Complex Worker: Self-Concept and Boundary-Work Among the Solo Self-Employed

Solo self-employment, entrepreneurial subjectivity and the security–precarity continuum: Evidence from private tutors in the supplementary education industry

“…[A]fter the lesson, I invite the parent in and I kind of go through what we've done and then ask the kid to demonstrate what they've learned…I want to show that their money is being well-spent…it's like a customer service thing (Adam-PT). Some enjoy the business side of the job more than others, so there is diversity in our sample; however, whereas Kapelinsky and Shoshana's (2019) solo self-employed workers in diverse professional employment (e.g. lawyers, psychologists, designers and curators) argued they disliked and were poor at marketing themselves, most tutors in this study regarded competence in tutoring and business skills as essential.…”

“…The paper shows that solo selfemployed tutors are not, for the most part, classic entrepreneurs. Few tutors were keen to grow their businesses to the point they would need employees (Light and Munk, 2018;Storey and Greene, 2010); instead, they were happy to make a reasonable living, without being tied down by running a more challenging business (Kapelinsky and Shoshana, 2019). Indeed, some felt that entrepreneurship is anathema in education as here professionalism is imbued with notions of public service (Aurini, 2004).…”

“…Two qualitative studies in Israel and Italy suggest that the highly educated solo self-employed do not regard themselves as entrepreneurs, as they have a passion for their work rather than an interest in business growth. Notwithstanding the insecurities of solo self-employment, neither do they see themselves as precarious workers, as there are others worse off than themselves (Kapelinsky and Shoshana, 2019;Murgia and Pulignano, 2019). However, research in the creative sector in Germany and the UK demonstrates that while the skilled solo self-employed rarely frame themselves as entrepreneurs, they may nevertheless be constituted as entrepreneurial subjects in the 'psychic life of neoliberalism': for example, they may regard their self as the business, embrace risk and seek perpetual self-improvement in order to flourish (Scharff, 2016: 107).…”

“…In economic terms, their position is extremely weak, but local social capital means they are experiencing a particularly middleclass form of precarity, and notably one they anticipate will end on entry into graduate employment. This diversity of experiences demonstrates that binary representations of entrepreneurial success or economic precarity do not do justice to the heterogeneity of solo self-employment (Bögenhold, 2019;Kapelinsky and Shoshana, 2019), and instead reveals the importance of a security-precarity continuum spanning high-, medium-and low-income tutors.…”

“…Indeed, some tutors are actively uncomfortable with the notion of combining education with entrepreneurship. The resultant boundary work (Kapelinsky and Shoshana, 2019) sees entrepreneurs constructed as money-centred, an orientation thatdespite the widespread marketisation of education (Ball and Youdell, 2008) is deemed to be at odds with the educator role:…”