Freelancers should put themselves at the center of their world and the top of their to-do list. Makes sense, right? Without you, nothing happens. Nothing goes out or comes in. Meetings don’t start. One freelancer recalls, “My dad took out a big loan to buy his father-in-law’s business. He says my grandfather once asked how he could sleep with all the pressure. My dad answered, ‘I sleep great. It’s you and the bank who ought to be worried, in case something happens to me!’ When I feel stressed by my work, I remember that.”
Employees get vacation time, sick leave, family leave, bereavement days, and personal days. Those policies exist largely because workers advocated for them. Who advocates for you?
Contented people work harder and longer and have better work relationships. Why ignore something that would make you more successful?
Freelancers don’t have bosses and the nine-to-five workday to help them set boundaries and priorities. They have to decide what’s important day by day, hour by hour.
Sometimes they do it with ambivalence:
“Now and then, my husband will propose we go out to breakfast or lunch. And because I love hanging out with him, it’s hard to say no. When I do, I feel guilty, or like someone who was more committed to success wouldn’t be doing what I’m doing.”
Sometimes they get a wake-up call:
“I ran into a freelancer I know on the street one evening. I hadn’t been out all day and was glassy-eyed. He was coming home from a meeting to do more work. He said, ‘I thought I was burned out in my company job. Did I even know what burnout was? I’m working harder, earning less—and buying all my own benefits!’ We were both laughing—but not because we thought it was funny. We were just kind of hysterical.”
And some people have the right perspective:
“I feel that since I live this lifestyle, I have to take advantage of it. I might go to the museum in the afternoon, or to the movies. I know I’m much more productive if I do or see something that’s beautiful, makes me happy, and takes me somewhere I haven’t been.”
By the end of this chapter, I hope you’ll know what you intend your work/life policies to be. So when it’s tempting to skip breakfast, the gym, sleep, a snuggle with your love, or your kid’s plea for “just one more story,” you can shrug and say, “Boss’s orders.” Or “Workers’ rights.” And then do it, no regrets.
First, let’s look at where you are right now.
Knowing yourself is the first step to finding the right work/life fit. Download the quiz and answer each question below by putting a check mark in the column with the response that most closely matches your thoughts or feelings.
Please download a PDF of this quiz here:
workman.com/ebookdownloads
Scoring
Give the following point values to each answer:
Strongly agree: 4 points
Somewhat agree: 3 points
Somewhat disagree: 2 points
Strongly disagree: 1 point
Add your scores for questions 1–4: ______
Your answers to these questions show your current feelings about Your Personal Life.
Add your scores for questions 5–8: _____
Your answers to these questions show your current feelings about Your Body and Mind.
Add your scores for questions 9–12: _____
Your answers to these questions show your current feelings about Your Work Life.
Add your scores for questions 13–16: _____
Your answers to these questions show your current feelings about Your Financial Life.
Add your scores for questions 17–20: _____
Your answers to these questions show your current feelings about Living in the World.
What Your Scores Mean
If you scored 13–16 points in a category: You feel mostly pretty good about how things are going. Congrats! Keep going!
If you scored 9–12 points in a category: Your satisfaction level might be uneven or so-so across the board. Focus on ratcheting up your satisfaction in lower-scoring areas.
If you scored 5–8 points in a category: Some key issues are causing you concern. Take a step back; review relevant chapters in this book; and talk to friends, family, and your Brain Trust about ways to make changes.
If you scored 4 points in a category: You’re likely pretty aware of stressors in your freelance life. Focus on solutions. Read up on the topics where you want to score higher (financial planning? marketing? health?). Ask for advice. You might find others are having trouble and you can help each other.
Freelancing gives you the freedom to do your life and work your way. But, paradoxically, work isn’t always in our control. A project explodes or implodes. A diva client lays waste to your schedule. After a dry spell, it starts raining gigs.
Freelancers with young children often have to work around child-care schedules: “On the days my daughter is home with me, I don’t keep regular office hours and can’t always turn things around quickly. I compensate by working all hours of the night and constantly checking my smartphone.”
Freelancers without kids have different problems but with a similar feel: “Lately I’ve been realizing I have no balance at all. I am my work. If someone asks how I am, I answer based on how my work’s going. I think it’s mostly because I don’t have kids and I work at home—so there’s little besides work to think about and little separation (literally!) between home life and work life.”
Try these ten ways to defeat drudgism.
1: Know Your “Most Productive Day.”
“At first I worked all the time, everywhere. Eventually, I realized that was anathema to my cellular structure. I’ve learned I’m quick and can cover more ground in fewer hours. Now, I wake up and work in bed—my favorite spot—for a few hours. I stop at six at night or so. I don’t work after that.” (See Chapter 13 for more on productivity.)
2: Have an Availability Policy.
“I don’t answer unexpected phone calls when I’m working. Clients sometimes resent that, but you have to ask yourself: Is complete accessibility good for you, your family, and your lifestyle? It’s a huge question, especially since we all can be reached 24/7.” For tips on developing your policy and sharing it with clients, see Chapter 6.
Then stick to it. “Early in my career, I was practicing martial arts and went away to karate camp for a week. There were only answering machines and services back then, so I left a basic ‘away’ message. One of my clients got furious that I couldn’t be reached and hired someone else for the next project. I had to ask myself if I wanted to work with a client who had that attitude.”
Clients who don’t like your schedule will get winnowed out over time. It’s part of being an intentional freelancer.
3: Make ’Em Wait.
Being unavailable can make people more determined to work with you (the scarcity draw we talked about in Chapter 4). “I heard about a super-busy freelancer who’d say, politely but firmly, ‘I can start your project in X months.’ And the best doctors are booked months ahead. I tried it. It’s surprising how often people are willing to wait, or we find some small part of the project I can start.”
Of course, being able to do this depends on a) the norms in your business, b) being so excellent that clients will wait, and c) having enough financial cushion to afford starting projects on your schedule, not theirs.
4: Forget Faux Free Time.
A short time away—if you’re really away—can refresh you more than time when you’re supposedly “off” but keep checking messages or doing chores. “I almost never take a day where I do neither business work nor housework. Recently, though, I’ve been having an experience of time passing way too quickly. A friend suggested it might be because we never take a day to do just nothing, relax, and rejuvenate. I’ve been pondering trying to do that more often.” Another freelancer knocks off early on Fridays: “I try to take off Friday afternoons for exercise, meeting friends, or going to the movies.”
5: Ease Off the Gas.
Like extra pounds, overwork creeps on gradually. We sneak in message checks here, a half-hour of work there. Stopping short can be hard on your brakes. Try stepping back in the same gradual way you sped up. Ask yourself: “Do I really need to do this now?” Wean yourself off checking your messages. Ratchet back the end of your workday half an hour at a time.
6: Schedule Free Time Blocks.
“I’d sneak work and chores into free time: ‘I’ll take my laptop to the park!’ or ‘I’ll get exercise by running errands!’ Now on Saturdays, my husband cooks us a special breakfast, I work or do chores until three p.m. Then I do a full stop: I leave the house. I get out and do anything but work or chores. Just thinking about that time during the week gives me a mini mental vacation.”
7: Subcontract.
Sharing work evens out everyone’s workload. These can be some of the best relationships you’ve ever had. “One thing I love about freelancing is all the wonderful people you meet along the way. I hired an amazing professional copywriter to help me with my copywriting challenges. I would have never had an opportunity to work with him if I hadn’t started my own business.” It starts with intentional networking.
• Mentor newbies for smaller tasks until they can step up to do more.
• Network with peers for shared projects.
• Network across skill groups to assemble teams for big projects to grow your business.
Before you subcontract or organize a team, make sure you’ll get enough income for yourself, not a small fraction of what’s usual for you. For information on subcontracting, see Chapters 11 and 15.
8: Little by Little, Build a Financial Cushion.
Working from a place of greater financial security is a powerful drudge-buster: you aren’t forced to overbook yourself and pursue every gig, no matter how bad or poorly paid. For tips on taking steps to get there, see Chapter 17.
9: Don’t Be Penny-Wise, Pound-Foolish.
Budget for the things that will help you work efficiently: “I sometimes try to save money by not hiring a babysitter when I really should. I need to be better about creating sane blocks of time for work, not stuffing it into spare moments or into hours that should be spent sleeping.”
10: Advocate for Unemployment Protection for Independent Workers.
Employees who lose their jobs have unemployment insurance funded by employers to help them meet expenses until they find another job. Freelancers Union is advocating for a fund that would let freelancers contribute pretax dollars to draw on in dry times—lowering their tax burden while weaving a sorely-needed safety net.
In Chapter 13, you filled out a What’s Your Ideal Day? chart to compare your ideal day to “what really happens.” Here we’ll take a deeper dive into “what really happens” to find where your work/life balance goes off-track. Again, there are no right or wrong answers—this is totally for your information. The more detailed you can be, the more insights you’ll get, so write them down.
Fill out the chart explaining what constitutes an “ideal” day, a “good” day, a “medium” day, or a “bad” day.
Please download a PDF of this quiz here:
workman.com/ebookdownloads
Here’s how one freelancer completed her chart (download a PDF here):
Look at your chart and ask yourself:
1 Where do things start going off-track to turn a good day into a medium or bad day?
2 Are there specific events or behaviors that trigger it?
3 What’s one thing I could change in my day that would make a noticeable improvement?
Try changing that one thing and see what happens. Then pick something else and make another little change.
Here’s what the freelancer who filled in the sample chart said: “I see that the biggest thing that gets me off-track is how late I stay up. I really need sleep, so if I go to bed late, I sleep late and spend the day racing to catch up. I do marathon work sessions instead of pacing myself. I cancel appointments and skip exercise. Then I stay up late trying to fix everything, and the whole cycle starts again. Just going to bed earlier would make a huge difference in how I feel and work.”
Employees get paid for sick days and maternity leave. Nobody pays you unless you deliver—and we don’t mean the baby. But you could budget so you can afford to take sick days, or some weeks off when the new baby arrives. See Chapter 17 for ideas on budgeting yourself through income ups and downs.
Your subcontracting team can step in, too. You still need to guarantee the quality and oversee the final results. Having a great reputation, doing client Love Banking, and having Blue Chip clients increase your chances of having the kind of client relationships where you can be upfront about what’s happening and work out a plan.
If your problems are creating real headaches for them, see what you can do to lighten their load, maybe reducing your price this time, eating rush costs, or squeezing your margins to subcontract it out.
If you’re too sick to even monitor subcontractors and the deadline can’t be moved, the best save for all might be to negotiate a kill fee and help them find another indie to finish the job.
Take care of your health and if you need medical care, don’t delay getting it. Getting affordable health insurance is a major challenge for freelancers. But letting a health issue worsen only gets more expensive.
If you get sick and the opportunity to knock off completely is there, take it. “I was sick recently and since it was a Saturday, I watched TV and did crossword puzzles all day. It was heaven.”
If someone you love dies (pets, too) your emotions might affect your work. “When my mom died, I kept working. But I felt mentally fogged, was less decisive, and had no patience. I should’ve taken time off.”
Freelancing’s flexibility can really help at times like this. Need more sleep? Take it. Want to be with your spiritual community? Do it. Need to empty a house or handle estate matters? Go mobile.
“Because you can freelance almost anywhere, it gives your life amazing flexibility,” Doug says. Which leads to the dark question: If you can work almost anywhere, what’s stopping you? Why is turning it off a struggle for many freelancers? Because “you believe the one time you’re away will be when the call comes for a big job!” (and sometimes that actually happens). Because freelancers typically can’t afford to let the phone go unanswered. Because with more and more freelancers out there, you’re afraid you’ll lose ground.
Oh, please.
1: Decide You’re Going and Budget for It.
So, another year has passed and you didn’t see the Great Wall of China, hike that fourteener, try out that sweet B & B in Maine, or take your kids to visit Uncle Ted’s farm before he puts it on the market. Time will run out. What will you have done besides work? See Chapter 17 for ways to set aside money for things you want.
2: Don’t Succumb to Freelance Superstition. (“When I Leave, the ‘Big Call’ Will Come.”)
That’s the lottery ticket approach. If you’re prospecting, marketing, and networking, big gigs will come because you’ve put the odds on your side.
3: Get Off the Gig-Go-Round.
You can’t turn off and go if you can’t afford to. That means working your Freelance Portfolio, knowing your market value, making sure your skills are worth the price, Love Banking with other freelancers who can refer you for good gigs—and making lifestyle changes so your living costs don’t force you to drag projects along over well-deserved holidays.
4: Set a Vacation Policy.
• How often will you take vacations?
• How long will they be? “I take one week in the summer when I put an ‘away’ message on my email and don’t check in.”
• Are there slow times in your industry when you can take breaks?
• Will you work at certain times during vacation? Says one freelancer, “I never take work on vacation.” Says another: “I often take work on vacation. I put in a couple of hours before anyone’s up. Sometimes in the afternoon, my family goes off to do something I’m not that into, and I work another hour or so. Once everyone’s in bed, I do another couple of hours. I can pack about six hours of work into a vacation day and still have plenty of downtime.”
• Will you check emails and messages? If so, how often? “I might check email or voicemail a couple of times a week, but that’s all.”
• Will there be times when you don’t check emails and messages? If so, when?
5: Block It Out.
Put big X’s, colored blocks, or write VACATION in your calendar. Otherwise you might inadvertently make a project commitment and then have to renegotiate, work over vacation, or rush to finish early. No good.
6: Schedule a Staycation.
If travel’s not an option, kick back at home. Sleep in, take yourself out for breakfast, catch up on movies, hit the museums, double up your workouts, enroll in a class, or tackle a home project that would make you feel incredibly good to get done.
7: Tack Vacation onto Business Travel.
Add downtime to a business trip, even if it’s just taking the scenic route home, stopping to take pictures and eat at a great roadside diner. Just be sure you deduct only your for-real business expenses on your taxes (see Chapter 15).
8: Decide Who Needs to Know You’re Going.
This might include your Blue Chips, anyone whose project you’re in the middle of (better yet, build it into the schedule from the start: “FYI, I’ll be away the week of the fifteenth, but that won’t affect delivery”), and anyone you might be in serious discussions with about a future project. Let them know if you’ll be reachable while you’re gone.
9: Set Up Your “Away” Messages So People Know What to Expect.
Will you check messages daily or every few days? Will you have limited access to voicemail and email? “I was at a campsite where the only cell phone signal was atop a cliff. There’d be people pacing around up there at night, cellphones clamped to ears!” Are you totally unreachable (as in: on a raft, floating down the Amazon)?
Craft your “away” messages to give yourself wiggle room, since you can’t totally predict your accessibility, or in case you change your mind: “I often say I have limited access to messages so I can choose whether I want to reply or totally unplug.”
10: Book It.
It commits you to the trip, and booking early might get you better rates. But watch out: There may be hefty fees for changes or cancellations, or rules prohibiting them.
11: Go Where They Can’t Find You.
Going where there’s no cell phone signal, no electricity much less Wi-Fi, and where you’re watching the clouds, not uploading to them, takes the entire dilemma out of your hands.
12: Let Technology Help.
The flip side of “Go Where They Can’t Find You.” Use an online file-sharing service to send or receive files from the road. Stay at hotels with free Wi-Fi. Talk to other freelancers who travel a lot; find out how they plan the tech side of their trips.
13: Don’t Trust Technology.
Flip side of “Let Technology Help.” Don’t expect airport wireless to work, don’t expect to find an outlet when you need one, and don’t expect reliable Wi-Fi at the hotel or other places that advertise it. Carry a flash drive (secured by password or encryption if needed) that backs up your laptop. Cloud backup is good insurance, too. Speaking of insurance, find out if yours covers theft or damage of your tech equipment during travel. Get good antivirus protection on your computer, and don’t trust the security of public equipment.
14: Give Travelmates a Heads-Up.
If you’re with other people, make sure they know you’ll need to work for specific periods of time. It’s part of running your own show.
15: Set Up a Smooth Reentry.
You need time to unpack, wash off the beach sand, make it up to the cat, open the mail, restock the fridge, and—most important—edit your vacation photos: “I set my ‘back in the office’ date one day after my actual return.” Feel like revving up sooner? Your client will be happily surprised to hear: “I’m back early and spent the afternoon working on your project. I’ll send some sketches in a couple of days.”
When Freelancers Union was getting started, I remember being at home on a conference call arguing for a huge grant while my infant daughter played nearby, and just praying she wouldn’t cry.
There’s been much debate about work/life balance, especially for working parents. Many of us also help our aging parents: “My father’s health is fragile. I take him to the doctor and sometimes the hospital, pick up his meds, spend time with him each week, and handle all his finances—a job in itself.”
Then there’s all the other stuff you have to do to keep modern life going, which can sound like this:
“Cereal for dinner’s getting kind of old.”
“What do you mean, the cable guy will get here ‘sometime between eight a.m. and eight p.m.’?”
“Omigod. Today is our anniversary.”
“How could we already be out of toilet paper?”
Everyone struggles with work/life balance to some degree. But the equation’s different for freelancers than for traditional employees.
For traditional employees:
geographic distance + inflexible schedules = work/life balance challenges
For freelancers, it’s the opposite:
geographic proximity + flexible schedules = work/life balance challenges
Geographic proximity is obviously toughest for home-based freelancers: “One of the hardest things about working from home is too much intermingling of the business with the personal.”
And because freelancers have flexible schedules, it’s sometimes assumed they’ll run the household if their mate’s traditionally employed or has a less-flexible schedule: “My wife’s teaching and getting her master’s degree, so her schedule is nuts. Because I’m home, it makes sense for me to do the housework. I’m mostly OK with it, but three years is a long time. It’s hardest when I’m just getting rolling on work and have to stop to deal with a repairperson, run errands, take the dog to the vet, or whatever.”
Freelancers with young kids may feel major push-pull between parenting and work: “My kids are in day care two days a week, so those are ‘work days’ for me. I drop them off, run errands, and head home to get to work by ten, checking email as infrequently as possible. I race out at four forty-five to pick them up. Family time lasts until eight; then I work after bedtime, trying to be in bed by one a.m. On days when my youngest is home, I can work for an hour or two during her nap, but my main work hours are after bedtime. Honestly, I have trouble balancing things. Either I’m focused on my family and home or I’m focused on work (and a little too reliant on TV-as-babysitter).”
For some freelancers, proximity can increase their guilt about not putting in enough family time: “When I had children, I continued to work and hired a sitter, even though I was always home. But if it’s hard for many adults to understand that a freelancer working at home is actually working, how can children be expected to understand that they ‘can’t bother Mama’ when she’s sitting a few feet away? There we were: me on the telephone with clients, my child banging on the door, crying, because he wanted to give me a flower, and the sitter crouched outside, trying to hold him back and secretly wondering, I’m sure, how I could be such a cruel parent.”
The stress can get pretty severe: “It’s almost impossible to work on anything when the kids are home from school. I still haven’t come to a place of comfort where doing housework because it needs to get done instead of doing my work feels OK. I get snarky. I want to know just how many hours I’m supposed to put in daily, but there’s no union to negotiate for me.”
Even with older kids, there’s more of everything: “Now that the kids are in school full time, I have more time for work. I’d like to say I’m back to my old schedule of turning off the phone and shutting out the world, but those days are gone.”
Mark says: “It’s a lot of work to get gigs, but my friends assume I have more free time than they do.”
Heather’s friends were bolder: “Many of my friends, none of whom worked at home, thought nothing of calling ‘to chat’ or even dropping by. This was a big problem as I was always on deadline. No matter how often I explained that I couldn’t hang out, some people refused to get the message. I’d promise to call when my work was finished for the day, but the damage was done: I was accused of being antisocial, when in truth I was constantly stressed-out trying to keep up with the demands of my projects.”
Another adds: “I screen my calls, but it just leaves the ball in my court to call back. I haven’t really saved time as much as delayed spending it.”
And it’s not just friends wanting to chat or hang out. There’s all sorts of stuff people think freelancers have time to do: pet-sit, sign for packages, help at the school, run the youth group, coach the team, and on and on.
“People with staff jobs can say, ‘I can’t do that because I have to work,’” Gina says. “But because freelancers supposedly have more control over their schedules, if they say they ‘have’ to work, it’s viewed more that they ‘choose’ to work. Which must mean they’re putting their priorities ahead of others’. Which must mean they’re being selfish.” Yet freelancers need their friends: “Truth be told, I’d much rather talk on the phone with my friends than do my work!” They need community with one another, with friends and family, and in organizations of all kinds. We all do, but freelancing can be very lonely without it.
The answer to these work/life-balance questions depends on the situation, who’s involved, and your work. Here are some strategic mindsets.
When you have to work, you have to work. No apologies, no excuses. It’s OK to choose to work instead of waiting for the cable guy (or the neighbor’s cable guy). Repeat this to yourself until you start believing it. Repeat it to others until they start listening.
An agreement being (as you know from Chapter 5) an arrangement as fair as possible for all the parties. And what’s fair is a very personal thing. Also, assumptions are not agreements. If you haven’t discussed it, it’s not an agreement. You might be surprised at the workable solutions that come from a simple conversation.
Work and life have been merging for years. So, let ’em. Because technology finally supports it. Because work today demands it. Because earning a living now often requires it. And because you, freelancer, can.
Unlike millions of traditional employees, you can work while you wait for the cable guy. You can be in and out of the gym before the nine-to-five crew descends at six p.m. You can stake out picnic-blanket turf early for the concert in the park and happily work on your laptop and cell phone until your cube-controlled friends arrive. You can walk the kids to school, say hi to the teacher, stop for a latte, then hit your desk: “I wake up early with the baby, then doze with him before my daughter wakes up. We eat breakfast together and play until it’s time to go to day care. I feel so happy that I can give my children time in the morning, compared to the days I used to scramble for a suitable work outfit, throw lunch together for my daughter, hurry her out the door to day care—and still be late to the office!”
Being in control of their time is a huge reason people love freelancing despite the rocky income: “Being able to create my own schedule has made an enormous difference not only in my work life but in my family life as well. Now that my kids are getting older, I’m even more grateful that as a freelancer I could be more available to my children when they were younger.”
Believe in your deepest self that your career’s worth taking seriously. It’s like negotiating price with clients: Waffle too much and they’ll question your value. It may mean having some reality check conversations about what you need. Freelancing has a natural elasticity that can help, too.
Make Home/Family Responsibilities Fit Your Schedule, Not Vice Versa.
“I incorporate chores and errands into work breaks so I get them done bit by bit, get some exercise, and can relax later.”
“I have two phone lines: an unlisted ‘home’ line for family and close friends, and a ‘business line’ for everyone else. I have a ninety-year-old mother who lives at home with caregivers and two grown sons with children, so if the home line rings, I usually answer. I’m more discriminating with the business line. Caller ID is a godsend. If it’s not urgent or I don’t recognize the number, I’ll let it ring into my voicemail and answer or email at my convenience.” Other freelancers I know flip it: They screen personal calls and pick up business ones.
We talked in Chapter 13 about ways to boost work efficiency. Do it for personal stuff, too. It could be getting your groceries delivered, paying bills online, scheduling and grouping appointments into particular days, starting a carpool or babysitting co-op.
Small efficiencies add up, opening your time, easing your mind, freeing you from the busywork of life so you can engage in the important work of living: comforting a friend . . . tending a child . . . untangling a parent’s finances . . . helping at the fund-raiser . . . training for and completing your first 10K . . . fixing up a room to rent out . . . planning a surprise party for your mate or best friend.
One freelancer says: “When I worked in the corporate world, my marriage went down the tubes—I spent all my time at work. It was important to me to have a life when I worked on my own.” Marriages do better when there’s an agreed-upon division of labor and R & R time built in. “My husband and I go to the gym together in the morning.” “My boyfriend’s the ‘breakfast king’—he gets coffee going, showers, and dresses so the bathroom is free for me when I get up. He’ll make an omelette from yesterday’s leftovers or start pancake batter, feed the cat, and let me sleep an extra forty-five minutes. I do the menu planning, food shopping, and dinner, and he washes up.”
Kids can have responsibilities when they’re ready: “My kids are ten and twelve. When they get home from school, they’re expected to do their own thing until my work time ends. I think it sets an example of a work ethic. And the kids have a chance to manage their own time.”
Look for some reciprocity. Example: Your neighbor asks you to take care of her dog while she’s on vacation (or water her plants or whatever). When you take yours, ask her to return the favor. Is she too busy, or does she grudgingly agree, or mess it up somehow? You will, in the future, be “sorry, just too busy” to help her out.
Company workers can’t. You can: “When my kids were young, I shifted to a kind of writing work that didn’t require such rigid hours.”
If the push-pull between work and family is a continual stressor and your strategies for managing it just aren’t working, maybe it’s time to revisit your freelance goals. Can you afford to be a part-time freelancer so you’d have more time for family? How might you economize so you could work less? Can you save money to hire household help? Are you charging enough for your services, so you could conceivably work less but earn more? Can you develop a specialty or passive income streams to help increase your income?
Others will take their cue from you.
• If you’re a new grad starting to freelance, do you talk about it in ways that say this is your chosen career path?
• If you’re freelancing while you job-hunt, have you made it clear that your freelance work and your job hunt are your jobs?
• If you’re transitioning into full-time freelancing, do others realize this isn’t an in-between thing until you find a company job?
• Keep a schedule (no one needs to know if you change it a lot). Slip it into conversations “. . . so after work I went to the box office and got tickets.” “I finish work at six—I’ll give you a call then.” “Let’s meet after work.”
• Look the part. I’m not saying you should sit at your desk in a jacket or heels, but just be aware that people make judgments based on appearance.
When you say no, be polite but don’t make excuses: “Unfortunately, I’m busy.” Or use an “I can” statement (see Chapter 6): “Sure, I can take care of your dog while you’re away, if I can do it before nine a.m. and after five p.m. No? Ah, well, I’m sorry I won’t be able to help.” Or offer to do something that adds to your work chops: “I won’t be able to help at the silent auction, but I could design the poster.”
Think before you commit your precious time, care, skills, and resources. That goes for the gigs you take, the friends you hang with, the money you spend, the causes you join: “My husband and I both do volunteer work. We feel it’s very important to do that. He plays guitar and sings for hospital patients, and I teach knitting there one afternoon a week. It gets your mind off yourself, and you realize there’s always someone who’s worse off than you are.”
When you willingly give your best, your all, your awesomeness, everything you touch will shine. And so will you.
Family and friends are your biggest fans. They’ll brag about you, attend your events and bring their friends, sample your test recipes, hang shelves in your office, watch your kids while you work, and love you enough to tell you that your latest brilliant business idea is in need of adjustment. Don’t be afraid to seek help, advice, and work there.
But they’re also your family and friends, so know when to knock it off:
| TACKY | TACTFUL |
|---|---|
| Blowing off events or pulling an “eat and run” if there aren’t good business contacts there. | At family/friends’ events, ask your host if they’d mind introducing you to a couple of people they think might have work interests in common with yours. |
| Handing out your card with your handshake at a social event. | Circulate and get to know people, and sometime during the event say to several, “I’ve really enjoyed talking with you. Do you have a card?” [And offer yours]. |
| Using your kid’s school friends to get to their influential parents. | Get to know other parents by inviting them to your kid’s birthday parties and other events and meeting them through school events. |
| Joining school and parent groups just to network, without pulling your weight. | Meet people and network by getting involved in your child’s school. |
| Calling only when you need something. | Check in to say hi, how’s it going, what’s happening, how can I help? |
Know your policy before you’re asked, so if it’s a no, you can have an “it’s not you, it’s me” decline on tap: “It’s hard for me to be objective when I work for family and friends—but here are a couple of people I think would do a great job for you.”
If you do work for (or with) family and friends, the next question is what (or whether) to charge. Have that conversation before you commit. “I recently did some work for my mom’s company and was just waiting for them to request an invoice so I could nobly offer to donate my priceless contribution for the good of the family. They never even brought it up!”
Assume word will get around about your rates, so decide how you’ll price family/friends projects: same as any? One-time Love Bank discount followed by usual price? Always a special discount? Maybe swap services (see bartering guidelines in Chapters 11 and 15). Or request something of value for your business: a thanks from the podium; a spot to display your business cards or brochure. Remember people who’ve never freelanced may not get that you’re losing real income for your donated time and skill. Wrap a reminder in a polite suggestion: “I’d love to do that for you and I’m happy to do it free of charge, but would it be possible to . . .”
As your own boss, how well do you treat yourself? When you can take your lunch break anytime, do you take it at all? When you can work out anytime, do you ever? How do you dress when there’s no dress code? Would dozing off at your desk at two a.m. be considered sleeping on the job? And how do you have those all-important water-cooler conversations without a water cooler?
Freelancing gives you flexibility to do whatever you need to be at your best. Don’t miss out on this coolest of perks.
• Figure out your food/energy balance. I believe each of us knows, deep down, how to eat to keep our mental and physical energy strong. We know when we feel good and when we don’t, and how our eating patterns on a given day contributed to how well we felt and performed. What works for you may not work for the freelancer next door. Experiment. Also make sure you drink enough water—keep a glass by your desk to sip from. All that drinking will then require leaving your post from time to time—which gives your body and brain a break.
• Figure out your work/exercise ratio. What’ll help you stick with exercise? Is it one big workout, or several minis? Is it before work, as a break, or at day’s end? Is it solo, with a buddy, or in a group? You have the freedom to mix it up to fit your schedule: midday gym when the machines are available; weights at home on project-heavy days; basketball with friends on weekends.
One freelancer discovered: “Exercise used to feel like something I had to do and I felt guilty if I didn’t. In my networking group, someone said she considered exercise time her ‘me’ time and guarded it jealously. I’ve latched onto that—that exercise is time for me and worth guarding. Sometimes I still feel guilty if I don’t exercise, but now exercise feels a lot more like something I do for myself to help provide that balance between work and home.”
Other freelancers feel guilty if they do take time out to work out—wouldn’t they be more productive if they kept working? That’s a mental trap freelancers need to get out of: “Sometimes I have to force myself to stop working and go to the gym. To do it, I remind myself of all the times I’ve had an epiphany about what to do about a work problem, either en route or after I’ve finished my workout and feel relaxed and pleasantly tired. Sometimes it’s just a tiny passing thought: ‘Maybe I could . . .’ Or: ‘Call . . .’ Often it’s the thread I can grab onto that starts to untangle the problem. I need to learn to trust that process and let myself have that time.”
Maeve recalls: “In the market one night, I was surprised to run into an executive recruiter I know who’s very connected in my business. I was on deadline and a mess—just running out to buy food for dinner, wearing these faded, frayed, floppy, super-comfy overalls that have a giant rip in the crotch. ‘You look like you came from the farm,’ he said. I laughed and said something (I hope) witty. Then we talked about other stuff, but for a few seconds there I wished I could have hidden behind the heirloom tomatoes.”
There’s a stereotype of freelancers in pj’s and slippers. If that’s you and it makes you happy, go for it. But when you’re out and about, take a moment to decide if you’ll be comfortable running into a potential work connection. It’s not about being someone you’re not. It’s about being an intentional freelancer, affecting others without saying a word.
A good rule of thumb: Mirror how people dress in the setting you’ll be in. “I’m on a committee with a bunch of senior execs,” Katie says. “For meetings, I try to dress like the others, who are coming from their offices. At the last meeting, I sat next to a new member from a company I’d love to do projects for. She actually complimented me on my outfit! We talked some; then she said, ‘Could I have your card? There’s a project we might need some outside help with.’ Maybe the discussion would have happened anyway, but her opening comment showed that her first impression was about how I looked. It helped make a bond.”
Sleep is as important as anything else you do for your health, but it’s something most of us skimp on.
Our sleep needs change over time, and some of us need more than others, but we should all buck the tide of “progress” that has shortened our sleep time over the last 100 years. We just aren’t built for it. You need the benefits to your blood pressure, hormonal system, kidneys, brain (including memory integration), and other functions that happen in the quiet of the night. “Sleep helps the creative work I did that day ‘cool off.’” Geoff says. “My unconscious works while I sleep. I’ll often awaken with an insight, a solution to a problem, or a new way to look at my work.”
Some tips for good sleep:
• Try to be consistent about your bedtime and when you get up.
• Stay away from caffeine (chocolate, too!) and alcohol before bed.
• Finish workouts three hours or more before bed.
• Have a calming routine before bed.
To learn more about sleep, one useful resource is the National Sleep Foundation website (sleepfoundation.org).
Based on Freelancers Union surveys and years of talking with freelancers, here are their top stressors:
1 The stress of episodic income. “As a freelancer you truly don’t know where the next dollar is coming from or what you’re going to earn in a calendar year. Not everyone can handle that kind of insecurity and yes, it is stressful.” Former staffers might especially feel the pain: “I never used to worry about money. Now I worry all the time.”
2 The stress of work/life balance. “I try to get to the gym and not work on weekends. Sometimes that’s possible, sometimes it isn’t.”
3 The stress of isolation. “It’s kind of scary how much I talk to myself.”
4 The stress of identity. “It’s annoying to have to explain and sometimes justify my freelancing. People don’t really understand what I do.”
Stress can have consequences ranging from headaches to backaches; stomach problems to sleep problems; panic attacks to problems with decision making or concentrating, to name some. Coworkers can cover for stressed-out staffers, but freelancers can’t afford the drag. If stress is getting you down, consult your doctor.
DEPRESSION
“The biggest challenge for me is to remain positive when I don’t have any work and it seems no one will ever hire me again. I know that’s not true, but downtime can play tricks on your brain.”
Your emotions can affect your productivity and well-being. It’s one thing to feel a little down for several days, but depression can drain you for much longer and needs to be treated.
The signs of depression vary, but below are some symptoms from the National Institute of Mental Health:
• Feeling sad or “empty”
• Feeling hopeless, irritable, anxious, or guilty
• Loss of interest in favorite activities
• Feeling exhausted
• Not being able to concentrate or remember details
• Not being able to sleep, or sleeping too much
• Overeating, or not wanting to eat at all
• Thoughts of suicide, suicide attempts
• Aches or pains, headaches, cramps, or digestive problems.
Depression isn’t something to be ashamed of or try to tough out. Consult your doctor about any symptoms that concern you.
Reprinted from The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) (nimh.nih.gov)
1 Portfolio, portfolio, portfolio. The more you take control of your Freelance Portfolio, the better you can ride the waves of freelancing.
2 Be excellent. Improving your skills and developing sought-after specialties will make you a freelancer who can command top dollar and top gigs.
3 Seek financial balance. The more you can reduce your living costs, pay down debt, start saving, and track your income and spending, the less frazzled you’ll feel about money. For more on money, health insurance, and safety nets for freelancers, see Chapter 17.
4 Find your work rhythm. As a freelancer, you’re free to work the way you work most productively, healthfully, and happily. Find out what that is (for more on work habits, see Chapter 13): “What I learned after years of stress and breakups is that I have to respect the rhythms of my body and mind.”
5 Get a life. “It isn’t work habits I’d like to improve—it’s life habits. I need to do other things so I don’t work all week and all weekend, which is what I do now.”
6 Pad the schedule. But never tell.
7 Don’t go it alone. Confide in your Brain Trust. Help and hang out with family and friends. Network with other freelancers as potential subcontractors, project partners, and problem solvers (see De-Isolate!).
Freelancing can put the “sole” in sole proprietor. Even if your work connects you with lots of people, you might feel the loneliness of being on the hook for every decision: “One of the most challenging things is not having anyone to bounce ideas off of.”
Extroverts can find the silence deafening: “So much is done by email, the phone hardly ever rings. It has led to hours of silence in my life. Last week, a client actually called me. I was so glad to hear her voice; it was nuts.”
Introverts might relish the silence but might not get out there to network: “I make my priorities and don’t let clients make them for me.
I’m very protective of this benefit of working for myself. But my best work habit is also the worst thing I can do for my business: I isolate myself.”
If you’re thinking about freelancing or starting out, ask yourself how you do with alone time, and how you plan to scratch your social itch.
Savor the flip side of solopreneurship: the freedom to come and go as you please in your own professional life: “I love that I don’t have to commute to an office during rush hour. I love being able to take a class in the afternoon or an extra long walk with my dog on a nice day.”
Set up a structure for connecting with people, places, and activities. One freelancer says, “A friend had a summer-evening tradition called Thursdays in the Park with Jane. Open invite, always the same time and location on a beautiful slope near a fountain. She’d get there first with her picnic blanket. People brought their own food and stuff to share. We’d eat, laugh, and play Frisbee until it was dark. Perfect early start to the weekend.”
For more on building community, see Chapter 12.
How do people react to you as a freelancer?
Even though freelancers form a huge sector of the workforce, society doesn’t always know what to “do” with them.
Some still think freelancing equals slacking: “There’s this perception that if you’re not working in an office, you’re not really working. What it really means is that you’re working all the time.”
Others have idealized visions of freelancing. While their enthusiasm is genuine, they may not offer the kind of understanding you really need: “A lot of people were excited about this ‘new chapter’ in my life and were sure everything would somehow just work out. I appreciated their optimism, but it’s better to be realistic. There are a lot of ups and downs in the freelance world, and you have to be prepared.”
Bottom line: They don’t get it. But how could they, unless they’ve been there?
Freelancers are blazing a trail for a model of work that’s been around forever, but was eclipsed for generations by the centralized, mass-production industrial model. Now, technology, a changeable economy, and the shift toward decentralized work have made freelancing mainstream. The world is still catching up to that reality.
Your image starts with you. If you want to be taken seriously as a freelancer, you have to address these three key elements of stability in your own mind and life:
• Identity (who am I?)
• Society (where do I fit?)
• Economy (do I have enough?)
I hope this book has helped you discover that you can address these core questions. It goes like this:
1 Know and grow your skills.
2 Pursue work you love.
3 Be excellent at it.
4 Attract the best clients possible.
5 Get your elevator speech down for the “what do you do?” question.
6 Be businesslike in how you walk and talk about your work.
7 Be a hub and a hive: connected, active, and giving.
8 Have some money in the bank (see Chapter 17).
9 Take the best care of yourself that you can.
10 Thoroughly enjoy your life.
We talked in other chapters about being there for your clients. Be there for yourself, too. It starts with the day-to-day: good sleep, the right food, a productive routine, and ways to destress, take time off, and connect with others. It deepens into a strong, clear way of seeing yourself and being in the world:
“Gigs are great; they teach me and help me get the next gig. But they are not me. I tie all the pieces of my career together. That’s a powerful feeling.”
“When I went from being a manager to being ‘just me,’ it was amazing how fast my phone stopped ringing and emails stopped arriving. I realized that no matter how good I was as an employee, I was just a gateway to the larger company. That was a good reality check. Now I don’t buy into anyone’s hype. We’re all just trying to make it, inside a company or out.”
“Most people think what I do is really, really cool and many seem to envy my courage at setting out to do it and succeeding. I like how brave and confident they think I am, but the truth is that it’d be much, much more difficult for me to work at a staff job than it is to do what I do. I’d be miserable. So it’s a very easy choice to be a freelancer, and one that doesn’t really require any bravery at all.”
