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This week we look at Jason Fried: Why work doesn’t happen at work by Jason Fried. In this video he explores the radical theory of working: that the office isn’t a good place to do it. He lays out the main problems and offers three suggestions to make work more productive.

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Photo by Geekgirly.

We all know how many responsibilities a freelancer has and how many different hats we have to wear (client work, invoicing and finances, marketing, customer service, etc.). It can be easy to forget that we all have strengths and weaknesses because we spend so much time trying to be good at everything.

In order to do our best work and to maximize efficiency and productivity, we need to recognize what we do well (and what we don’t) and avoid trying to be all things to all people.

From what I see, our weaknesses can be broken down into two categories: 1) specific types of projects, and 2) the various tasks of freelancing. On this first point, most of us have a particular type of service that we specialize in. A designer/developer may be best at designing high-end flash-based sites, and may not be so skilled at designing an attractive website with a minimalist approach, or vice versa. Freelance writers will typically have certain topics or types of writing that they are more experienced with, and so on.

On the second point, we all have certain aspects of freelancing that we excel at, and others that are more of a struggle. For example, you may have a hard time with keeping your invoices and finances organized, but you may excel at dealing directly with clients.

Regardless of what our strengths and weaknesses are, we need to recognize them and realize when we’re not able to do an effective job on a particular project or a specific aspect of freelancing. Continue Reading