Best career options for housewives
Housewives have plenty of talents that can be creatively tapped. They can have their own careers. All that needs to be done is to go a bit deep into the options and understand them. This article is an attempt to discuss such career options for housewives in some detail.
Introduction
Housewives need not be just housewives forever. They can start a career even at the age of 35, when the children would be old enough to manage on their own. At this age, if they are qualified, they can go ahead in life with at least two or three career options. They may not even have such careers as a full-time option. These are days when the options have opened up in a far better way than ever before.
In the main, the careers for housewives are centered around a) Teaching careers b) Careers in the Corporate Sector c) Careers based on special skill-sets d) Careers related to meaningful social work and e) Home-based entrepreneurship.Teaching options
If there are housewives who are graduates, no issues. There are careers that open up in elementary schools with just the Diploma in Teaching qualification. Such qualifications are the starting point. Once they start teaching, doing the B.Ed course through distance education from IGNOU or the likes of Annamali University or Bharathidasan UniversityTiruchirapalli, is the best option and the courses can be easily completed at one's convenience. It should be noted that at Annamalai University, attending the face-to-face lectures at Chidambaram (60 kilometers from Chennai, and well connected by trains and buses from Chennai) is compulsory. Promotion to handle the education of students studying in classes V to VIII will automatically happen. There are many private schools that require good teachers and the problem is very acute in semi-urban areas.
Another option is to do the Post-graduate courses in Sociology and Public Administration through distance education through the same universities referred above and then enter the school as a teacher at any point in time. For example, there is plenty of scope as a teacher of social sciences. After getting into the school, the concerned teacher can also qualify herself as a senior teacher. This is an extremely good career. More so, in residential schools, where the school also provides free accommodation and even food for teachers. There are schools that encourage both the husband and wife to be teachers. So, if the husband is also a teacher of any subject, say, Mathematics, it is the best career move.Careers in the Corporate Sector
A housewife can start a bit late, but do the catching up after some years of life as a house-wife. For example, these are days when she can easily do the ICWA course on a private basis and the coaching classes are being conducted in many places, including the smaller towns. This can help the woman to get a junior or asst officer's position, even after passing the inter examination of the course. This is one option. The housewife can also pursue a career option in public relations if she is an extravert and good in English. After acquiring a post-graduate degree in journalism, part-time opportunities abound. There are positions such as reporters and housewives who can work part-time. With some experience, the housewives can also start writing articles in their mother tongue or in English in the local newspapers.
Another option is to do a course in Investment management, capital markets, and or portfolio management on a part-time or through distance education and then look for appropriate positions in the Best Mutual Funds' companies and so on. Similarly, if the housewife is interested, after a Master's Degree in Personnel Management and Industrial Relations from the likes of Algappa University Karaikudi, she can find the entry positions in HR in any good organization. Karaikudi is a fully developed town in South Tamil Nadu and is well connected by trains and buses from Chennai. It would take around nine hours to reach Karaikudi from Chennai. There are a number of organizations where housewives have gone to become successful HR Managers, even when they had entered the industry at the age of thirty.Careers based on special skill-sets
Housewives should look around in the metro cities and the other big cities. There are short-term courses in digital marketing, bakery management, jewelry design, Tanjore painting, and the like. These are highly skilled and job-oriented courses. After even a small experience of six months or one year, the housewives can become entrepreneurs as well. For example, there are hundreds of housewives who exhibit their cooking skills in preparing a wide variety of dishes on YouTube. They earn decent incomes even as housewives. These courses can help housewives to explore every possible avenue as trained professionals.
The scope for entrepreneurship is very wide. For instance, there are so many bakeries that make good profits even in semi-urban towns. There is tremendous scope for innovation as well. In fact, there are housewives throughout India, who make excellent multi-taskers, as they are able to manage their homes and their businesses admiringly well.Careers related to meaningful social work
There are hundreds of housewives who have successfully immersed themselves in meaningful social work. Helping the old and the destitute is one such example. There are many who have built concrete structures to take care of them. Similarly, there are many housewives who have mobilized public support to educate students in Government schools and colleges. There are many who have set up infrastructure facilities to give some support to the disadvantaged groups such as tribals. Housewives can act as catalysts to give a big fillip and support to such noble causes, in any part of the country.
It should be noted that there is no age to start such noble initiatives. Whenever housewives feel that they should do something useful to society, they can do so. In fact, housewives are known to have done commendable work in many places in India. The scope for meaningful social work is very wide.Home-based entrepreneurship
Starting a trading business from one's own residence, is a good career option. For instance, it is possible to start a small hotel in the front portion of one's house and get going. When the business picks up, the housewives could take a bank loan and expand their business.
Similarly, the manufacture of pickles, papads, and so on can be started from home. These require minimum capital and with the help of locals, the business can easily pick up, as the marketing costs are almost nil. Two young ladies, for example, started the brand called Mamblam Iyers. Today, this brand of pickles is so famous in most of South India. A housewife, who innovated with cooking through the traditional methods in earthen pots in Tiruchirapalli, Tamil Nadu is already a force to reckon with. She is the subject of so many YouTube videos and her restaurant is a branded one. She had started small and then scaled up. The scope of such enterprises is huge in any part of India.
Given the scope of such services, the scope is always good. One such service that is now finding a big scope in big metro cities, is the A to Z service business concerned with supplying servant maids, electricians, plumbers, carpenters, and so on. The agency has an agreement with hundreds of households and a fixed amount is collected by the agency every month. Conclusion
Based on a number of real-world observations and my personal involvement in specific cases, some career options for housewives have been discussed in the aforesaid paragraphs. However, there is a good deal of innovation that is always possible in any given situation.
A good article from the author. Housewives will have some spare time and they may like to use the same for some earnings which will be useful for her personal expenses or for family also. But that depends on the nature and time availability of the individual. These days all housewives are qualified and they are minimum graduates. So she can engage some students and teach them. The main option for a housewife is a teaching job. I always recommend a teacher job to a housewive.
Another option these days that appear attractive is digital marketing. If she learns something about computer data entry and other basics she can do online marketing jobs and if she is having interest she can also do content writing and postings in various blogs that will give her some income.