Having an entrepreneurial spirit means you hold certain values close to your heart. You’d choose creativity and personal fulfillment over stability and predictability. Many entrepreneurs are driven by their passion. If you recognize these traits in yourself, you might consider gig work as your path toward full-time entrepreneurship. Here’s why.

We talk about entrepreneurs for all different companies and the business they start and run.

Yet, gigsters have many parallels to entrepreneurs, though both have different business models. Both run a business, act entrepreneurial, and can have employees. But, the main focus of their work and their business models are entirely different.

The gigster

The gigster gets paid when he or she works. Gigster can’t outsource the work or have someone else show up. Gigster is asked to deliver a service. The service offered is customized to the client's exact needs, so every time it is different. Gigster is the brand of the business. It’s his or her uniqueness that makes others choose him or her - his or her unique craftsmanship, experiences, track record, etc.

Gigster’s not a hired set of hands that need to be instructed. Gigster’s the expert in a way. There’s a need, and it’s up to him or her to decide how to solve that.

Gigsters are in business from the moment they find their first client. Generally, the costs are low and most of the revenue is the income.

But most importantly, a gigster's main job is to do the work. To do great and unique work. Everything else, like administration, marketing, hiring, is all in service of doing great work.

The Entrepreneur

The entrepreneur gets paid when the company he or she runs sells enough products. The entrepreneur himself is not the one making or delivering the product.

Clients don’t necessarily want the entrepreneur to deliver the product. We want the thing the company makes. And since the entrepreneur is not involved in actually making every single product, they all need to be standardized. They need to meet ‘spec’.

The company has a brand. It stands for something. It makes a promise and its products need to fulfill that. The uniqueness is in how the ‘machine’ is built.

The work can be taught relatively quickly. Or the work is a complicated concoction of different expertise, brought together by the entrepreneur. By doing this organizing, the entrepreneur creates a product that solves the problem of the margins of the products he or she sells. Others do the work; revenue is higher than the costs; the profit is his. It often takes time and investments to build this machine up to a point where it can generate money.

The entrepreneur's main job is growing the company. That involves telling the story about the company to find clients and teaching others to do the work. It involves very little to none doing the actual work.

Summing up

Many people try gig work for a simple reason: they want to earn extra cash. And while that’s a perfectly legitimate reason, some with an entrepreneurial spark are looking for a little more. These gigsters see taking on contingent work as a low-risk, no-cost way to open the door to entrepreneurship.

When taking on gig work, gigsters learn the basics of business—the importance of doing a good job, resourcefulness, flexibility, and adaptability because their livelihood depends on it. Every gig can give you a taste of what it’s like to be your own boss.