Comments on: The Forgotten Advantages of Becoming A Freelancer

By: Matsya Siosal

Matsya Siosal — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 21:23:33 +0000

I provide writing and marketing services to companies and organizations that contribute to a healthier, more sustainable marketplace.

For me, the greatest benefit of self employment comes from upholding my mission statement: to write about the things that move me and to use my creativity to influence positive change in the world.

By providing creative and professional services to businesses and organizations that promote a healthier, more sustainable marketplace, I manifest this mission.

I elaborate on this benefit of self employment in this week’s post on my blog http://skullandquill.blogspot.com/.

By: Alik

Alik — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 03:04:45 +0000

The biggest advantage to freelancing that I enjoy is not ever being micromanaged. When I was a company employee, I was micromanaged to death; and as an only child, I didn’t take that too well. As a freelancer, you get to determine how you work, how your desk is set up, when you take breaks, eat lunch, etc. It’s a nice feeling after spending years and years on a short corporate leash.

By: Valencia

Valencia — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 19:39:45 +0000

Being a freelance writer can teach you perseverance. It’s not always easy, and most people don’t strike gold in their first month of freelancing – or their first six months.

By: James Chartrand

James Chartrand — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 17:34:01 +0000

@ Angie – Yeast infections, peanut butter, dollhouses… I jest, but you’ve got a good one, definitely. Writers are indeed learned people, and become informed consumers faster than one would think!

@ Aurora – Absolutely. More time because of better systems equals more money and better jobs. Hands down.

@ Lisa – Not only can you never be fired, you can always fall back on what you’ve learned and rebuild better and faster the second time around.

By: Angie Haggstrom

Angie Haggstrom — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 17:30:09 +0000

Ok, this sounds silly, but I’m amazed at all the various topics I’ve learned about since starting as a freelancer. Most of it is stuff that I never would have taken time to learn about before.

Lots of it has come in handy for something else completely unrelated to work. For example, I was able to talk with a friend about certain web design problems not because I’m a web designer, but because I had worked on a project that involved 10 common problems designers/developers face and what to do about it. The collection of bookmarks I have is so varied that they always seem to come in handy at one point in time or another.

It helps relate to clients directly as well. Knowing what I know about certain topics has made it easy to relate and understand what they’re trying to achieve or what difficulties they may be facing. I know the industry lingo. In all, I would say that customer service has certainly improved (not that it was bad before, but I can always improve).

Thanks to a host of diverse clients I know about hunting, industrial topics, mechanics, and many more. In fact, these topics seems to stick better than a lot of the things I read or research for fun or to improve my business. This doesn’t include the significant improvement in my research skills.

Completely different from the benefits you mention James, but vital to a successful business in my opinion. You actually brought up a few I had never really thought about before.

Regards,
Angie Haggstrom
Freedom Freelance

By: AuroraGG

AuroraGG — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 14:58:50 +0000

Another bonus advantage to “time management, scheduling and discipline” that I personally have gained, is an increased income. At one point I really believed that I did not have the time to do more work to earn more money. Once I started running my freelance business with a well-planned and organized schedule (one I rigorously follow each and every workday), I was surprised at how much more work I could do on a daily basis. The value in better managing my time, scheduling work and having the restraint to stick with my own schedule was literally doubling my income. I just never realized how big of a difference these three things would have until I bit the bullet and got a good system in place and started making better use of my time.

Expanding knowledge in related fields of business is something I need to work on. Thanks for the advice to get me started.

By: Lisa

Lisa — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 13:04:01 +0000

You can’t get fired. Even if you lose a client, there are always new possibilities.