There are two sides of every coin and freelancing is no difference. After reading all good things about freelancing now it is time to take freelancing with a pinch of salt.
1. With More Power Comes More Responsibility
Freelancing gives you the power to work for whatever you like at a price you feel satisfied. This means you have the power to choose your work at a price but you should also be more responsible in setting the price for yourself. Make sure you do not set it too high or too low. It is always good to start low and move up as you grow as a freelancer.
2. Need Lot More Discipline
You need to be a lot more disciplined to not only to keep you driving but to even stop you at times. There is no boss when it comes to freelancing and this means there is no one on top of you to say when you should start and when you call it a day. I myself had quite a few 16 hours day quite often when I started freelancing and slowly but surely I made a rule not to power on my laptop (no matter what) once I called it off.
3. Becoming Workaholic
The more you work the more you make and this at times can work to your disadvantage. You should not start your work too early and work late in night suits or pyjamas. Once in a while is acceptable but if this is becoming your habit you should make sure you take needed steps to come out of this habit or else there will be hardly anytime you will give for yourself. You will not realize but you will become workaholic.
4. Working in Non-Productive Environment
You may always think that you are working from your home and what else could be more comforting than this, but make sure your environment is productive. Freelancers at times can become lonely, especially if you work from home and you do not have anybody to talk about your work and achievements in your coffee break. Apart from that your there can be lot of other external factors which make the environment un-productive like your kids playing around.
5. More Than a Job
Being a freelancer means that you control everything from profit and loss to your PC maintenance and so you are not only a freelancer but also a finance manager, the admin guy and the marketing manager at the same time and so make sure you are prepared mentally for all those responsibilities.
Can you think of anything else? I’d love to hear it from you. Share your thoughts in comments below.
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I do lot of experimentation on new ways to internet marketing strategies for my web properties and like to share my experiences on ways to make money online @ IMTips.co. Read more about me
{ 13 comments… read them below or add one }
I think discipline is pretty important in any aspect of life in order to be successful or in order to achieve your goals in life
Hello shabir,
It look like your mutual fund blog is having some problem. Not able to post any comment in that!! Please do check the same.
Salman
Actually your comments go through but they are being flagged as spam. I have replied to your comments now and whitelisted your comments as of now.
Being a freelancer for almost 5 years is what I’ve noticed to be disadvantage is…NO medical benefits unlike working on companies locally.
Is it a disadvantage or an advantage?
“disadvantage”
You don’t like the money but the medical benefit schemes?
Hi Shabbir! I like them both..I just wonder if there are freelance site that could offer medical benefits to its member by asking a percentage on each withdrawal. Do you thinks its possible??
Why don’t you get the money and do the medical benefit yourself instead of relying on some website to get it done for you. Also what happens to cross country medical benefit differences.
Actually I did it already
That should be enough.
Hi Shabir,
I tried many freelance sites online. I would like to ask you: Which freelance site is the best of all. I saw other day, details of many submitted Bid ( with a leading freelance site) are appearing on Google search results! It is too bad.
Do you suggest any ( Because you have used many of these sites) site that is more reliable and professional?
How is your experience with vWorker? Is it better than elance?
Regards
Salm, Elance is better in some respect than vWorker and vWorker is better than Elance in other respect. I have used both of them. Currently I am using more Elance because I am not doing freelancing full time. vWorker is a good place to start because you are not charged anything to start with.
Don’t try to find the site that is best but try to find site that work’s best for you.