to get distracted by the exciting lifestyle and take your eye off the ball (we did it too). If you’ve got contingency plans and are proactive about managing your finances, then you can mitigate all but the most dire situations.
In the final part of this post, we’ll look at what to do when your dream lifestyle is ruined by something awful happening…
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Related posts:
- Planning For Crises: What To Do When Your Dream Lifestyle Becomes A Nightmare, Part 3
- Planning For Crises: What To Do When Your Dream Lifestyle Becomes A Nightmare, Part 1
- This Is How I’d Design My Ideal Lifestyle; Now How About Yours?
- 5 Things That Will Help You Settle In Quickly When You Lead A Nomadic Lifestyle As A Web Worker
- A Post About Lifestyle Design With Some Nuggets Of Wisdom (I Hope)
Hi, Lea. Thanks for the solid reminders about good strategic planning and implementing.
I’ve been doing a kind of hybrid design since 2004: I live and work in countries where I can get a visa (my partner has dual citizenship in the UK and Australia, which is damn handy). We both get part-time work that is as aligned with our life design objectives as possible and work on our total freedom plan alongside. The pitfall of this system is that the work for which we are actually accountable to another person or organization, as opposed to our own dream work which is still in development so no one is waiting on it, takes more time and energy than simply part-time. It gets short changed a lot.
We’ve been living in budget but your post has inspired me to take us to a new level. I want to develop a savings strategy to get a buffer going so we can reach a “jump point” where we devote ourselves to doing our own work exactly where we want to be.
Thanks for the inspiration, backed up by solid advice.
@ozpiratequeen - sounds like you’re on the right track and well done for taking it to the next level!
I know what you mean about doing work that’s accountable to someone else (am doing that temporarily at the moment and hating it!!) - and how difficult it is to prioritise…the one thing I always remember when I’m working for someone else is that once I leave, I get nothing…so my priority is always focused on setting things up for ourselves which continue to generate income and work for us into the future. I know that getting that balance is difficult…but keep going and let me know how you’re getting on!