Articles by: Hanna Brooks Olsen

[caption id="attachment_5952" align="alignnone" width="620"] Image via Flickr[/caption] Working for yourself can be extraordinarily rewarding — many small business owners say it's one of the best decisions they ever made — but it's hard to ignore the financial challenges, especially when you're just starting out. Of the millions of Americans who currently work for themselves, many of them find themselves in debt without a safety net, which can be scary and, in the long run, impact your ability to do the kind of work you want to do.

Ever wonder how Chase Jarvis went from soccer-playing PhD drop-out photographer to purveyor of global education? It's pretty simple, though a little unsexy: Work.

[caption id="attachment_5883" align="alignnone" width="620"] Image via Flickr[/caption] All of us learn differently — and if you're the kind of person who does really well with, say, audio books, but can't focus on the words on a page, learning via podcast may be something worth looking into. Once a fringe medium for audio dorks and one-time public radio hosts, podcasting is now a major industry, with big names like Adam Carolla and Joe Rogan drawing millions of listeners to their on-demand audio productions.

[caption id="attachment_5856" align="alignnone" width="620"] Image via Flickr[/caption] Your small business may sometimes feel like an island, but really, it's more like a tree in the forest, vying for resources and trying to grow the biggest and the fastest. Which doesn't mean you need to hire loggers to come down and cut all the other trees down, but it does mean that part of your business plan should involve looking around to see who else is in your field.

[caption id="attachment_5843" align="aligncenter" width="620"] Chase Jarvis in action. [/caption] Do you ever feel like people just aren't listening to you, or that you're speaking but no one's listening?

[caption id="attachment_5828" align="aligncenter" width="620"] Photo courtesy Andrew Scrivani. [/caption] Product photographers watching the Colbert Report last week may have been a little surprised to hear that one of the most ubiquitous set-ups in the business now officially belongs to one particularly giant online retailer.

[caption id="attachment_5820" align="aligncenter" width="620"] Photo via PhotKing on Flickr. [/caption] Think you'd be happier being your own boss?