Contributed post
While self-employment is often synonymous with freedom, it’s only when you embark on this professional adventure that you realise how much work and dedication it takes to become free.
Indeed, most freelancers and self-employed entrepreneurs agree that they chose to quit their 9-to-5 job because it didn’t give them the freedom they required. Whether it was the lack of flexibility or the absence of professional initiative, they decided that self-employment could be the key to gaining their freedom.
However, if you want to make it work, your freedom relies on being able to manage the challenges of your new career.
Managing your clients
It’s not uncommon for freelancers to establish a digital presence only – more often than not, self-employed individuals don’t share their physical address because they work from home.
Consequently, your website is an essential tool for customer acquisition. However, a website that isn’t equipped to handle visitors is a waste of your time and money. The 3 main complaints about freelancer sites are their peak time sluggishness – something you can sort out with a cheap VPS –, lack of responsive design – find a modern template – and abundance of lead capturing forms – visitors don’t want to sign up to your newsletter yet.
Managing your tasks
Let’s be honest: when you have to rely on yourself only to get the work done and be paid, you need to understand how to prioritise your work. You have to stay away from the first arrived, first served principle. Instead, give priorities to tasks that are likely to generate high income. The key is to balance urgency and importance, hence not to focus on the deadline only.
Managing yourself
Contrary to the common belief, people who work from home tend to work more – as long as they manage not to get distracted! As a result, most self-employed individuals tend to deny themselves the very few things they need to work. When you can’t afford to waste time or money, it’s easy to only focus on work. But you need to make time for yourself and learn to manage your personal needs as well as your professional requirements.
Managing others
Being self-employed doesn’t mean that you should do everything by yourself. In fact, you can and should outsource to manage both your workload and your freedom. Outsourcing may not be the first option you need to consider, but when you realise that you’re wasting too much time on non-billable tasks and have too little for the things that matter, it’s time to look for support. This will avoid from work from suffering from a loss of quality in the long term.
Manage your income
While in a typical work position, you may not need to consider rainy days or taxes, a self-employed individual needs to put aside around 20% of their income to prepare for their self-assessment tax. Additionally, you also need to divide your income into what you can use as emergency funds, capital for your business and everyday expenses.
Freedom is not easy to acquire. While it isn’t impossible for a self-employed individual, you need to learn how to manage yourself, your online presence, your finances, and your workload.