The goal when I started this freelancer journey was to try and maintain a maximum three-day week, safeguarding the weekend as well as the two days with my daughter, wherever possible. The second challenge was to try and at least maintain the level of income I’d had in employment. What I’ve found is that I’m playing a giant game of contract tetris.

Fitting It All In

The challenge in taking on new work is two-fold:

Firstly, it’s got to sit well week-to-week. I need to make sure any contracts I have don’t add up to more than that three-day week, and realistically less than that to make sure I have time for the business admin I need to do alongside contract work. It’s sometimes tricky to work out, given each contract is different, with some being fairly fixed and some being completely output-based.

I’m currently doing one role which is quite a set pattern each week (but with some flexibility where needed), another which is set hours across a month that can be flexed however they/I need, and another which is a one-off event. For this last one, while the event itself is set, and we’ve had some time-bound prep meetings, the rest of the preparation I’ve been able to do whenever it suits. All of them have an element of fixed time, either through meetings, events or deadlines but flexibility to do remaining work across the week. While my contracted hours this week used all my three-day availability, I went into overtime doing my business admin (invoice, CPD, IT problem, marketing, and several hours of prep work for pitching for new work). Hopefully more of a one-off than a regular thing because I took the event on as a sudden extra.

The second challenge is looking at how contracts sit together longer term. There’s something I want to explore more – whether high turnover of clients (because the work is say event delivery) or having fewer, longer-term relationships is better. My gut says maybe a mixture of the two.

My Current Status

As we begin October, I’ve got:

  • Contract 1 extended until December (which will have run for 5 months total)
  • Contract 2 until December (which will initially run for 3 months as opposed to the 6 they originally discussed because of their income streams, although they’re hopeful of extending to the full 6 months)
  • Contract 3 delivering a one-off event in October

It’s ended up a funny situation to have one contract extended and another shortened, both unexpectedly. Financially, it definitely worked out in my favour that way round. But one implication is that unless either extends, that’s both ending in December which definitely isn’t ideal.

Application Central

So, behind the scenes I’ve been doing a fair amount of looking and applying for other work. In the end, I’ve applied as a collaboration with a freelance contact to undertake a fairly big monitoring, evaluation and learning contract together that would run for a year until next summer. Alongside that, I’ve also applied to be a freelance trainer with another charity, and last week interviewed for another role that would be 4-6 days a month. At the same time, I saw two other roles I’d love to have applied for but with a fairly full week and then the additional application work on top, I had to draw the line!

It’s essentially a giant game of tetris. If I’d been successful in all of those applications, I wouldn’t have been able to take them on. There was a brief family chat about whether my husband would reduce hours, take some of the weekday childcare and I increase mine but it started to get very tangled. And honestly, I wouldn’t want to lose all of that time with my daughter, especially as it’s so limited before she starts school, and it’s a bonus way of keeping up with friends when our days off match.

Rightmove For Freelancers?

While it seems crazy to spend so much effort looking like you’re trying to overcommit yourself (and how on earth do you handle a conversation of “yes I know I applied but now I don’t have time?” if it ever comes to it?!!), realistically it’s the safest thing to do. One of the biggest challenges of this move is that you’re responsible for finding and securing your own work. Constantly. And that fear of not having enough, or even any, is always there. So even when my weeks look well filled right now, I’m still scanning across the various platforms to check out other opportunities. A bit like Rightmove, it’s fun to constantly have a look and see what’s out there, even if right now I’m not after anything. But whereas I’m not after a new house for, well, potentially ever, I know my need for new contracts is imminent so keeping an eye out is astute from a business perspective because I need to be ready when the right thing comes up. With that in mind, I do need to think carefully about keeping a slice of my week safeguarded for that contract hunting as a minimum, let alone the additional work of writing proposals and submissions.

The Elusive Retainer

I felt I achieved a massive coup recently when a previous client came back with further work. I think that’s one aspect of the jigsaw – aiming to build a pool of clients who will keep boomeranging back with additional projects. I also think I’ve been lucky (but maybe it’s more common than I realised) to have to contracts with such regular hours as it’s provided such a reliable income. The true gold dust though I hear is to be add in the elusive retainer. Probably more common in other sectors than charity, and maybe also other roles e.g. its more likely I think you’d keep someone on retainer for IT, risk, fundraising, areas with a more regular need. But having a regular retainer income is definitely work-goal territory.

What’s Next

I need to secure extensions or new contracts for January onwards, which is an interesting balancing act because I haven’t got time to fit much more work in right now. So, I’m hoping either one of my recent applications will come good, or more opportunities for the right time period come up. I’m feeling more confident lately on where to hunt for opportunities, and it can only help that I’m starting to build a portfolio of experience with previous clients, and testimonials alongside. I also had a really good experience recently writing a proposal with a freelance contact which has sown a seed about undertaking future opportunities in collaboration. I feel like keeping an eye on my projected income about 3 months from now is about the right timeline to make sure I’m clear on whether I’m “full” or in need of securing more and need to up my application game.

Photo by Ben Stern on Unsplash