Side Projects are the new Growth Hacking Tool for Your Career

We are ambitious millennials and we all want to climb up our career ladder quick. But our white paper resume will not distinguish us from other talented million people. Employers today look for a real work that could be measured and quantified. So we need a different approach for success and side projects are the new growth hacks for this. This tool can elevate our career with productive results and is an even a pleasure since we get a chance to practice our interests and passion.

Managing time for side projects can be a challenge, but with some extra efforts, it’s not hard to squeeze in some extra time. And nothing is more satisfactory when you see your work take a first fresh breath of air.

What should be your goal?

Fostering my existing knowledge and to adapt new skills is what I always seek. And the best thing about side projects is I got plenty of this opportunity with it. I’ve been working on side projects for a few months now, and the flexibility of time and no one to report other than myself makes me beat the pressure and learn beyond my abilities.

How to begin with a side project?

Getting started with side project doesn’t require very strategic plans. But it will help if we keep these points back in our brain.

1. Search your Interest Box: Side projects become meaningless if we don’t relate them to our passion and there is a great possibility we will drop them in the first week of beginning. So best practice to find ideas for our side projects is to explore our own interest box.
2. Assemble your skills: We don’t have to lose hope if we’re are not equipped with all the skills to built our project. This is a journey where we unlearn and learn many things. And if we come across something beyond our reach than we may look at our network for help.
3. Pen down a short write-up: Its similar to business plan we make for our venture. By penning down a write-up gives us a clear vision of your project. This becomes immensely useful if we look forward to launching our project in the market.
4. Draw a timeline: A bold timeline, for each week and month help us being on track and record our progress.
5. Build Small and Grow Big: Many people fails because all a sudden they want to build big. I suggest working with a small project will build a confidence and experience to go for a big shot. So in initial months choose to work on little steps.

Tell the whole world about our Side Project

Our work becomes irrelevant if nobody sees or connects with it. In order to take the advantage of incredible opportunities out there, we’ve to think like marketers and sell ourselves.

And I’ve seen many people using Side Project for this personal branding. For instance, Max Bruan some months back did an unconventional thing. With his skills in technology, he built a smart mirror for his home. This gained him a huge traction here and this project became an inspiration for many in technology & design.

Or see what Esther did when she found herself in the position when there was not to do much in her routine job. She went ahead to build a Messenger Bot as a side project. And the marketer-in-her couldn’t resist the opportunity to tell the story of her Bot via publications like Fast Company, Lifehacker, The Atlantic, and VentureBeat.

 This concept applies to startups as well where “Side Project Marketing” has become the far effective channel of marketing when blogs and ads become irrelevant. They connect you to only those who matters to your business and will bring an organic growth. Young startups can learn a lot about this strategy from companies like Buffer and Crew.

Side Projects are for everyone

Don’t get into this myth, side projects are only for marketers, designers or developers. Anybody can grow with this. A dancer can go on to create a YouTube channel, someone with an interest in sports can create a platform to connect local players and a biologist can create a blog on medical discoveries. These are only a bunch of ideas, there is the whole universe for us to explore.

When we love something, we naturally set on to work upon it. There can be plenty of failures, but we have to face our fears. We need to get ourselves committed with side project building and over a time we will see success.

Join the Side Project Community

Usually, people work alone in Side Projects but teaming up make this experience even more valuable. And so we bring this culture of Side Projects to the global audience with Cero People, a Side Project Community. Here digital nomads come together to collaborate on side projects out of their work. A vast knowledge & network sphere is what they get with their contribution.

We aim for professionals who believes in the knowledge economy. People who can bring impact with their creative work are always welcome here. Our end goal is to get millennials work upon the world issues as side projects using their skills in technology and designs.

Our team has been working together to make this community live! Be a part and we will help you start your own side project!

 Saksham Jain is an independent Digital Marketer and Partner at Cero People. He frequently write on business, technology and marketing.