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Freelancing: A 6-Month Retrospective

mrooney.github.com

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Re: Freelancing: A 6-Month Retrospective

#71

Post by capsule_toy »

skrebbel wrote: post #57

Guys, a question about this: reading HN, I have the feeling that in USA freelancers are a pretty common phenomenon in software. Where I work (Netherlands), all freelancers I know are working full-time 2 year projects anyway, not at all getting them the flexibility articles like these refer to. They mostly get paid more than the employees, in exchange for less job security and having to invest in education themselves.…

A lot of the people I work for need someone to be able to make sites and maintain them, but they don't have enough work to justify paying someone fulltime. Most of my employers just come to me when they need work done. Luckily, they always seem to want and need extra customizations on a somewhat consistent basis.

Re: Freelancing: A 6-Month Retrospective

#72

Post by capsule_toy »

brandall10 wrote: post #45
nolok wrote: post #10

I've always wanted to turn to freelancing, mostly because my girlfriend has visa issues and it would allow me to go live with her full time and take better care of my family, but my biggest drawback and what stopped me was that I didn't know how to start getting decent projects. I'm a webdev, I mostly feel confident to start with PHP where I have lots of experience and worked on websites with millions uniques and thi…

I would say get involved in your local community... go to meet-ups, tech talks, Startup Weekends, etc, and become a known entity. The real benefit to this is you get to meet people who are already established, as usually those are the people who tend to do these things and sometimes they work in teams. I did a pro-bono project with a local known dev, he liked the work and invited me to come along on a long-term paid…

I do this a lot. A couple things I've realized: - Quite a few of the people you meet aren't going to lead to much. A few of them will lead to something but not until further down the road. Basically, not everyone is looking for freelance developers.

- You have to know a bit about sales. If I'm talking to someone non-technical looking for an online store, I'm an expert in e-commerce, but if I was talking to someone in the industry, I'm less likely to throw out the term expert and more likely to try and talk about specifics.

- This is culture dependent but in the States, I've found being too modest is a negative and people seem to interpret it as either disinterest, lack of confidence, or lack of skills.

- I once overheard a discussion that went something like this, "I'm looking for a developer." "If you can get that would be great." I'm not there yet but I want to be .

Re: Freelancing: A 6-Month Retrospective

#73

Post by alinajaf »

yourapostasy wrote: post #59
alinajaf wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only thing you're missing out on is the ability to work on and towards your own projects. Not sure about the average freelancer, but most technical freelancers I know see it as a stepping stone towards getting their own little SaaS or iPhone app business off the ground. If you're working full-time for a company, IME contracts tend to own all intellectual output at your time there, at home or otherwise. This doesn't m…

That's just a matter of negotiation. If you are billing significantly above $100 per hour, you are not a commodity technical talent and have leverage in negotiations. Redline the IP clauses you find objectionable, and supply alternate phrasing. Stress that whatever is paid for by the project from inception to delivery remains solidly available to the client. Lots more details for freelancers to work out, but I don't…

I think it's possible that you've misunderstood the comment I was replying to. The poster is referring to permanent employees under a ROWE-like system.

As you say, I would have to be in dire financial straits before I accept a freelance contract that even casually mentioned IP outside the scope of a given clients project.

Re: Freelancing: A 6-Month Retrospective

#74

Post by cageface »

mgl wrote: post #46
cageface wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been doing iOS apps for the last year or so and lately I've had a bunch of people approach me for work mainly because they liked the apps I'd published on my own. I think if you want to get started freelancing the best thing to do is build up some kind of online portfolio to show people what you can do. If you're not a designer yourself maybe you could partner with a designer in a similar position that's interes…

Thanks, sounds like a reasonable advice! Does portfolio have to be quite large to attract people with application ideas? Is it yours: http://www.plastaq.com ?

Well I'm too new at this to be able to give you a good answer. It probably depends on exactly which programming market you're trying to get into.

And yes, that's my site.

Re: Freelancing: A 6-Month Retrospective

#75

Post by Rodeoclash »

If anyone is looking to freelance in Australia (specially Melbourne) then please reach out to me at sam@dragonflylist.com - specially if you're a front-end developer or mobile developer.

We don't take a percentage of your earnings (we charge a subscription to the agencies instead) and we have WAY too many requests for positions for us to fill at the moment.

Re: Freelancing: A 6-Month Retrospective

#76

Post by davidcann »

skrebbel wrote: post #57

Guys, a question about this: reading HN, I have the feeling that in USA freelancers are a pretty common phenomenon in software. Where I work (Netherlands), all freelancers I know are working full-time 2 year projects anyway, not at all getting them the flexibility articles like these refer to. They mostly get paid more than the employees, in exchange for less job security and having to invest in education themselves.…

I did freelancing (web, then iOS) for 8+ years based in the US, but for companies (large and small) around the world. I rarely worked with companies in my local area. The problem is thinking of the clients as "employers".

If you think of them as just clients and you have a lot of inbound leads (built up by word of mouth over time), then you can choose the projects that interest you.

In my experience, projects ranged from 6 weeks to 6+ months, but I almost always had multiple projects in various stages happening at the same time. There were often a couple other freelancers on the project, coordinated by a project manager. It's useful to work with or through a design agency or "interactive" agency (as they were called 10 years ago). The key is to manage the entire project from start to finish for the client. The worst problem is clients who don't deliver content/approvals/etc, so you need someone focused on bugging them.

I also usually set a per-project price, not hourly. I hated tracking hours and it didn't give me the motivation to get stuff done faster. A fixed price also forces everyone to agree on a detailed spec up front. Add a little padding into your price, so you you can be kind about implementing the inevitable changes.

tldr; Yes, it's totally possible to make a living doing freelance development, all from home (or anywhere you want).

Re: Freelancing: A 6-Month Retrospective

#78

Post by Daniel_Newby »

LVB wrote: post #70
michaelochurch wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

LVB: you now what I think you should do? If you don't want to leave the corporate world, and your only gripe is the lack of vacation, negotiate . If your boss gives you a raise, ask if you can trade in 2% of salary for another week: taking an 8% raise instead of 10%. If he can't give you a raise at all, ask if you can get an additional week off instead. If you have to, offer to have any time past your 3rd week unpaid…

PTO was a part of my negotiation when I was looking for a new job, but it didn't work out. The job market was worse then, and I was quite keen to make the move out of my previous location (it was a cross country move) so it wasn't worth not getting the new job. That said, over the past week I've been drafting a polite but direct letter asking for the extra week. Sure I've already had the job for a couple years and my…

What stops you from just taking a week of unpaid time off?

Re: Freelancing: A 6-Month Retrospective

#79

Post by davekinkead »

xxbondsxx wrote: post #38
sneak wrote: post #8

This guy knows what he's talking about. He omitted the part about not having to put on pants to go to work, though. That's worth $25k/year to me, easy.

I don't get this with developers. Are pants that uncomfortable? That much of a terrible obligation that you'd forego 25k a year?

As someone reading this post while working from home on my sunny balcony at 10:30 am and still in PJs, the freedom is worth at least $25k per year.

Re: Freelancing: A 6-Month Retrospective

#80

Post by boralben »

nolok wrote: post #10

I've always wanted to turn to freelancing, mostly because my girlfriend has visa issues and it would allow me to go live with her full time and take better care of my family, but my biggest drawback and what stopped me was that I didn't know how to start getting decent projects. I'm a webdev, I mostly feel confident to start with PHP where I have lots of experience and worked on websites with millions uniques and thi…

A very simple formula worked for me: a full LinkedIn profile and a technical blog. I've found that many people land on my LinkedIn profile, then some continue to my website where they can get an idea for my skill level by looking at some blog entries. Also, the clients that come via that channel are usually high quality clients. In general, they are dev shops with too much work to handle in-house, so they're looking for an extra hand. Since they're technical people, their projects are clearly stated and expectations are realistic.
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