I’m trying hard to do things the right way. I really want to rush ahead and design my web site and tell you all about the most exciting everythings. But here’s the thing: If I’m going to do this the right way, then I need to truly take my time, cross my Ts and dot my Is.
So I spent some of my weekend taking a freelance inventory. And I don’t mean just the stuff I have that I will use as a graphic designer, although that is important too. But what I really wanted to look at all the things that make a job like this possible for me. The intangibles that will help support my success. I like knowing what I have to begin with so that I know where I’m strongest or where I might need to build.
Consider this my baseline, my starting line, like an assessment test before school starts. It’s no fun. But you still have to do it, right?
Knowing you skills is such an important first step of freelancing success. You have to know where your strengths lie and where your weaknesses hide. This makes it easer to tailor your offerings and services so products are the best they possibly can be, so that you deliver top quality products every time. It also is a good indicator of where further education and research can be applied.
When it comes to design, I’m feel confident in my ability to design web site and blog elements; retouching photographs; or creating stationery, logos and marketing materials. I can do illustration work too, but the time it takes me can make it cost-prohibitive to clients. I would like to improve those skills and abilities. I am proficient in Adobe Creative Suite, I know WordPress, and I have a working relationship with a local printer.
I really want to work more on developing my design style, but that can only come with more time and working on new and exciting projects.
If you don’t have the time, then there’s no way your freelance career can ever thrive. You have to be able to commit in a realistic and important way. But it’s more than having time to work, it’s also about balancing family, life, and career all into 24 hours a day. It’s about having the ability to balance time and working efficiently in order to get the work done.
This, more than anything else, is the area I am concerned with. I have kids who have to be my top priority, but I’m learning how to juggle them, their schedules, and my work needs to make this work. I take my laptop to work in the car line. I get up 15 minutes earlier. I’m putting dinner in the oven and returning an email. You have to fit in work where it will go. But I must remember that I have other priorities too.
People can make or break a career that is service focused. A client base is made of people. Teachers and mentors and people. And word of mouth is spurred by people. The bottom line is that I need people to support me and my business.
I have some amazing people in my corner, but I recognize that I need clients. I need word-of-mouth promotion. And I would very much like to have a mentor to help me as I move forward in this industry. I am feeling the importance and necessity of other people, and I’m just getting started.
Some of the physical tools of a graphic designer include a computer, design software, Internet access, pencils, paper, camera. But a designer also needs space to create and space to think clearly.
I’m not good about going to a physical space consistently to work. In fact, my desk is beautiful, but it becomes a dumping ground. I do think that by using it consistently, I’d increase my efficiency and my creativity. I’m adding this to my (growing) list of things that need to be taken care of this month. Having an amazing and inspiring space to put my computer feels just as important as having a computer itself.
Every time I inventory my intangibles I come up lacking in social skills. Just saying hi to someone I’ve never met can be difficult. And thinking of what to say next? Impossible. It’s not until I have already said goodbye that I think of something I could have said or asked. I can tell that will be a big part of what you are trying to do. I wish you the best of luck in it.
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