A few weeks ago I was so excited to get my first referral – a charity I’ve worked with a few times had recommended me as a facilitator. It felt incredible to have someone value me/my work highly enough to recommend me. Plus it was to a new organisation, a charity I hadn’t worked with before, so another step towards expanding my network. However, after the initial excitement, unfortunately they turned into my first ghost.
First Impressions
It was an interesting charity looking like they were doing great work – another small charity that wanted an independent facilitator to support the development of their business plan. The timeline they gave was tight – really, really tight. Both for how soon they wanted the event and how quickly they wanted an outline, costing and availability confirmation. While it can be a cause for concern, I also know what it’s like running a small charity and the need to prioritise day-to-day operations, and that each person holds quite a few roles to keep things moving.
Work Versus Return
I already had work scheduled in for the few days until their outline deadline, and it was a judgement call about how long to spend on it, and where to get that time from. I knew I might regret it but it took at least two evenings to work through what they wanted. In retrospect it was probably too much time to spend without a work guarantee, but they were really enthusiastic on the phone (about this event and further opportunities to work together), and I want to be known for my high standard of work. I can’t lie, it was also really exciting to have the first referral, and I wanted to do it justice.
It’s also just a really fine line between how much work you put into prep before work is set in stone, because the higher quality your pitch, the more likely you are to secure the work. On the other hand, if you put more time in and don’t get the work, it makes it really demoralising to consider how much time you’ve lost.
Feedback
Naturally when things don’t go the way you expect, you want to know why. But with leads for work, there’s only so much you can do. In this situation I did an initial chase after a meeting date to check in about the decision, but after no response, I decided I could only do one more. So another week later I followed up to manage expectations – that I was releasing the hold on the date we’d discussed and wished them well with their event. I also outlined that if they were able to give feedback about why they didn’t want to progress I’d really appreciate it. In this instance, I’ve heard nothing.
Naturally, it’s hard because you’re left with a lot of questions – was I too expensive? Was the outline not strong enough? Were we just not a good match? It’s hard not to fill in the gaps with negatives, and one thing I’m getting better at accepting something probably turned out for the best. Perhaps we just wouldn’t have been a good fit and its better the work didn’t go anywhere, than I deliver an event that I really don’t enjoy, or worse.
What’s Next
It’s frustrating but I’m sure it won’t be last time. It feels a little like lost income, even though nothing was agreed. It’s definitely lost time, but then that’s part of the reason for charging a day rate – because you have to account for leads that don’t progress. The lack of answers is probably the worst and my gut feeling says it was cost, but ultimately it’s just one to chalk up to experience and move onto to the next. A freelance rite of passage – my first ghost.
Photo by Michael Mouritz on Unsplash