It takes a few months for a season to come and go, and it seems, the pace of my life. I am no longer employed by the previous company – we parted on good terms. I’m not going to sit and rant about it because, for one, i’m not angry. The company just couldn’t seem to keep the business afloat for a variety of mistakes. All I will say is though, if you are going to create a web development firm, then it is a good idea to know what web development actually is – the directors and seniors were not developers. A manager just should understand something about the core of the business or something will go very wrong, as it did.

So, why am I not angry? Because as it currently stands, I am my own boss. A freelancer. I have my own clients, and the next few months are well and trully taken care of. Beware though, none of the clients have anything to do with the company – the contract with them absolutely forbids a developer from externally contacting a client or enticing clients away from the company, and one, I’m not going to try and take on a legal team I can’t afford to fight, and two, the clients of that company wanted sites which just don’t interest me.

To keep a potential book shorter, here are the good parts of all this:

• I am making a lot more money than when I had the full time job (no kidding!) and less money is going out


• I work my own hours. If I want a couple hours mid day to break the day up a bit, then I can do that. As long as I get the work done, then things are fine


• There are almost no travel costs. Ok despite petrol being expensive these days, that was not the problem – time was. Now I just use the car for meeting face-to-face with clients


• I can maintain my own sites. Again the rule is, as long as I deliver for the clients


• I can build my skill base by experimenting with new technologies. Again, as long as I deliver for the clients


• I have far more time to actually live, compared to the full time job

I have to admit though, I have been very lucky with this. I certainly doubt many freelancers get to start off with a client who is so well off, “anything you ask for is yours – just get me that site!” His site is technologically the most advanced I will have worked on, which makes it fun. He has asked for features which would tax the most powerful dedicated servers. But he is rewarding well for it. It involves two months entirely dedicated to his site, just for the first stage – get it done, get it out, and that doesn’t involve designing the site – just the raw technical details. There’s the prospect of working with him too – maintaining the site, managing it, and keeping it feature-wise up to date. He wants to start something big – very big, and I feel rather honoured to be a huge part of that, not to mention EXTREMELY thankful for pulling me into the way of life I have aimed for, for so long.

Sorry for the way this post was written – I am excited, and that’s after two weeks of leaving the company. The aim if this post is to encourage people of what could be, and what the benefits are. If you are reading this as someone maybe going into college, leaving college, starting uni, leaving uni, somewhere in-between, or just wanting to change career, then maybe I can provide a few thoughts.

• If your mind drifts when you work on your own projects, or college/uni work, and you think this will still happen if you go freelance, chances are it won’t. Getting the first paycheck is extremely rewarding, and will push you on and on for weeks to come. You will wake up excited to carry on working, even if the job is mediocre. Trust me, it is better than uni work in pretty much every way, not to mention the financial security will keep a huge stress off your mind.


• If you are aiming for a full time job in the industry, then it is better to be afraid of ending up in a job which would be too easy. A job that challenges you will keep you going, especially if you are in a room full of like-minded people.


• If you are in a full time job, it is better to ask and fail, than to wonder what would have happened. From personal experience, if I had not bothered the technical manager in the first week, and really showed I wanted to be on the bespoke team, I doubt I would have been a senior developer, at least way ahead of planned. (Actually, be careful with this one – failure could mean they cut your contract).


• Be careful with who you meet. He/she could be the key to a fantastic future, or might know someone who is.


• A full time job will get you mixed with like-minded people, who also know people. Some of you will have different skill sets and different desires. Depending on the company, you could also find people who want to break out and go it alone – but just didn’t have the final piece of the team (beware though, as some companies will have a clause in the contract that STRICTLY forbids this).


• Yes, there are thousands of freelancers. Tens of thousands. But there is only one of you, and also many people near you who will help you. All it could take is for one very well off client to meet you, and you have a good few months sorted. Each client is another task added to your portfolio too, and each could eventually want you to do more work.


• Having one simple, monotonous task when you just want to get on with the big task by another client is still a good thing. You still get paid, you make another person happy, they will recommend you, and the job itself shouldn’t actually feel that bad.


• If you want to go freelance, you need a strong understanding of what you are doing. If all you have created is a forum, then you are not ready. Put it this way – if the client wants an e-commerce site, can you slap one together within a week, by modifying an e-commerce application you haven’t yet seen? Of course it will take you longer, but you should be able to get a good understanding of someone else’s application, especially after a good few hours of pulling it apart.

Finally though, freelancing isn’t the bliss-end-of-all-bad. You will eventually meet a client who just wants more and more, without paying for it, or who won’t pay you until it is done. You cannot just rush into it because there is the chance of cash on its way next week. You need to agree on something, in writing, with the client, BEFORE DOING THE JOB, and make absolutely sure you both know where you stand. It is better to not get the job than to waste weeks of development for a client who won’t pay you because he first wants “this changed”, “that changed”, “oh wait this changed too”, “and this”.

P.S – I am new to freelancing. The thoughts above are only my experiences, which could be drastically different to other people’s. Rest assured there are a LOT of freelancers out there who would disagree with me. Again, I have been lucky so far, and thus, wrote about this very positively.