Do You Have a Side Hustle?
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As a woman in a professional career, do you also have a side hustle? The topic has been on my radar in a few ways lately: (1) in a fashion subreddit, I saw a post from a woman seeking advice on what to wear at a once-a-week record store job, (2) I remembered some of our past Personal Money Snapshots have mentioned second jobs (btw, we'd love to see more submissions, nudge nudge!), and on the personal side, (3) this week I accepted a (very) part-time job to supplement my freelance work.
Readers, do you have a side hustle such as podcasting, selling crafts, or doing portrait photography, for example? Ooh, or professional organizing, which has always sounded fun to me? Is there something you enjoy, or are just good at, that you'd like to turn into a second job?
With the abysmal 2025 job market and the recent pause on certain student loan forgiveness, this is a prime time for many people to want or need to boost their income. Of course, others simply take on an extra paid activity for fun or social reasons, which is an envious place to be.
In my case, I'll be doing work that's totally unrelated to my freelance work — I just got hired by a petsitting/dog-walking business. I already have a few regular catsitting clients on my own, but with this W2 position, my fun side job will be more stable and “formal.” The exercise and time outdoors will be a bonus, though it's a “Neither snow nor rain nor heat…” type of thing.
Here are a few side jobs readers have mentioned in Money Snapshot posts:
- maintaining rental properties
- performing accounting work for freelance clients
- selling on Etsy, doing microtasks, nannying (from a college student)
- working an unnamed side job that brings in $2,500/year in addition to a $100,000 salary
Not surprisingly for Corporette readers, who obviously skew professional, most featured readers had zero interest — or need — for a side hustle, and a few have mentioned their distaste for the term, which, granted, can have a bro-y vibe.
Readers, do tell! Do you have a side hustle? How's it going? Do you do it for fun, for extra funds, or both? And is the work related to your career or something completely different, such as working part time in a bookstore?
Image via Pexels
I own a rental property but I didn’t really consider that a “side hustle” (when I was working) so much as an investment. Many years ago I taught kids’ karate classes a couple of times a week while working at the law firm, but it wasn’t for the money — it was for fun and stress relief.
Again many years ago, one of my fellow law firm associates had a part time holiday-season job at Nordstrom. I always felt like that was weird because she could make more money billing more hours and increasing her bonus.
wonder what their employee discount is?
maybe for commissions?
I’ve seen retail mall jobs in my area posting salaries of $13-16 per hour, even larger known clothing stores. That seems low for a side job.
Was it a seasonal job she had since high school? My SIL did something similar. Well into her 30s, she would take PTO from her professional day job to work the Thanksgiving Black Friday sales at the retail store where she had a summer job as a teen. It made sense in college when she was trying to squeeze extra money out of every school break. After a while, I think she just developed a misplaced sense of loyalty to the place; they were happy to have her fill a hard-to-staff slot year after year.
Many years ago when I was in the early years of practice, I worked at Nordstrom in the evenings through a holiday season. We were building our house and my DH was gone a lot overseeing the construction. I enjoyed shopping and had relationships with some of the sales associates at Nordstrom, who asked if I wanted to work through the holidays, so I did it for fun and to pass the time. The discount at that time (early 90s) was 20%, but could be used on any item, including designer pieces. I used the discount and the income as an opportunity to purchase forever clothing items, like my Burberry trench, which I still have and wear. By the next holiday season, our home construction was complete, and I never worked at Nordstrom again, but I have good memories.
Sort of? I have a seasonal hobby and offer my services to others for a fee. It helps offset the costs of said hobby, but it’s by no means a big moneymaker. I’d love to scale up at some point, but at this stage in my life, I can’t find a feasible way to make that happen.
Maple syrup making?
This made me LOL
No, humans have a finite amount of productivity.
I joined two boards as a ‘side hustle’. It’s a great way to network within my industry and to earn some money and options at the same time.
Can you please say more about how you joined the boards? I’m curious about how that happens. Is it through social connections, or something else?
I started by taking a directors education course. Mine was called “the directors college” through McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. But there are probably many similar programs. The program took me about 18 months to complete and while I was doing it I told EVERYONE. I managed to work it into literally every work conversation that I had. At the time I was working as an equity research analyst and, while not eligible to join boards due to my employer’s policies, I had great access to CEOs and management teams. After leaving for a role which did allow me to join boards, I had already planted the idea through my network. I did talk to a few recruiters but I managed to land my two seats through networking.
sorry, anon = waffles. I’m responding to my own posting…
We had a post once about joining a board — hope it helps: https://corporette.com/finding-joining-professional-organizations/
I do medical journal research for personal injury firms. I don’t have a law background, but I’m guessing it’s more specialized than what a paralegal would do, but cheaper than hiring a subject matter expert. Was previously $10k/yr but I’ve been trying to get out of it and only have one client now. It’s about $2k/yr.
Interesting. What is your background? How did you get into that? I would love to do that.
I consider my selling on Poshmark a side hustle. I get rid of things in my closet or house, and it subsidizes my thrift shopping and allows me to feel like things are going to good homes. I mentally budget the money I earn as funding for donations to help anything that’s actively pissing me off. I don’t make more than 2-3k, but it’s easy to do while I wfh.