Freelancers Don’t Have Weekends pt 4

Part 4 of the epic quest to become more organised. You can read parts 1, 2 & 3 if you haven't already. Long story short; I started using the Getting Things Done method created by David Allen. Last time I explained how I implemented the system. I was pretty happy wth it. One month later, am I still that happy?

Not to put too fine a point on it: yes, it's been working really well for me. I feel that I have been exceptionally productive this past month. I finally made major progress on my side project, I have finished various small tasks that have been lingering and I have more variety in my social life.

I feel like it's nigh on impossible for me to forget things now. I have the Trello app on my phone and, whenever I think of something, I put it straight into my In list. When I'm next at my computer, there it is. I saw a great quote the other day that captures how I feel:

I can’t forget, because I don’t need to remember. — Johnny Chadda

What Went Well

Putting everything into lists forced me to be clearer in my intentions. Various parts of getting aut0m8 up and running had been waiting for me to do something. I was a bit vague about what needed to be done and so I kept putting it off. Once I sat down and documented everything that was needed, I was a lot more motivated. The clarity helped me know what to do to get things moving. Action begets action and, before you know it, I had ticked most of the things off my list. There is still more to do... there's always more to do... but I am very pleased with the progress.

Forcing myself to document everything that I had in my mind led to a lot of small victories. Things like:

• reviewing and indexing holiday photos
• organising my documents folder (containing tons of stuff that I have moved from computer to computer over the past 10 years)
• sorting and reducing the big box of chargers and cables that we all accumulate these days

Socially I have seen benefits too. Whenever someone recommends a new restaurant or I see an interesting place while I'm walking around... bam, on the list! Agi and I have then made an effort to go out and try these places.

I mentioned last time that I added a task on my weekly review checklist to look at concert and event listings. This is a small thing that makes me really happy. I always used to find out about concerts and events after they had already happened. Now I feel like I have my finger on the pulse. During my review I saw that Skunk Anansie are playing in Poznan in February, I talked to some friends and we bought tickets. How easy is that?

What Went Badly

Nothing has gone badly per se. For the most part I feel overwhelmingly positive about the whole system. However, there are some things that I still have not nailed.

For example my Waiting For list. The idea of the list is great; whenever you are waiting for something, add it to the list. It could be a reply to an email, the results of an application or delivery of a package. During your review you can look at the list and see whether there is anything on it that needs to be chased. So far, so useful.

The bit that feels clunky to me is when there is some email tennis. I send an email and add it to my Waiting For list. The person replies and I need to answer a question so I move the task to my To Do list. I reply and move it to Waiting For. They reply and I move it to To Do etc. At some point I forget to move it off the To Do list and later I wonder whether I replied or not.

This hasn't caused any major problems and it is a minor annoyance rather than a total system failure. I just need to come up with a process to manage it better. Maybe I am being too granular in needing to have the task move back and forth each time; especially when the emails are short and bouncing back and forth quickly. I've just added a task to find a better process to my In list!

How do you organise your time? Let me know, I'd love to get some alternative ideas.

Thoughts on Moving Country

I mentioned recently that Agi and I were leaving Bangkok and moving to Poland. Working remotely is great because we don't need to worry about our income but it's not all easy. Here are a few thoughts about what to consider when moving country.

Finding Accommodation

Unless you are the kind of remote worker who travels constantly you will need to find somewhere more permanent. Of course, you could opt to stay in hostels or Airbnb places but you're going to get a much better place at a lower price if you can find somewhere to rent for a while.

This is one of the big differences between Thailand and Poland so far. When we arrived in Bangkok and wanted to find somewhere to live we called a few agents. The next day we saw 5 apartments. We liked one and the deposit was paid, contract signed and keys handed over within a week. This is a symptom of the fact that Bangkok is a buyer's market. There are more apartments than people to rent them. As a result, a lot of apartments are sitting empty, meaning you can move in quicker and also negotiate a discounted rent.

Poznan on the other hand is a seller's market. When we arrived we found a decent number of apartments advertised for rent. Not as many as Bangkok but still a pretty good selection. We arranged viewings and found one we liked very quickly. However, there are not lots of apartments sitting empty waiting for you to saunter up and take your pick. Also the landlord would not budge on the price.

The apartment we chose was still occupied and would come available a month later. It's not that unusual but, if you have just moved to a new country, then you will need to pay for a hotel or something. If you work for a large company then they usually pay for your accommodation during this period. As a remote worker, and especially a freelancer, no one is going to cover this cost for you. This wasn't a huge problem for us because we were able to stay with Agi's parents until the moving date.

Take a look at where you want to move before you do so and find out about the rental market there. Are there a lot of apartments available? How long will you have to wait? Where can you stay in the meantime?

Moving Money

I talked in my Brexit post about the best ways to access your money when you are travelling. I would like to add a point about opening bank accounts. I have experience opening, or attempting to open, bank accounts in Thailand and Poland.

Thailand was extremely confusing because the information available online was... what's the word for it? Wrong. The staff in the bank itself had no idea what was and wasn't possible. I was told foreigners cannot open bank accounts, I was told you need this piece of paper, that piece of paper. In the end it was really easy. I took my passport to the bank and they opened the account. They didn't think they could... there was confusion and hand waving... they had to check with a manager... but it turned out they could!

Poland is actually a lot easier but you need to have a Polish ID number. Everyone has to register their residence in Poland. Foreigners automatically get an ID when you register. I am going through the process of this at the moment and I will get my number eventually but I can't get a bank account until I do.

Again, do some research before you move and find out what the requirements are. There may be things you can do up front to make the process smoother.

Freelancers Don't Have Weekends pt 3

This post comes on the heels of 2 previous ones; part 1 and part 2. I have been documenting my efforts to become more organised as a freelancer. Last time I said I was going to try the Getting Things Done method. How did it go?

I thought I would write this post last month but it actually took me a long time to finish the book. I could blame this on being super busy but in all honesty it is a combination of 2 factors:

• Laziness on my part
• Verbosity on the book's part

I have a friend who maintains that any non-fiction book longer than 100 pages is padded. I don't 100% agree but it was certainly true in this case. There was altogether too much philosophy at the beginning before getting into the meat of the method in part 2. The excessive philosophising killed my enthusiasm for the book and I had to force myself to push through. Thankfully, a long car journey from the UK to Poland provided a lot of dead time that helped me finish the book.

What's It All About?

Despite what I just said, I think the book is full of excellent ideas. I am going to try and summarise the book's main thesis in a couple of paragraphs and thus prove my friend right:

Trying to keep track of all the things, personal and professional, that you are doing and want to do provides a mental burden. Remembering that you need to buy toothpaste when you are not at the store is ineffective, it stresses you out a little bit because you feel you should be doing it now. On top of that, you have to try and remember to do it again at the actual right time.

All of the things that you want to keep track of should be taken out of your mind and put onto lists. This relieves the mental burden of trying to remember things. Every item on the list should have a clear next action. This means that you are clear what to do to move things forward. Every list should be reviewed at the appropriate time. This means you can be sure that nothing slips through the cracks and you can rely on the system to do the remembering for you.

There are a few points that I could elaborate on but that is the bulk of it. The book then goes into the actual process of realising the system.

What Did I Do?

One Saturday afternoon I sat down for a couple of hours and dumped out everything in my head. Everything. Everything that I was currently doing, needed to do in future or dreamed of doing at some point in my life. Everything from a dental check up to Scuba diving the Great Blue Hole in Belize.

I then identified every "project" that was there. I grouped them into current projects, projects that need to start at a particular time and projects that I might do one day. For every current project I wrote down the next action that was required. I grouped the actions into contexts; things to do in working time, things to do in free time, things to do at the shops etc etc.

It was a very freeing experience. I enjoyed it. I felt good writing down all of the things I dreamed of doing.I created lists of life goals and responsibilities. I felt daunted by the amount of stuff but I was happy to get it out of my head. 

Then came the review schedule:

• An hour every Friday afternoon to go over all of the projects; to check that everything is up to date; to check whether anything should start; to check whether there is anything lurking in my brain that should be in the system.
• An hour once a month to review my areas of responsibility and life goals; to check that all my projects are the right ones; to review what I achieved the previous month.

I even created checklists so that each review has a structure. On the weekly list I added a reminder to check out concerts and events. This made me happy because I only check event listings every so often when I remember and frequently miss things I would have liked to do.

How Did It Go?

My first monthly review was last Friday (it hasn't been a month yet but I wanted to trial the system). I loved it. I feel like there is less on my mind because I know it's all in the system. I feel very proud of getting everything down on paper and having a proper system in place. Like a real grown up!

Paradoxically, I've actually been busier since starting the system. This is because I wrote down tons of small projects that had been lurking at the back of my mind. Without a next action I was vague about what to do. When they were written down in black and white with a next action attached I felt compelled to do them. Organise my address book, sort out the holiday photos, book train tickets. I've been ticking stuff off the list and I feel great about it.

I've already realised monetary value from the system - I made a note to book advance train tickets for our trip to the UK; something I would have thought of and then forgotten until too late. I wrote it down, gave it a due date and saved myself 100 pounds.

As you can probably tell, I'm pretty enamoured with the system so far. I will do a follow up in a month or so to let you know how it's going when I am past the honeymoon period.

How do you organise your time when freelancing? Let me know, I'd love to hear other ideas.

Home Again, Home Again

As I have mentioned, we left Thailand recently. We have been visiting friends and family in the UK. Working freelance is great because we can be flexible with our hours and make time to see people.

We have been staying with my parents in the South West of England. They live in a wonderful little country town surrounded by fields and farms. As we have been out of the UK for about 2 years Agi and I have been experiencing the English countryside with fresh eyes. Everything is so green and fresh.

Unlike Thailand, it's possible to go for a walk here without sweating profusely. We have been taking advantage of this fact by going for walks in the afternoons. It's been a while since I went walking in the English countryside and I'd forgotten that cows like to chase you. I went walking one afternoon, happily listening to a podcast. I couldn't hear anything, but something made me turn around to see bout 20 cows running across the field towards me. I picked up the pace and jumped over the stile. I took a photo of the crowd that gathered. I think a zombie infestation wouldn't be dissimilar.

We mentioned our walks to our parents' 80 year old neighbour and he invited us on one of his walks. Just a short, 6 mile one; not like his "real walks". He does 10 miles every Sunday!

Being freelancers we could take the morning off so we went out with my dad and our neighbour. It was a fantastic walk. The area is truly beautiful. One place in particular struck me as something out of an Enid Blyton book. There was a small valley carpeted with buttercups. A small river snaked across the meadow with a beautiful wooden footbridge across it. I didn't take a photo because I'm an idiot. Agi made a friend though:

One of the reasons we have come back to Europe is because both of us want to be closer to our parents. Yesterday they wanted to go for a walk at the coast with me. Again, freelancing to the rescue! I could easily put my work on hold and go for a walk with the folks. We went to a nearby beach and had a walk with the dog followed by coffee and cake at a cafe on the cliffs. You can see a photo at the top of this article. Lovely!

All of this flexibility is enabled by freelancing. Get in touch if you'd like to know how to make your transition to freelancing.

Freelance is the Future

I have been advocating the freelance lifestyle on this blog for some time. I am genuinely happy with my work as a freelancer and I think a lot of other people would be happy as freelancers. I also advocate freelancing in person and if we meet and talk you'll find out! I wanted to share a few stories about friends who have recently made the transition to freelancing and what their experience has been like. (All names changed to protect the innocent).

Steve

I met Steve in my Thai class in Bangkok. Steve is a web developer and had been working for a web agency in Bangkok for a couple of years. A couple of months ago Steve messaged me. He had just been told he was probably going to be made redundant because the company was bankrupt. On top of that his girlfriend had recently become pregnant so he was understandably nervous! He knew I was a freelancer and wanted to talk to me about what it was like.

We met up for a beer and discussed the freelancing lifestyle, how to get clients and what rates to charge. He was a bit worried about how long it would take for him to ramp up his business as babies are not inclined to wait while their fathers get their finances in order!

I recently met up with Steve again and was delighted to hear that he was happier than he'd ever been at work. In his own words he'll "never go back". Steve had teamed up with his colleague and formed a partnership. They got in touch with all the contacts they had made and found a few clients who wanted to work with them. Steve is now working half the hours that he used to and making the same money. He is also at home to help his girlfriend and he can't wait to spend lots of time with his baby when it arrives.

Paula

Paula and I have been friends since high school. Paula is a graphic designer by day and an artist by night. She worked for years in very high pressure work environments and was always super stressed. Last year she quit her job and decided to start working freelance.  She wanted to earn enough by freelancing 50% of the week that she could afford to spend the other 50% focusing on her art.

I met up with Paula last weekend and she looked happier than I had seen her in a long time. She had used the contacts she made during her salaried career to pick up 2 big businesses as regular clients. These 2 clients pay her well enough that she can work half her time and create art the rest of the time. She is renting a studio where she goes on days that her clients don't have work for her. She seems extremely happy and I am glad to see my friend looking relaxed and healthy.

What's Your Point?

Freelancing is awesome!

In seriousness, I think this is demonstrative of the world we live in now. The opportunities for freelancing are many and the flexibility enables people to have more control over their lives. The 2 examples here were enabled by contacts made during a salaried career, and that is definitely an advantage. That said, contacts of any kind are beneficial. My main takeaway is to focus on talking to people and making more contacts. You never know where your next opportunity may come from.

If you would like to know more about getting started freelancing get in touch.