If you do freelance work, it’s easy to get caught up in projects and in deadlines without looking at the bigger pictures. Here are four areas that can really sabotage your freelance business if you don’t plan for them:
- Factor One, Administration — I’m talking about paperwork: the bills, the e-mails, the queries, and the proposals. Another example is filling out your tax forms (in the U.S. most freelancers file estimated taxes quarterly). These tasks have gotten be finished. Yet, too often we freelancers forget to allot time for the mundane tasks of running a business.
- Factor Two, Appointments — The oven repairman is coming, and yes, he’s going to take some of your time. You need to run your child to the doctor for immunizations, and yes, that will take time. Your car needs an oil change, and yes, that will take time.
- Factor Three, Freelancers Get Sick Too — It’s 8:00 p.m. and the big deadline is tomorrow. Suddenly you’re filled with gut-wrenching pain. You rush to bathroom and vomit repeatedly into the commode. In fact, you spend your entire evening in the bathroom.
- Factor Four, Murphy’s Law — When you least expect it, things will go wrong. The computer will crash. A storm will sweep through the area and wipe out the power for a few hours. You will have problems with your Internet provider.
These factors can undermine your business if you don’t watch out. A colleague of mine, a fellow freelancer and a mentor, used to say that if you can’t take care of yourself at least as well as a corporation would take care of you then you shouldn’t be freelancing.Â
Contents (c) Copyright 2007, Laura Spencer. All rights reserved.
10 responses so far ↓
1 Paula Neal Mooney // May 24, 2007 at
Yay! I’m finally subscribed by email!
Thank you so much for adding the Feedburner email box, Laura. Did you hear that Google just bought them for $100 million?
I hope this means good news for us.
2 Harmony // May 24, 2007 at
Factor 3 – yep, that sums up my last couple of weeks. Bronchitis and deadlines don’t mix!
3 Courtney // May 24, 2007 at
So true! And I’ve been hit by all of those many, many times.
4 Tammi // May 24, 2007 at
Paperwork? I thought that I didn’t need to deal with that. I mean, I work on a computer. I have to admit that this is my weakest area and my greatest source of clutter.
5 Laura // May 24, 2007 at
Hi Yvonne! You are so right!
Paula, welcome to my short, but growing, subscription list.
Harmony, I’m sorry that you’ve been sick. I hope that you are feeling better.
Courtney, It’s good to see you again.
Tammi! You really made me chuckle. I actually know an attorney who says that he keeps an entirely paperless office. I’m pretty much online, but there’s a few things that still happen on paper.
Speaking for myself, I’ve had three and four today. I woke up with a splitting headache that still hasn’t gone away. Plus, the power was out for about an hour due to a thunderstorm. Wouldn’t you know it? There’s a deadline tomorrow too!
6 Lillie Ammann // May 24, 2007 at
Laura,
I can relate to all of these at some time – sickness and an e-mail outage when I needed to send a project to a client on a tight deadline in the last week or two.
7 alicia // May 25, 2007 at
Sometimes I think I need to hire an assistant to handle the paperwork I get lost in.
8 Teresa Morrow // May 25, 2007 at
Laura,
I would like to chat with you all about a great time management system that I have been luckily enough to be a part of and I believe that it is going to be a huge revelation to the solo entrepreneur industry.
You can read my post at
http://keybusinesspartners.wordpress.com/2007/05/25/the-ultimate-time-management-system-for-the-solo-entrepreneur-including-virtual-assistants/
9 Lisa // May 25, 2007 at
Laura,
Wow! I know first hand about #4 this week! Guess it just goes with the territory, doesn’t it? Great post!
10 laura // May 26, 2007 at
Lillie–I think every writer has experienced one or more of these circumstances at one time or another.
Alicia–maybe we should all chip in together for that assistant?
Teresa–thanks for the recommendation. I’m really not in the market to buy a new e-book right now. I hope you keep reading here, though.
Lisa–I’m sorry you were hit by Murphy’s law. The good news is: the week is almost over.