Hi. I’m Shane. I tweet about my misadventures running (with some pretty smart people) a 100% freelance driven agency at @justlikeair. Working with freelancers offers an interesting conundrum. In a polygamous environment, a genuinely free market, how do you build loyalty? Why would a great freelancer choose my urgent project over someone else’s? How do we stay attractive after the 3rd date (project)? What about after dating (without getting married) for 3 years? After all, the best freelancers get to pick from a wide pool of suitors.

Check out the slides from the entire talk. The article below elaborates on section 4. Continue Reading

With the economy so unstable and a personal down-shift in the number of good-paying projects, I have begun to search for a full-time job, or at least a part-time job to fill in the financial gaps. My preparations for this search has included some deep thinking about my skills, assets, and what it is I really offer a client and how different that is from working in a company. Based upon my discussions with contractors, recruiters, and line managers, I’m finding that the current needs of organizations differ enormously from the work I’ve done for the past twenty years as a freelancer. For me, the shift from “one-stop-shop” web designer and marketing writer to some sort of singular role on a team within an organization that creates web sites is a paradigm shift.

This article is part therapy and part research about what we offer to our clients as freelancers and how that translates back into corporate life. Continue Reading

I read a series of great articles by Jaan Orvet and Andreas Carlson (“Strategy Basics: It’s Really About Having A Plan” and its follow-up, “Strategy Basics: Getting Your Clients Ducks In A Row“) on Carsonified’s Blog called “Think Vitamin” and on the importance of having a sound plan for a successful project. This is basic project management logic, but so often when we start a project the client has not fully developed what they want to do as well as many of the details of how to accomplish it.

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Sometimes, a client will come to you with a fabulous project: something that you want to work on that just happens to be open-ended and will pay a nice chunk of your bills for months to come. You go in very excited about the project and the money and generally it’s a good gig. But the ending might not always be what you want. Maybe the client puts a sudden end to the project. Maybe the client has been following your every step and taking notes in the hopes of handling everything in house as soon as he’s learned all he can.

These situations are not necessarily bad, but if you plan for them from the start of the of the project, you can make the final transition for the project much easier when it does come around.

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Photo by | spoon |.

Dear Aunty

I’ve started a design project with a new client. How often should you contact your client or contact them with updates and do you have any tips for this?

Yours

Emo Fudd

Dear Emo

Remember: A client wants to feel loved like everyone else. Even if you have no news, a brief email every day or two days, even to say ‘hello’, is a non-intrusive way of letting the client know that you are thinking of them and have the project in your mind. This also keeps you fresh in their minds — flow-on work usually happens this way.

It’s a good idea to submit a weekly work-in-progress update once the project has started. Try and submit this at the same time each week –- Friday afternoons are good as a ‘close-off’ for the week. Continue Reading

Photo by Please! Don't smile.

Dear Aunty,

We’re halfway through a project and I think the Art Director is going to kill the Technical lead. We can’t get through a day without constant sniping, terse words or snippy emails cced to the whole office.

Yesterday, the technical lead poured his slush puppy over the art director’s head and unplugged his laptop in the middle of a presentation causing the art director to cuss wildly about the cost of his suit and the state of his hair. It didn’t help that the client was sitting in the meeting room watching the presentation at the time.

Is there any advice for this? I’m the PM by the way. Continue Reading

Dear Aunty Entity

I recently started with a new client on a project. As well as normal project management duties I attend at least two hourly client meetings a week and spend as much time again on the phone. As the project is potentially a long-term one I can see a lot of unpaid hours stacking up already. How much can I charge back as a project manager and do you have any tips on how I should present these to the client?

Flat Eric

Dear Mr Eric

Whatever made you think that meetings and phone calls are not part of a project manager’s duties? Unless you have agreed to a fixed fee, billable time can be defined as any task you undertake for a client as part of the project. For instance, if you attend a meeting at a client’s request it is perfectly fine to charge for this. Phone calls and email communication are necessary and time-consuming co-ordination tasks relating to your job as are tasks such as archiving and filing. Continue Reading

Image by Idle_Type.

Creating an efficient project management process, such as Leo’s Guide to Simple Project Management, provides the framework for freelance designers to deliver on time and make a profit. However, the biggest challenge for a designer is efficiently managing client feedback and communication. Profit margins are quickly eroded when clients drip-feed design feedback intermittently or request monster changes towards the completion of a project.

Without a very trusting working relationship these issues are difficult to manage once they occur. The best solution? Avoid them in the first place.

Rewrite the Brief

When clients are involved from the beginning of the design process changes will be minimized later. Client involvement requires more than communicating acceptance of a brief and providing regular status updates. The client needs to provide input into the design. The challenge for a designer is to maintain the position of the design director without becoming a design monkey following instruction, and this challenge is best overcome by restating the brief on your own terms. Continue Reading

Dear Aunty Entity,
I recently inherited a multi stakeholder project where one of the key production team is in another country. Do you have any tips for working with offsite teams and in different timezones?
Signed, Harried

Dear Harried,
Ooooh. The catch-all term; ‘outsource’. Back in the days when every blue chip happily farmed out the more technical aspects of a job and customer service centers to a country where the workers are awake at odd hours, seemed more qualified than their boss and cost less per day than co-workers spent on lunchtime burgers and beer it was a dream come true. Then, after a honeymoon period some disgruntled rumblings appeared and grew to a very loud crescendo of anti-outsource sentiment…. “More errors were being introduced which cost more time and money to fix than phase 1″ and: “I want to talk about gardening and football, not which type of buffalo skin is best with chilli jam ….”, it all went a bit quiet… I think you have the picture.

Outsourcing can benefit your project. You can save money, have an entire team dedicated to a project which frees up your own team and of course there’s the lure of international travel. But as with everything, you have to make allowances.

For instance you might want to take the following into consideration:
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Dear Aunty Entity
How often should I keep in touch with my client, can you have too much contact and and how close is too close?
Signed, Touchy Feely

Dear Touchy,
There is no right or wrong amount of contact for a client – it really depends on the project, your technique, their personality and the day of the week. Some clients like to be contacted every day even for a quick ‘hello’ – some don’t want to know you unless there is something important to discuss. By rule of thumb, more is better. That daily email update or phone chat maintains the human level of contact and helps build a relationship if you are new. If you feel comfortable around a client to discuss and raise issues, then you are more likely to be able to work through any project problems that may arise. When you start working with a new client (and in a freelancer’s case, the client’s client), you both need to take time to get a feel for how you work/prefer to work. As a PM, you should be prepared to alter your working practices to suit a client’s needs for example: a daily update rather than a weekly one, or phone briefings rather than a document.
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Dear Aunty Entity,
Someone once asked you how to make the switch into project management – well how do you do this if you are doing something different and any tips for making the switch?
Signed, Dormant Headspace

Dear Dormant,
Making a career switch is always going to raise questions from prospective employers. They want to know why you want to switch and importantly, what relevant skills you bring to the table to enable you to do the job you aspire to do.

First up, be clear about why you want to change, where you see this taking you and what you bring to the table for a future employer. Also be realistic in your expectations, making a career change generally means that you will have to start from a lower level from where you may have been previously.
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Dear Aunty Entity,
How can a freelance project manager make themselves indispensable to their new employers?
Signed, Daria

Dear Daria,
Let’s get one thing clear. No-one but no-one is indispensable in a workplace unless you own the company and even then you can be taken over, edged out or just plain fired if it’s big enough….

Freelance project managers are usually hired on a temporary project by project basis – when the project is over, so is your contract. To ensure you stay in their memory and get asked back, ask yourself the following:

• Are you comfortable with doing what has been asked of you?
• Are you generally fun to be around?
• Do you look like you belong there?
• Are you available when required?

…and probably most importantly:
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