Call it a scheme or scam, or just another deceptive sales tactic but here is the latest rampant time and money waster to avoid. It’s the ‘hiring’ scam. I refer to it as a scam because deception in any disguise is a scam in my opinion and this latest one is a doozy.

It starts with an offer to hire you as a coach (or some other business position), on your own schedule, working from home, and requiring the strict guidelines such as ‘must have the heart of a coach,’ or ‘must  be willing to learn and follow our success steps,’ or some other amazing ‘God send’ of a qualification. A highly successful person or group then promise to invest their own time (and maybe even money) to make you a six figure rock star coach in a short period. Yes, they will even share their secrets to generating fast leads that close quickly and ‘sure fire’ methods to make you profitable.  If you are one of the fortunate ones, they book a call with you when they eventually mention that you must first invest in the platform or secret tools that are required for you to achieve your goals. Yep, they aren’t hiring at all. They are selling their ‘make money’ system and they’ll teach you how to use the same sneaky tactics to lure in others who want to believe in the impossible, and it will cost you, literally.

U.S. regulators are starting to determine that these are blatant scams that they are cracking down on, but I seriously feel that the takers of such schemes are just as responsible for the deception. After all, aren’t the deceivers banking on a good percentage of people who want fast money with little effort? Absolutely. Why would anyone want to spend months or years learning skills and building a real business in the school of hard knocks if wealth can be hardwired with little effort? Why would they let a little fib here and there get in the way of their potential vast fortune? You too can learn their bait and switch tactics that bank on human greed.

You see, I am one of those ‘hard knocks’ students who learned real skills, studied and worked hard, made mistakes, many times wanted to quit, and pulled it all together to eventually achieve big goals. I learned so much that I have been hired as an expert business coach, teaching entrepreneurs what it takes, step by step. And I continue to learn and ride the entrepreneurial roller coaster with the others who never say never. I watch the world where aspiring entrepreneurs quit when they find out the truth – that there is no shortcut to success – which is why a small percentage actually achieve it. I watch them run to the next shiny object, spending more money on big promises and schemes, lured by more fast talk and sometimes blatant lies and there isn’t a darned thing I can do about it. Next to ‘get rich quick’ promises, my offer to learn about how businesses online work and how to build them isn’t very exciting.

I wonder what it is about humans that prefer the shortcuts and the lottery win. Do we think that somehow we will be the ‘one’ that will hit the jackpot despite the warnings from others who got sucked into dirty back door deals. We think we will be different even though stats tell us that most lottery winners go broke and money didn’t solve any problems after all. On top of it all, wouldn’t everyone be buying the ‘miracle methods’ to earn if they actually worked? Are we lazy? My guess is ‘yes.’ I think that the world is a big, never ending challenge that exhausts humans.  The lottery or the “I will make you rich” promises start looking pretty good even when we know they aren’t real. It is much more fun to believe in the fantasy than to experience the journey of learning, pain and pleasure of earning those goals.

So we continue to reward the schemers and scammers, making them rich and then complaining about them – blaming them. Yes, they are the problem! Yet that whole ‘flim flam’ sales tactic still lives on because of the support of its believers (and buyers). I teach skills and learning. No one can take my knowledge and experience away. It is not the easy road to travel, but it is one with a real destination that can be reached. I hold fast to my belief that we will soon embrace the entrepreneurial journey and its rewards, and like the businesses that disregard the planet, we will also put those who disregard humans out of business. It is up to us to take that responsibility and be the leaders. Are you one of them?

Landria Onkka is an internet influencer, best selling author, business and transformational coach with several successful internet businesses. You can find her at https://landriaonkka.com and https://landriaonkka.net