How hard do you work?
Back when I worked for the man, I often spent time commuting to and from work thinking about how much freer life would be as a freelancer. After freelancing for a few months and after having started getting a decent client list, I found that rather than working less than I used to, I was in fact working much, much, much more.
Although there were some easy weeks, for the three years I freelanced I averaged a 60 hour work week and peaked one horrible, stressful week at just under 90. Admittedly I am what most would call a work-aholic, but even so I suspect that most freelancers work more than they did when they worked as an employee.
And so I thought I’d open up the floor to FSw readers to see if my experience was an anomaly or if most freelancers work harder than they used to. Leave a comment and let me know how you find it, and be sure to vote in the poll!
PS. On a sidenote, have a look at the sexy new PollDaddy skin that I made for FSw today, its erm.. very green 
Leave a Comment
I think it’s not an analomy. And I think it’s not even a problem for some people, because they work for someone they like, themselves.
There are times, when I’m working on several projects at the same time (a situation to avoid in my opinion) or a project has to get done, when I put in extra hours or a weekend. That’s totally fine with me. What I don’t like is to work like this all the time. That’s just not worth it. And besides client work there’s always other stuff that has to get done.
I have worked harder since freelancing, but I don’t work the same hours a day, sometimes 4 sometimes 12. Mostly I work in the weekends too.
It’s normal to work harder when freelancing, because there is a lot of additional work you must do: administration, self promotion, business etc… but it can be dangeours too, before you know you are too tired…
I’m currently working 10-12 hour days, full time. No paid overtime and for a tenth of what my employer bills my time for. Freelancing is looking very attractive to me right now
I work more than 8 hours in a day. Sometimes i work on weekends, but i only work no more than 4 hours on weekend. Must have some free time for me or family or else… i go crazy!!
Working harder in freelancing is normal situation, we got pay more than working full time.
I start between 9:30 and 10:00am each day, and finish between 5:30 and 6:00. So that’s an 8 hour day. Before I freelanced I worked a 9 hour day. However, I do often work on weekends when the pressure is on (today is Saturday and I just finished a 9 hour day), and I have been known to finish work at 4am when the s**t really his the fan.
But generally speaking, I don’t feel I work any harder as a freelancer than I did as a fulltimer, and my stress levels are lower and my satisfaction levels higher.
As a journalist, I used to work 8-10 hour days when I had a boss. But every now and again I’d put in 12+ hours to cover a breaking news story.
It’s a lot harder to calculate my time now that I’m a freelance journalist/blogger, because in one way or another I’m almost always working. If I’m reading the news or scanning blogs, I’m working. It’s not just about writing.
But whereas 50+ hour work weeks used to be the exception, I’m pretty sure they’re the rule now. I usually work 8-10 hours a day, and I do some work almost every weekend.
Yeah I do think you work longer and harder. You also have the stress of bringing the work home were if you work for a company, you can leave it at the office.
I personally think that you need to limit yourself and have a day off once a week, which will actually make you maximise your time as you are refreshed. Im starting this, this Sunday….
Myself I refused all companies that came to me with different payment offers and 8 hours, 5 days per week.
This means I started freelancing first and I still do that now. I am still a student though, and this might be the reason why I don’t imagine working as an employee. Now I work when I want, and I win maybe three times more than if I had accepted any of the offers. (some were actually very good
)
I am aware I work more like this, but I work for me, and working more, for me, brings me much more revenue. I wouldn’t want it other way – unless I would work for my own company.
I wait to see if things change once I finish studies.
I have found by setting specific “work” and “play” hours, I get a lot more done in less time. Of course there are times when deadlines need to be met or some situation develops and I need to work more than I had planned, but even still, I’m work a lot less hours than I was when I worked for someone else.
I’m usually in front of my computer from 8 to 6. I usually stop for a quick bite to eat at lunch, but sometimes I just inhale food in just 5 minutes flat. Would I give it up for a “real 9-5 job? Not in a million years. Working for myself, I can decide to stop at 4, go do some yoga, meet a colleague for coffee and then do more work in the evening if I wanted. You can’t do that if you have a “real job.”
Best of all, I get to decide what I work on. If I don’t want to do it, I just say no. Freelancing involves long hours and a lot of work, but at least it’s work that I want to do.
I work from around 9 am till around 5 pm… But I can usually only bill a client for 4 of those hours.
I don’t know where the rest of the time goes
having never worked at a “real” job (been freelancing for 5+ years), i cat say more or less. but i CAN say that i work loads (in web dev). it sometimes feels like i’m working non stop. my offie is at home, which is great, but i never feel like i “leave the office”. its a reall bummer, but i know that that’s the tradeoff of working from home.
i usually start at 8 or 9, work thru till 4:30pm, spend some time with the young lad when he gets home from kindergarden, till 7-ish, relax with a few mins of tv, eat supper, and then go back to work – at least till 1:30, sometimes till 3am…. so i guess that’s a 10-12 hour day… by the end of the week i’m a goner! i usually try catch up a bit on the weekend, but we dont really have a 2 day weekend here in Israel.
i keep telling myself, that this is the time to work hard, while i am still young (31).
Anyway – the good side of it all, is that i am busy, thank god.
interesting to hear all the other comments.
cheers for the quality blog!
moshe
As a general rule I would say that if you are workign that many hours you aren’t valuing your time highly enough. Of course if you are the wolds worst planner then you are going to get bad weeks.
If you are routinely workign more than 50 hours a week, charge more. If you gradually increase your rate/fee workload should reduce but you should still have a similar income.
Go look up price elasticity of demand
I seem to work a lot harder, but that is mainly because I know that what I put in, I get out, which inevitably works out greater than my previous options.
The ability to choose when I work, and for how long I work, allows me to work longer hours, but have them feel as though they are not as long as my previous job.
The worst day working for yourself is better than the best day at a 9-5 job. Just too many places want you to sign ridiculous NDA’s and non-competes, want to conduct pretty invasive, sometimes humiliating, background checks and then want you to sign away the few rights you have left. It’s completely insane. There used to be advantages working for a big company but most of those have been wiped away over time.
The strange thing about operating your own company, it changes the relationship footing with your customers. You’re not an employee and don’t get treated like one. Contracts are negotiated.
There are downsides. Getting paid for instance. Sometimes I’ve had to work six to eight months to collect invoices. And from my perspective, it’s the big companies that pay the slowest. Did work for major cell phone manufacturer, it took them months to pay their invoices. It wasn’t unusual for them to be six figures behind on billing on a regular basis.
I work longer hours but they are not necessarily conventional hours. I generally put in a 50-60 hour week but sometimes it can be an 80 hour week. There are days when I get up and work at 5:30am. Sometimes 9am. Sometimes I start work again at 8pm and go until after midnight. I often work weekends but I don’t return business emails or phone calls on weekends (weekends are productive!) I think that thing that makes the difference is that as a freelancer I am loving what I do so it doesn’t seem like work at all…most days
To: Simon Farrow: This is an interesting concept, i will look it up. I guess its been my ‘freelancer’ mindset – that any job is good to have (within reason of course), and being afraid to lose contracts to cheaper quotes.
time to up the price, you say? just like my mom keeps telling me
I might be a bit unusual in that I set out starting my own business with the plan to be part-time. My wife went back to work full time when I started my own business, and the plan was that I would take care of the kids part of my time and work part of my time. What’s ended up happening is that I work part time during the day, take care of the kids part time during the day, and then work until midnight or 1am every night.
You know what, though? I don’t mind it. As all freelancers quickly realize, the difference between working in a salaried job and working hourly, is that when you work hourly if you work more … you get paid more! It’s wonderful incentive to work your hind end off
I started doing freelance about a year ago. I definitely work more than I did at a “regular” job but it doesn’t seem like it. I guess that is part of the reward. When you know you are on your own and you “reap what you sow” you don’t mind doing extra.
A 3am bathroom visit often turns into a very productive time. (after the visit to the wc that is)
I find that most free lancers tend to take on more work and work longer hours when things are booming. The thought being that when times are slim you’ll have, hopefully, saved some money. The other thing is, if I say no now will they offer me any work in the future. It’s also true that sometimes we take on work that maybe over our heads and have work harder to finish it. I’ve seen free lancers bid on jobs they know they’ll have a hard time finishing because it requires some knowledge they don’t have but think they’ll find. Until you’ve established a clientle of repeat customers you always run the risk on taking on a job that may cause you grief. I’m not a general contractor, just a handyman…so to speak. I’ll take on the small mundane jobs and leave the heavy stuff to someone who has the resources.
I work odd hours and I work hard. I love what I do. Freelance is feast and famine sometimes. So keep your powder dry.
I think you need to expect that you will work more and harder when you run your own gig. In my little pond, I am the chief window washer and the big boss, and some weeks I work hours that are really mental. Things take time.
When I first started I was easily working 50 plus hours. Not all of it was billable either. Most of my time was spent with internals to get the projects and clients I wanted and needed. Now it’s a lot more manageable. My youngest client is about 8 years with me now. I have clients going past a decade. Juggling different clients and caring for them can easily burn through your day. Every year, or when it makes sense, I will fire a client when they become a liability or detrimentally affects the health of my company, or me for that matter.
It might seem simplistic, but one of the biggest benefits is being able to go grocery shopping during the day and having the place almost entirely to me self
Everyone is so helpful at the counter. Much shorter line ups too. To *me* that’s cool.
…sip…
I gotta agree with James, being able to run chores or do something in the middle of the day that you like for an hour while the rest of the world is busy behind a desk (on a regular job) is just… ecstacy..
here’s to you james. *toast hot chocalate mug*
…sip..
Ya i hear ya I’m Just starting out (decided to become a freelancer on the 29th of dec, and been reading FSw articles or working setting up sense about the whole time. Still in high school and jobless so I’ve worked/reasearched for um probably 40 hours sense then.
I don’t know if I’m still getting the hang of all this, but I’ve been freelance for 2 years now and I still have trouble managing my time.
I think I just feel the pressure of meeting deadlines sometimes, and I can’t rest until it’s complete. So I’ll do what it takes 10am–11am if I have to. If it wasn’t for my wife I’d probably work those hours everyday. hah. The thing is, there’s always going to be something that needs to get done. I’ve got to learn to just pace myself, plan projects properly, and trust that everything will be done on time.
—
..I don’t know what this hot chocolate business is about (@ikram)..
We’re running things with Italian Roast : )
..sip..
hmmm…maybe my problem is I just drink too much coffee so I can’t relax enough to stop working!
I quit my full-time job one month ago to do consulting work. For the past two weeks, I’ve told myself more than once “I guess I’ll sleep next week…”. Having said that, I definitely put in more hours, but I don’t call it “work” with a negative connotation. I feel ten times more fulfilled working 80 hours a week at something I am in love with, rather than 50 hours at a job I dread.