Band 6.0 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 6.0 · Cambridge IELTS 14 · 2026-10-03

IELTS Writing Task 2 question

Nowadays many people choose to be self-employed, rather than to work for a company or organisation.

Why might this be the case?

What could be the disadvantages of being self-employed?

Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or experience.

Student answer (Band 6.0)

Nowadays a large number of people prefer being self-employed rather than to work for a company or an oganisation as they would no longer have the need to work under someone. They will be independent and can work accordingly. More details are shared in the following paragraphs.

Being self-employed is becoming really common in recent years and I have personally seen many people quitting their jobs or giving resignation letters to their heads or bosses. There are several pros and cons of being self-employed .

Some advantages would be: a person who works for himself can undoubtedly contribute more to the economy and will be more happy with the outcome. It provides the person the independence and flexibility he desperately wanted while working in a company, additionally all the profits and products are of the owner itself which acts as a huge incentive for the individual to work with more consistency and determination. In addition to this, a successful business can yield a lot of wealth which is nearly impossibe in a corporate job.

Talking about disadvantages, it can be a tedious and time consuming work for the person as there are no fixed working hours. The individual has to devote uncountable amount of time to build a successful business and it can be a huge burden on him/her if he or she is the only person working, as they would have to handle all the departments themselves wether it be finance, sales, marketing or human resource. Furthermore, being self-employed can be really risky due to unguaranteed pay.

In conclusion, I certainly believe that the advantages outweigh the disadvantages since the person learns practical knowledge and develop their skills related to each department. Moreover, the financial incentives can themselves be enough for a person to opt for being self-employed, however owing to the disadvantages, many people still prefer being a corporate employee with fixed wages as it bears significantly lesser risk.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 6.5

The response addresses all parts of the task, examining both the reasons why people choose self-employment and the potential disadvantages. The position is clear throughout, culminating in a balanced conclusion. However, some ideas are more fully developed than others, which is characteristic of this band level. For instance, the reasons for choosing self-employment—such as flexibility and financial incentives—are reasonably well elaborated, but points regarding disadvantages like the burden of handling multiple departments are slightly less extended and could benefit from more specific examples. Additionally, around 10 words copied directly from the prompt were excluded from the official word count, though the overall response comfortably exceeds the minimum requirement.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 6.0

The essay presents a coherent overall arrangement with a clear progression of ideas from the introduction to the body paragraphs and the conclusion. Paragraphing is used appropriately, with distinct sections dedicated to the reasons and the disadvantages respectively. However, cohesion sometimes feels mechanical or slightly repetitive, particularly with transitions like 'In addition to this' and 'Furthermore'. Referencing is generally functional, though phrases such as 'More details are shared in the following paragraphs' in the introduction represent an unnecessary and formulaic approach rather than natural academic progression. Overall, the logical flow is maintained, but smoother integration of cohesive devices would elevate the response.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.5

The student uses an adequate range of vocabulary for the task, attempting less common items such as 'incentive', 'tedious', and 'unguaranteed pay'. However, there are noticeable lexical errors and awkward collocations that reflect this band level, including spelling mistakes like 'oganisation' and 'impossibe', as well as collocation issues such as 'time consuming work' instead of 'a time-consuming task' or 'consuming work'. Word choice is sometimes imprecise, such as using 'products' in the context of business profits, but meaning remains clear throughout despite these inaccuracies.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 6.0

The writing demonstrates a mix of simple and complex sentence forms, utilizing structures such as relative clauses and conditional-like phrasing appropriately. There are some errors in grammar and punctuation, including subject-verb agreement issues such as 'practical knowledge and develop their skills' where 'develop' should be 'develops', and minor punctuation oversights like the spacing before the period in 'self-employed .'. However, these errors are relatively infrequent and rarely impede communication, allowing the reader to follow the arguments without difficulty.

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