Preparing for Career Growth as Student, Freelancer, or Found
Learn how LinkedIn helps students, freelancers, and founders position themselves for future success.
Nowadays, finding a job is not easy because of market competition and the rapid expansion of AI. However, one article outlines several ways to prepare for your career while still studying (5 Ways to Prepare for Your Career While Still Studying, 2023). First, consider working while you are a student. Working student jobs are designed to fit well with your studies: you can work up to 20 hours per week during the semester and up to 40 hours per week during breaks if you want full-time work. These roles are also available in many different fields, allowing you to explore different career paths over time. Second, research assistant positions usually involve working 15–20 hours per week, often in a library or within a specific academic faculty. Third, internships during semester breaks are an excellent way to try out different industries and gain valuable experience. In this article, I explain how to position yourself as a founder, an employee, or a freelancer.
What the Three Actually Mean
An employee works within boundaries that someone else has already defined. The comfort does not come from the paycheck alone; it comes from knowing that someone else has already decided what “done” looks like, what falls within the scope of work, and what happens if something goes wrong. Freelance work means taking ownership of the execution without owning the direction. A freelancer decides how to do the work and who to do it for, but the underlying problem — what needs solving and what the market actually wants — usually comes from someone else. A founder, on the other hand, owns the direction itself. A founder decides what should exist before anyone asks for it and accepts the risk of being wrong about that judgment. It is not about having investors or a company name. In fact, freelancing can sometimes lead to founding: the freelancer who repeatedly notices the same unsolved problem across different clients and decides to solve it for everyone at once has already started thinking like a founder.
Where LinkedIn Fits In
LinkedIn is one of the few places where that decision becomes visible to others. An employee who writes about a problem they solved, a decision they would approach differently, or a lesson learned from a failed project is doing more than sharing content — they are building a reputation and positioning themselves for future opportunities. For freelancers, LinkedIn can be treated as a portfolio of ideas, not just a list of services, which is a mindset similar to that of a founder. For founders, LinkedIn is where the idea can be tested before the product or service even exists. Writing publicly about why something should exist, rather than simply announcing that it does, helps a founder discover whether the direction they have chosen resonates with anyone beyond themselves.
Conclusion
To conclude, whether you are a freelancer, an employee, or a founder, your rizq is written. Allah (SWT) says: “There is no creature on earth whose provision is not guaranteed by Allah. And He knows where it lives and where it is laid to rest. All is written in a clear Record.” Surah Hud Ayat 6 (11:6 Quran)
This article was previously published on bahrainmoments. To see the original article, click here
AI contributed to the creation of this article.
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