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Voices ᐋ ᐄᔮᔨᐧᒫᓂᐧᐃᒡ

Brave New Work

BY Sonny Orr Apr 12, 2019

I look at my calendar and see that it is rather crowded with appointments, meetings, travel, calls and conferences. There, among the few days for rest, are little dates called holidays. Oohh, waiting for one can seem like an eternity. But hey, it’s the price of working for a living. The reward at the end of the tunnel is the only way to escape the cubicle of public work. Yes, I’m talking about full-time employment again for me. Before this, I was a small-business operator.

It was a handful of years of working for yourself, during which my gracious clients kept me alive. And I kept my clients alive with my quick responses to urgent financial and paper wrangling affairs. I was a business doctor of sorts.

Welcome to my world of self-employment. It had its ups and downs but was always interesting and productive, with everyone winning in the end. Like a doctor, I did lose some clients due to hemorrhaging but most survived their initial bumps on the road to their own self-employment dream. Many of us are self employed and the ones you barely see are often too busy running their business to be seen. No, limelight isn’t a real award in this self-sufficiency thing – it’s hard-earned cash done your way.

Lately, I’ve swayed to the online approach to doing business. From planning to working to billing, and all that other good business stuff, all smoothly working together automatically in the background, in the palm of your hand. Yes, I left the desk and ventured out to try this new app that kept on bugging me in my emails. After a few bouts with logging in and updating, it was simplified to an okay button, which made me a happy business guy. The numbers and transactions flowed in effortlessly, every transaction laid out for your approval. I tried the easy way and the app quickly filed everything away for me.

My taxes (a dirty word for some) added up to the government owing me money, which was very nice indeed. Yes, this little app made my day, every day. If there would be something for me to love, it would be money all tidied up. In this case it’s digital data that represents my money. And I thought I was smart! Nope, this app is smart. The nicer thing is that it can accept add-ons, which handle another nasty financial exercise of keeping track of your employees. This app just keeps on going by eliminating all obstacles by dealing with the dreaded government tax (the most god-awful word ever uttered). But it lets you click okay as the last thing to do before paying your hungry staff.

Yes, money is happiness for many. But for bosses, this tax software is heaven-sent, an angel to save the small businessperson. I could go on and on about this, but I know that financial stuff actually can make you sleepy. Go ahead, close your eyes, your money is in a good app now, safely in your pocket, the tax monster is no longer under your bed. Sleep little reader… sleep. You’re safe for now.

In the meantime, back in my cubicle, I am busy like a bee in a hive that is working silently in the background, plugging away for information that could be useful for our future….

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Sonny Orr is Cree from Chisasibi, and has been a columnist for the Nation for over 20 years. He regularly pens Rez Notes from the cozy social club in Whapmagoostui where he resides.