 Hi, I'm gonna give you a couple of slides. It's nothing in great detail, and then I'll tell you what it is exactly We're gonna talk about Let's see if it works No Sorry, sorry We're all Canadians, so you're gonna hear a lot of A's so I'm apologizing in advance for I'll apologize So when I came up with this talk, and I'm gonna talk about what that is in just a minute For one of the first people I talked to was a dear friend Nathan Ingram So, you know, he wasn't gonna be here of course, but I pinged him and I said I need your help I need to help frame this talk. So I want to at least give some credit where credit is due There we go, so this is our panel in alphabetical order There is I don't give these guys each a chance to introduce themselves But I think I've got all the positions and Twitter handles and all that other stuff. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah Not something like that exactly yeah, so so I figured I give you guys this you know have a chance to sort of take a look at that and then you Know you'll have At least you know our photo, so you know exactly who each one of us is Yeah We'll go down the road here, and then we'll get to exactly what the topic is So my name is Shanta. I'm the project liaison manager at Codable Where does a WordPress platform for WordPress developers and finding your WordPress developer? I'm also that background in academia with some of these other people here and Their own I'm Matt Graham senior software for seniors Well, I've done software Senior web developer at sandbox software solutions Based out of 12, but we have a mostly remote team And I've been Developing for 15 years Michael Jones, I'm the Professor and program coordinator of the creative industries management program at Sheridan College Which is kind of a fusion of artists and business essentially But I have talked with Shanta before Separate communication culture information technology someone here's I'm Kara. I am a Freelance software developer I guess and in one one half of my life and the other half I have a software called dragon teach I like I like to call myself chief geek because you know, I it's my business. I can call myself whatever I want So I'm also chief awesomeness But yeah, yes And I've been freelancing kind of 10 years 11 years Yeah, so So what we've got here is a range of people and I'll tell you how this talk came about is When the pandemic hit or just before the pandemic hit I got laid off from my job as a quality assurance manager at a software company February I got laid off March we hit COVID Nobody's hiring So what do I have to do? I have to come up with my own So I did start my own business. I thought yeah, you know what I can actually do this And I got all brawled up and I started my own business and I started going and I'm like I'm getting caught up in this and that and the other thing and then I found codeable I became an expert on the platform. So I'm like, okay. Well, maybe I don't have to you know forage so much for for business And then I realized, you know, what I? Don't work well as a freelancer That's that's me. And so I have this theory that Not everyone is built to be a freelancer as a word or does well as a freelancer and that's okay Which is part of this talk and that was sort of my my premise for this and as I was developing the talk And I was having this conversation with my friend Nathan. I realized that if I gave this talk alone, it would be biased Hence the panel you see before you which is why I read to Trevor my Trevor. Can I change it to a panel? Which is why we know how to panel so some of these people have done their own freelancing I've gone back into business and I'm going to let them sort of you know guide their own sort of conversations. So So the first question I will post you all is What do you think? Makes a good Freelancer like what traits like that was my sort of theory is that there were certain traits that people needed to have or that That drives them Yeah, I think it's maybe not a trade as much as a skill set if you are Have a particular skill that's very much in demand and is difficult to replace Then probably freelancers your best option simply because people are coming to you You could say your price point and everything's gonna work out well for you if your skill set is pretty Vagant and differentiated from everything then you're in competition with a lot of people and you're basically competing on price which means You know screws go down on you So, yeah, I would say it really depends beyond trades what your skills I guess, okay I think being a good multitasker Because if you're a freelancer you are the business So, you know, I was a I was a freelance Developer I did both, you know web applications and WordPress stuff But when Looking back now being in the position. I mean I have a project manager That tells me what I need to do project coordinator Waiting for her to heckle me I So, so like I know the you know the scope of work Which I did as a freelancer because that was part of it, but the business stuff billing keeping up with communication like All these all the little things that as someone who's an employee Like if you're currently an employee and you go into freelancing you don't necessarily think about all these extra bits that you need to handle and Realistically should be billing for Because it's still your time And it's up to you if you bill at the same time as the core work or if you go at the lower rates Depending on you know where your skill set So yeah, like having all that in mind when you go into freelancing is really important And the ability to keep track of all Yeah, I think that that's well You also have to kind of learn where you where you where you're missing your your your stuff So like like you you get into this all of a sudden Yeah, you got to make some money you got to call somebody and be like I need money from you or you need to You need to be able to do that. You need to be able to talk to talk to your clients and That sort of thing as well as being able to like pick up quick books or find a solution to your to your billing needs and And and the same thing is you gotta keep yourself on track. There's nobody else there to to To be like you're you're you're you gotta hear of the three projects that are next it's like you can Feel easy. Let me tell you it is super easy to go off the rails to go go down a rabbit hole without Without kind of That was not coordinated not at all we didn't plan up it was damn good Yeah, right here you go down a rabbit hole. No, oh Rabbit holes on time is sort of like you yeah You almost have to have the the sort of wherewithal to make sure that your rabbit hole doesn't turn into a week of rabbit hole as Opposed to like you get a couple of hours to enjoy your enjoy that that that exploration Then you you come back to what you have to do But it's not necessarily Yeah Yeah That's a skill right there Billable rabbit hole My entire month Bill billable rabbit hole.com here we go. We got some red stars in the room. Yeah, I guess I thought I Guess where I think and I think you brought up a very good point And this is sort of where I got hung up when I was starting my own business is Okay, now I have to figure out what works for me. I have that choice That's the beauty about this I can go I can choose whatever damn software that I want to use I Can choose what I want to do what I don't want to do I don't want to do my own accounting. I hire somebody to do it or QuickBooks or whatever the heck it is The possibilities are endless and Therein lies the rub for somebody like me because that's practically all I spent my time doing I Got caught up personally again I don't I want to pass this over but this is where I'm sort of going with this idea of the talk is I literally got caught up in Well, how do I use this template or how can I make this do this other thing? And I spent a lot of time just choosing the tools that I was going to use for this And when something didn't work quite rightly or didn't work the way that I you know It's missing that one thing or it didn't work that one right way that I use something else or I go it and I spent weeks months even Just coming up with those Which is which is well, that's part of the problem is I kept it on the same track to change change a piece of software You know learn the new software. Yeah, it's a it's a big deal So it's like sure stay with the thing that you're you mostly know Maybe it doesn't work as well And then you have to pick it pick your pick your moment pick your time of place to jump Well, and this is the thing is I even said for myself I mean I ended up working for codable and now I do this Right the scope of what I do now is like here I don't have to worry about the accounting I don't have to worry about the sales or any of that other stuff And so for myself and where I was coming with this talk was is that I have a PhD and Intentive type Doesn't necessarily mean that you can't focus on anything. It's you focus on something far too long Right. So unless I have somebody else an External person to sort of go tap tap tap. Hey, by the way, this is what you need to do Or this is what you need to focus on I'll do it. I have no problems doing that But I need somebody to probably tell me what to focus on first and I will then sort of go that way So this is where I was sort of going with sort of the the traits of somebody like myself Like I I can't have a wide focus or I can't necessarily and I don't think anyways the type of personality I am so Then what would you say would be the thing that would make you? like not suitable for being a freelancer Either characteristics or traits or they kind of it kind of ties into what you're just saying I Just closing cons. Yeah, exactly. So what so flexibility? I've basically like I started out in More of a design capacity. I was the coder of my class, but I it was a design focused Program Basically within the last Four years, I've said no, I'm not doing design anymore Because I don't in my design perspective. I don't have that flexibility. I When I think of a design, I'm like, this is perfect. Here it is. This is the only thing you get. That's not how design works I know that now But when I was in my freelance role and doing a Little bit of design work mostly not but you know, everyone's gonna get that and I'd be like here you go I don't like okay You know, and then I go back to the drawing board and be all disgruntled So all that to say flexibility is very important in terms of being a freelancer because of the very Work that you have to do For me, what would limit me and I have done for I was part of a web consultancy The early days of the in 1996 it was And I was the coder for it actually because I was somehow taught myself how to do pearl sprues Why I do this to myself But you could like that was the day that you know 50 bucks an hour for basic HTML 125 pearl right so I'm right cool Definitely doing this and it was good because The hardest part though it was the Wondering where your next gig is Yeah, like it is I love having a predictable salary with the defined bench or benefit pension I don't have to worry about a damn thing when I'm 65 which is coming up in 15 years So I do have to worry about these things now However, I'm also one of the side projects that I do do I've been doing comedy classes and improv stuff and I'm now they work with a lot of Actors and I see it in their life where you know getting the next gig is really complicated It's difficult if you have to pay your rent on that No I look at their life and I feel very Because I mean there are people who are paying their bills on this and that can be really really stressful So again, I think that's where and again, you're at that I'm differentiated Stage there are all people who are taking background acting and non-union commercials things like that Anybody can do that job and so you're basically getting the lowest possible pay rate And again for every, you know a list Hollywood actor who could totally make and choose their own scripts and everything like that Make millions dollars. There's a thousand other people who are Indescribable and they're just, you know interchangeable and that's not where you want to be so Freelancing is much easier if you're in Worthy of the big bucks. I think if you're struggling to decide even what to your value proposition is It might not be the best Because it's almost instant exploitation Tara So well, I mean I want to be like the first thing is like you gotta enjoy it if you if you hate Right like doing a bill or if you I mean I am not as big fan of writing proposals for stuff I but I have I have long-term clients It takes me four months to get a client but it once I have them of them I will I will generally have them for years, right? So it's it's there's a there is that that like that Like what am I how am I going to pay my bill if that if that client disappears, right? It's going to be four months to irritate before I didn't get I can I can get a similar like long-term Client and I generally have two or three at any given time and that's my And it is like you have to be able to if you do not like if you do not like switching between Those the jobs if you do not like talking to your to your clients if you just aren't good at that that's not maybe it's not that the thing or maybe you find you find a Business partner to to help you with that right like that's say the other thing is is that if you You know get get somebody Not really answering that quite the question of like what would not make you but it's like there is there there are ways around it And it's it's all about yeah, it's flexibility you and your ability to To be happy with that with that level of both flexibility and uncertainty that is built into that Well, I think what Mike was saying as well about you know having that specialty in that value proposition and You know being in demand like that you've said you only have two or three clients Right. There are some people I know who are freelancing that have hundreds of clients Right, and I think that you've hit on something that I wanted to ask about it sort of You know is there a freelancer that does better with multiple clients just doing the same sort of thing or do you have like two Or three clients and we've also been talking about whether or not you know You want to keep doing that thing for that long of a time To switch it up and you know here. I know you've started to talk about that That's the thing that's like I had a client I last year I We went our separate ways just because I've been working for them for three years And that was I was bored at that point like it's it is it was time to sort of be like I'm done And they went off and another developer and I went off and did other things and it's And I quite enjoy like I might my big My my clients is they're they're big they're they're not just big, but they're big in scope They give you a lot of flexibility in what like and and you know interest in what you're doing too, right? You can you potentially are one day you're doing SSO on a WordPress site in the other day You're you're building a sub-java script that transfers of database from one place to another I mean it is if you like having that kind of that that level of Difference in the it you may just that you may have a small number If you are the expert in moving Drupal the WordPress that maybe that's all you want to do and you've got a hundred customers that you just you run You just do the same thing over and over and over again, and and that's okay, too Like you can find find find your I think you find your bliss the idea being is you know Do you want multiple or hundreds of clients or do you want like the select few that pay you a lot of money because you know What the heck you're doing right question is this you know Are you gonna get bored of doing the same thing over and over and over hundreds of times or you know Have two or three clients where you're doing slightly different things or the same, right? Do you do you want to change the gig up, right? Like you know you want to do this like a one-shot For this client and then there's another one-shot for that client or do you end up with things like recurring revenue? Right where it's literally it's almost all Right, so those I think you're some of the other oh, yeah That's the case if you have a hundred clients you do basically the same opportunity to to Build your own software to do that Well, I mean you know what tell me earlier talks or about you know, how do I become a WordPress developer, right? Those are some of the things that you can think of to actually you know go Hey, you know what I'm doing this every day and this and this that can help up your skills figure out a way to do it So you don't have to do it You just let it run right automated or yeah, or or in even in that vein I would source certain parts of it. I mean Nick Adams was doing talk earlier today. He's CEO WP buffs They do like their specialty is maintaining and updating WordPress sites if you love building the site And say I could care less about updating text or you know adding a little bit more margin above a block That's their that's their core business and as As a refer you get the recurring revenue now it's only 10 or 15 or I don't know what the percentages. Sorry Nick if I'm screaming. Sorry. Sorry But you get a portion of that monthly cost for the plan You're a fabulous salesperson Exactly. Yeah It's not even about coding. It's just a matter of like, you know, they give money off your sale. Yeah Exactly So it's good to have three clients You know, I drop one and I get I pick up another eventually And it just I just keep going like that and and I just word of mouth and I you know, somebody comes and says hey I want to do X Y Z that's We do so would you say that there are Let me ask you this as a freelancer are there routines That you go through either daily weekly Monthly and you say as a freelancer you must do these things like we talked about invoicing for example But is there something that you like I don't care you do a lot of freelancing and you have a certain This is my routine Every day every month what I do any of you guys have that sort of my routine is no routine really like it's okay It's it is fine. It is it was I guess from a time perspective It's like I'll work for an hour and then Then I get up and I usually put down open the fridge Realize I'm not actually hungry and close the fridge and then I wander around my house a little bit And like five or ten is later. I come up but come back and I sit down and I'll do that's that's how I change Change sort of change gears. Yeah change gears That's how I like and so I may even go back onto the same thing, but it's like there's I have these during the day those those routines of but it from a from what I'm doing. It's like it's the thing that I Happen to be you know, I want to do at that point Very hard for me to be like on Monday from 9 to 10 I'm gonna I'm gonna write some CSS That that would never work It's So my kind of It's it's similar to to Kira that I didn't really have a sex Routine but There was a certain structure that just kind of came out in the wash that I would sit down the gear I would check my emails You know respond to clients in the morning And I would try and fit in some form of learning Every day if I could unless I was on a deadline and I just got scared But yeah learning something new about your niche about your profession is Crucial you need to be an eternal student Because if you sit on what you know for too long someone else is going to write If you're like there's there's gonna be two people in the future It's gonna be the people who are telling the AI what to do if we're getting told what to do by the AI like it's sad And you want to be the ones tell it not the ones being told. Yeah, exactly So yeah, so having some form of learning and I mean, you know again coming back to the billing Because as a freelancer you need to be building or else, you know, what are you doing you're coding it for free? So yeah, I have that on a set interval whether it's weekly Daily seems excessive if it's just you But and then you know following up emails following up with clients that that haven't paid yet That sort of thing, I mean, yeah, I mean it's not again for me It was not a it was not a set thing It was not like but it kind of came out the wash that I every Friday we do billing I've had clients with the where the billings They just it takes them like two months three months to get back and they do not last with me Like it's it's like I choose I choose my clients as much as they choose me too. So it's sad Was the nice things was when I was freelancing I had one client again one of those cash cow clients Who was big corporation for my nameless, but They were excellent about having their bills paid on time and to do that like to the day Okay, the one thing I one of the things I remember That I realized like I said when I when I joined horrible is as a staff person is and I don't know if I'd actually made the connection before was For myself and I probably should have learned this before anytime when I'm learning something if I'm given like a self-paced learning I Don't end up doing it like I don't do it. Well, I Have to be in a class Right. I have to be accountable. I have to be present Right like just going to the gym Give me a time where I have to be in class and I will be there Right, whether it's a yoga class or whether it's a swimming class karate class doesn't matter and I've realized that about myself So I think also being you know a certain type who are talking about learning, right? So if I'm doing self-paced learning, I'm going to screw it up If I have class and I have to be there at a certain time whether it's for learning or whether it's for Exercise or whatever have you and what I realized about that is that I need a routine and Notness and I have to be accountable to someone else. Otherwise. I won't do it I know my way myself myself that way. So for example when I joined code really said, okay Well, what kind of schedule do you want to do and I'm like I want to do nine five Like I could have said I want to do like ten to six and I'm like I Know what I'm gonna end up. No, that's a bad idea so I went with nine five and Yep, every day and as soon as five o'clock comes I'm out Okay, so for me I found Not just having a routine that you necessarily build yourself because I can cheat and nobody else will know what except me But if I have to be accountable to somebody else To to actually be the productive person that I am and report to somebody And it's not even just for you like I can literally go through a whole day and not touch base with anybody else there Except by going through slack or you know checking in in the morning. I may not talk to anybody else Nobody knows if I've actually done anything or not But I will and then I know that I have to be accountable to somebody else So for me freelancing didn't work I think that is probably one of the biggest reasons didn't work for me Right, and I think the part of learning is interesting to that because you know certainly agree My life long there is absolutely essential, but doing it on your own schedule can be really difficult. I have the same problem, too It's like oh, I'm gonna learn Japanese. I'm going to learn how to play the guitar It's like those are two things that I don't okay Because unless you actually have some sort of and that's Well, I've had a discussion with friends of mine. I'm like, you know, what happens when all the information was free Why do people go to college or university or anything like that? A lot of it is just that pure accountability It's like here's a schedule. Yeah, here's a this is a semester. This is I repeat for this. I need to go. Yeah Get a good grade. Yeah, and if you don't get a good grade then you probably haven't learned it anyway Yeah, but even if you don't have grades, but yeah, let's say the the improv classes I've taken that been excellent Educational experience is everyone's serious. I mean there everyone's there for three hours and he goes the entire time or longer And everyone's having a great time. There's no great But everyone's having a super one fine, right? If you just said hey show up whenever it would never happen So if you are yeah, if you are going down the finance route I think there are some things like billing or whatever you find most Challenging or obnoxious or silly thing that you don't want to do. That's the problem. We have to schedule Friday is building day even though I hate it. And you'll hate Friday, but it needs to be done. So It's a weird it's because one of my my my big clients they pay on 15th, yeah You have to get it in just before and so I just so that I can get But yeah And it's right yeah, I'm like wait a minute. It's the last of the month. Yes, he's got a sender invoice into that But the beauty yes But the beauty is again when we're talking about billing. It's the same amount of your month That's it. That's all I do same amount change the dates. We're good done and off it goes I'm probably going to automate it, but hey, so I'm gonna ask you guys one last question And then I'm gonna open it up to the floor and y'all can ask anything you want sort of thing but so if there is one Podcast article resource, whatever That that you think all these lovely people need to read or or Look at the faces on these guys man. It's like I've asked them like the answer to the universe Exactly Is there like do you guys have one resource where you could go if you want to be a freelancer if you want to do This or even just learning in general Where would you point them? There was I'm not sure if it's still around so I haven't listened to it a while. There was a podcast that was put out by I think they've rebranded But they they had a podcast that they talked about the web design and web development It was the business side they didn't really talk about development They didn't talk about php's grab script all that stuff. It was the business side and for someone who is order That was invaluable One video that I played my class Oh But I play in class anyway because it's freaking good because my like my terror like my terror But especially for the students that I teach right now Half of them are kind of interested in some production role But it would be an employee within a larger organization. Half of them are thinking about entrepreneurship Coming up with their capstone projects that will involve creating their own business. And so that I Because it's like you have value you are someone who needs to maximize your own value Determine what that value is is a lot of what we talk about is like really drilling in the value proposition but if you don't monetize that and You're sabotaging yourself and it's difficult and it's especially for people who are very Kind and they want to help and everything that those are the people who end up getting There are people out there who totally suck at that energy and never be never give me respect You want me and the moment that you give yourself so much of that They will exploit that and your level of respect in their mind goes down So you have to actually stand up for yourself sometimes to say hey, you know what? Yeah Yes, I'm sure it's just like it's like I will I'm trying to be nice You know, you're asking me my profession. Why are why why am I not sending you a bill then and that I had on occasion I've sent bills to people with laughter like a two-hour long conversation and it's like and they're like shocked and it's like We you booked an appointment with me. This was not like you're not my Yeah, well, you're like you're my you're my friend, but you're not I'm not I'm not gonna just give you my my profession for free And maybe that and that's it that goes with like if you're in the freelancing if you're doing that And you gotta be you gotta be you gotta know Not like you're running a business you're not you're not running a charity right like you're you are Sorry, that was that that particular phrase is I will credit my brother of that one because he was my business partner like 12 years ago And that he used to say that we're running a business not a charity. We're not giving away things to people It's straight it's straight up though. You got it. Yeah, it got it like It is your business if you take two hours to and not not make that billable then you just lost two hours of billable time You could have been using on a client that is that will that respects your Right Anything from the audience But when it comes up to getting people there seems to be an Aggression or it is like somebody be called a freelancer to a consultant. So how do you differentiate? Because you're basically doing the same job The consultant is working with a client Independent the freelancer is working with the client How do you get me on that? I'm a consultant versus free. I've got a client I love in a Canadian client that refuses to have freelancers That would take consultants and then complain about the cost of consulting over a freelancer I feel like that's just marketing like that's like you're you call yourself. Whatever you call yourself. I mean definitions Yes, or Consultants tell you what you should do freelancers to do that. That's the difference Freelancers But by definition usually so for example Yeah, I mean I one of the things one of the courses that I took as part of my degree was literally a course in consulting It was a final year of course, and you know what the consultant will do They'll ask you for your watch and tell you what time it is That and this is a professor who used to work for McKinsey to you know, Deloitte's like the biggest You know consulting company, so I think that you know, I think you've hit on a bit of truth there That may be not what you think, but that may be the perception From the people you're working with your clients They may say look we're gonna hire consultants because we want them to tell us what we need to do Rather than we need a freelancer to do it for us That's a good question to ask them why won't you hire freelancers? Why are you gonna hire consultants or whatever that there is a certain level of and Believe me a codable. We've had tons of people who have said we do not want an individual To work on this project. We need a team Not just because of the volume of the project itself, but because they want to make sure that there's gonna be no interruption Right, so somebody falls sick if it's an individual What happens right, but if there's a team of people then that can be worked on Simultaneously or that can be done or that can be done someone else can fill in right now the codable We don't have any teams larger than six But at very least we've had clients that have come on there and say I do not want to work with an individual I want to work with a team So that may be part of part of the problem is what they are defining in their own heads And also it depending on the state here and it could also determine whether you charge sales tax or not So like if you're trying to show element work you charge sales tax if you're doing consulting for it You don't charge so that unless the consulting leads to billable You Yeah, so I've been doing this stuff for about 30 years now yes, and I have some very specific definitions for freelancer and Freelancing is what I do on the side when I have a job freelancing is what I do between jobs and It's not very professional in from like I don't treat it very professionally. It's odd jobs It's picking up side gates. It's stuff right now I lost my job several months ago, and I'm in pretty much probably going to just go on my own long term And so I'm not going to freelance I am starting a business and I'm going to be self-employed and I'm making an LLC and I'm going to form relationships with people who can do things when I'm sick and People who do skills that I don't do and I'm getting an accountant and I'm getting a business manager because I eat that stuff And that's stuff I would not do if I were just freelancing and messing around and picking up some cash in the weekend I think a lot of this has to do with what people think the word Having this because sorry to interrupt because that was that was sort of the thing about this is that you know everybody's like well why don't you just freelance and Like that was the normal thing to do for a web development sort of thing and I'm like But I don't like it Freelancing but going on my own period freelance has a kind of a connotation in American English of like Lucy Goosey That's how I treated it right so I mean I've been a freelancer for over 40 years in two different businesses But it's always been a business people say what do you do? Well, I was a photojournalist Are you a freelancer? Well, I suppose I am but nobody says jeep. I think I'll hire a freelancer Same thing with web development. What do you do? I'm a web designer. Oh, you have a business Well, of course I have a business. Oh, nobody ever asked me if I work with anybody else If you ask my client to see a freelancer, they'll scrub their shoulders. They don't use that word It's a business that they contract with to do their work, but I think the key to all of this As you all been saying yeah, it's up here. It's a mentality drives Yeah, everything. Yeah, I've taught in college and I told my students if you don't want to be a photojournalist Why are you in this class if you don't want to do it? You don't want to do the work and the research and the schlepping the equipment. Yeah, why are you here? It's not just a thing If you're relying on yourself If you're relying on yourself That's the key to whatever freelancing right because there isn't anyone else Yeah, and if you don't want to do that and you don't have the brain that wants to do that That's a completely different issue. What your clients think of you is whatever you project. That's right If you project someone who works out everybody works out of the kitchen. I don't but If you project, you know, I live out of my car and I you know I'm a great coder and I do websites because I'm a genius People will think of you as whatever that means and the joke I used to have Is people would call me up and say well, we're a nonprofit and we need you to come and shoot our annual report It's a well, that's very flattering. Thank you And they say well we need you to give us a break on the price and I would say well I'm sorry. Do you pay your accountant? And they say yes They say do you pay your cleaning service? Yeah, you paying the designer who's designing the report. Yeah, and I said well They would say do this job for us at a 80% discount and then the next time You're gonna do it for the exposure Let me give you the kicker. Yeah, I had a big corporate account. Yeah And I work for them until the company fell apart. They were wonderful. I had all their security And I once asked the art director You know when you think of me, what do you think about and you said all about $1,500 a day as they've got That's because you are as a freelancer Whatever you project to people and that's your job Because that's how they're gonna get They're gonna hire you Personally instead of you know the ad agency with 15 people who get around to fixing their website when the cows come home It's a totally different proposition in the way clients think about you The whole like the whole reason I came up with this is you know regardless of whether I call it a consultant Whether I call it a freelance or whatever the thing is it was the idea of as a web development person Right that you know whether you own your own business or whether you call yourself a consultant Etc. Is that it takes a certain type of person exact and that's what this was all about Right is that I came to the realization everybody's like well your web developer Of course, you're gonna freelance or you're gonna do your own business Whether you call it freelancing you I don't care what you call it, but you're gonna run your own business, right? I'm like Are you kidding me? Right, and I'll tell you I was in business with my own father for five years when he ran his own business And he's like oh yeah, you know when when I you know pass on to the next life or whatever the heck it is You know when I pass on to the next life, you know, you're gonna inherit the business and I go yeah dad I'm gonna shut it down Because what do you mean I go because dad you are the business Right. It was a real estate consulting firm and he had a very Specific very very specialized set of skills There were very few people who had been the city property commissioner who had the building code Who was a civil engineer? And could figure out all of this other stuff. There were literally two people in the city that could be an Expert witness on that topic that he could do and he said the only reason that the other guy paid got paid a little bit more It was a better witness Right, but I told him I said I cannot be You so as soon as this thing shuts down I said I don't want to run my own business I knew that When I was 21 years old So why the heck did I decide to do it two years ago or three years ago in COVID yet? Because they didn't have a choice at least I didn't think I did Right, it took a little bit longer But and so there in lies sort of where this the whole talk came from is like I was so geared up I was going to you know start my own business, and then I went Why am I doing this in the first place kind of idea, right? It's a good idea to just to practice it once to see if it is worth it and if it's your yeah Then that's exactly why I brought this thing together Yeah, exactly. I know you've gone a bit over. Is there any other quick quick questions, maybe? Yeah look at both experiences of Freelancing full-time versus having a full-time job of freelancing on the side Do you find that that takes some of the pressure off or is it more like I don't want this distraction? for me both Sorry, but the benefit of the the record is that you may not reach it So the question was is you know do you do freelancing as part like a side gig as it were like what we've just been talking about or You know do you do like sort of freelancing full-time? Or do you do it as side? Yeah? Yeah So for me both When I wasn't a full-time web developer, I had another job and I started into web development I would do that on the song but now as someone who does web development full-time and sometimes has to do over time I don't want to do it after work And I think I would be doing a disservice to my clients having that mentality I do that with my Job Whatever you want to call it now that now that we've had that your company It is like I my business hours are from nine to five like that's when I work That's obvious my desk. I talked to my clients from those times and and most of the time after that like I Want to have I want to have a life after that and if I had a full-time job And I had one six years ago or something. I I spent a little time with 10 up And and I was like, I'm not I'm not gonna work all day Doing this and then do like have clients a few hours in the evening or something like that Yeah, just a lot of If you're second you're second probably something totally different better be interesting. Yeah There's gonna be more of a hobby or you know something that this year I think if you were looking at sort of changing jobs Then you might consider it right, but then what I thought maybe if one way to do it and this is the only time I think we even told our own students that you do work for free, right? It's not necessarily for the exposure, but for the learning Right, so if you are looking at shifting into a different job and you want to learn You might do your full-time job and then you know help a friend I wouldn't even help a friend help a charity Okay, help a non-profit who can't afford you know to do whatever and and start from there That would be my somebody who can really use the help I know I do I didn't react projects I like when I was learning react was was that was the that was how I did it I was basically like I was doing it on my own time And just building my own stuff like it. Yeah, you know, so you're so you're fun. That's the other part So something for fun. I would like what here it does. I would call here What was amazing a little more Did you have a quick question I do Like how did you find the difference like having done independent contracting and Working for like a structured company like the difference between working directly with clients versus working With clients through a project manager, right? Yeah Yeah, so Basically as a freelancer you do everything. Yes, and it's you know, it's everything everywhere all at once Sorry It's it's it really is like you have to be in constant contact with them at all times giving them status updates daily if not every other day sort of thing Whereas with a project manager, I Basically or a project coordinator. I can say look this is this is what I this is what I'm doing today or What is there something that I need as a client said anything and I just get the quick Here you go, and I would say for me that is much more helpful Because then I can focus on So stay for my talk which is Was good Okay, so thank you everyone for coming I'd like to thank our panelists It's amazing what if you you know coffee Christmas lots of wine or two will, you know If you're looking for an outlet look up give camp and do action They are Yes strictly narrowly defined ways for you to code for nonprofits and other people who would otherwise suck the life out of you But then let you cut that bra cut that connection off, and they go their way you go there you go your way And do action do action has an underscore between do an action It's a wordpress thing give camp is not wordpress specific, but I've never done anything But wordpress at you can't okay All right, thank you very much