Latte? What’s That?
As promised, I’m presenting the other side of the freelance world – the side where work is uppermost and lattes are things we hear about but haven’t experienced for ourselves. Today’s freelancer is Kathy Kehrli, who walks us through her typical day. Kathy’s been hard-core freelancing for a number of years, and she’s graciously taken the time to give us an inside look. Thanks, Kathy!
Is yours a “latte life”? Why or why not?
Well, my hot beverage of choice is tea, but usually the only time I’m
sipping it is while I’m embroiled in one project with two or three waiting
in the wings, or late at night, when I’m wrapping up last-minute details
(like emails) I never got around to during the day. And that’s all assuming
I can carve out enough free time to boil a cup of water!
What’s your typical work day like?
Most weekdays find me working pretty steadily from 9 to 7. Now not all of
those hours are billable hours, of course, but running a freelance business
entails far more than writing an article or two every day in between sipping
lattes! There’s also marketing (which I try to do every week regardless
of workload), responding to potential clients who contact you, attending to
revision requests, invoicing, accounting, etc., etc. There’s so much to do,
in fact, that some of it is often reserved for weekends.
It’s been said that we freelancers can set our own hours, be our own bosses and work from coffee shops. Do you agree with this? Why/why not?
In some regards I do set my own hours and I am my own boss (I’ve been known
to fire a client or two…or three or four…over the years), but let’s face
it. Clients have deadlines and demands that need to be met. They call the
shots, ultimately meaning we freelancers have many bosses even if we don’t
call them by that title. As for working from coffee shops, I’m lucky to be
able to get to the bank once a month, so forget about Starbucks.
What’s the biggest challenge facing you as a freelancer?
For me personally, it’s juggling multiple projects when several ongoing
clients call upon my services at the same time. But I also spend a lot of
time advocating for freelancers’ rights, so I’d have to say getting the rest
of the world to treat us like the professionals we are is an even bigger
challenge.
How would you advise someone starting out in the business?
Although being a freelancer is a fulfilling role, it’s not an easy one. The
work’s not just going to come to you and it’s not going to happen overnight.
If you’ve got talent, a drive to succeed and the willingness to devote to
it, you will succeed. If you’re expecting to spend half your day hanging out
in coffee shops, you’re probably going to go broke faster than you can sip
down a latte.
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