And another thing about freelancing (and self-employment)

I really wanted to write this as a follow-up piece to 7 things I wish my friends knew about freelancing, which I published a week or so ago and got an amazing response to from fellow freelancing folk and small business owners from far and wide.

I have no idea if this piece will resonate as much, but if it does, feel free to show it to anyone who still doesn't 'get' what you do in the world of self-employment or freelancing.

Mother, I'm talking to you.

This piece is really just a rambling of misconceptions and assumptions that I'm these days fairly resigned to breaking down for people. And that's just about self-employment generally - I'm not even talking about my specific industry as a writer. I blame a lot of TV shows for giving us such misleading info in general, and don't even get me started on the lies sold to me about being a writer by Sarah Jessica Bastard Parker in Sex And The City. I'll never forgive her for that. Or myself for having sat through all six seasons and both films. Twice.

Here's where it's all going wrong with what you believe - and what's actually real:

Attire. Pre-Corona, we didn't all spend our working lives in our pyjamas. Yep, nobody's more disappointed about that one than me. Let's move on.

Eating. We don't spend our working lives at lunch, and this, like the pyjamas thing, is another disappointment. I personally never even seem to remember to eat at all when I'm in work mode, which is a massive shame because it's my favourite hobby. If we do have a meal out 'with work', it's usually a low-grade breakfast at a networking thing that takes place about 3 hours before any normal person can face a sausage anyway. Not glam.

Earnings. People's minds race when we even so much as hint at what our day rate is (to those clients who require such a contract). You can almost see them calculating how much they think we earn in a year based on that one day's figure, but of course, they base that figure on every working day being billable. They're really not. Though it's true that most of us do end up working all hours that the deity of our choosing might send, not all of that time is necessarily paid for by clients. I can only dream of getting paid for every blog or post I write for my marketing, every message, email or proposal I send, and every non-starter of an idea I scribble down when working 'on' my business instead of in it. I once had a gobshite of a client who still to this day hasn't paid me, who took sneering joy in saying, "If that's what you're charging people every day, then you'll hardly miss it if I don't pay you". Yes, he was serious. Yes, he's a twat. Yes, I will Liam Neeson him one day.

Clients. Getting a great new client can be a massive fucking deal to us. Yes, it'd be nice to be nonchalant about it and say that amassing hordes of new clients is just what we do, but if we're honest, if it's a particularly big project, or an exciting change to the norm, or it's a client we just knew we sparked with straight away, it's the equivalent of a promotion for us. We're excited - humour us!

Emotional state. I don't know how many people will agree - openly or not - with this one, so this point is a shout-out to my tribe, if you find yourself in it. Here goes. There's very little in the way of middle ground when you run your own business. Things are either going really bloody well, or they're really fucking not. We have ecstatic highs but crushing lows. We truly believe that every fantastic thing that happens is a massive turning point for our business, but then on the flipside, we take every low as an imminent sign from above that we should never have handed in our notice at our 9-5 all those months or years ago. We're wrong on both counts, usually, but it takes a good while for us to accept this. You'll have to humour us on this one, too.

Job Security. I don't believe there's any such thing as this one for any of us - whatever your employment status or history. But when you're self-employed or freelance, whilst you always have at least the opportunity to replace lost clients with new ones (through choice or necessity), notice periods are non-existent, retainers count for nothing, and we'll never truly accept that supposedly decent human beings are capable of ghosting other decent human beings in the modern workplace. Don't know what ghosting is? Ask a self-employed friend, but buy them a big drink first.

Competition. This one's certainly true for freelancers (and if it's not the case for you just yet, give it time). We actually get so much of our support from people who are actively working in the same role as us; quite possibly vying for the same clients and projects as we are. They're competitors, yet they're the ones who come out to publicly champion us. They share the pain and they celebrate the success. They even engage with our stuff on social media! "They engage with your stuff on social media?", I hear you cry! I know, it's a really fucking radical notion...

Job title. If your loved ones had to take a stab at your job title, how close would they be to hitting a main artery? I've long accepted that the responsibility for this one lies just as much with me as it does with the people who claim to be quite fond of me (I'm now a 'writer of stuff' instead of a copywriter, because my mum kept telling everyone I was still a teacher), but let's face it, there will always be confusion - especially as your business grows. If you're a Friends fan, it's a Transpondster situation.* It's okay though, because we even question what the hell we're doing ourselves, sometimes.

I know there'll be way more misconceptions or assumptions that my fellow freelancing and self-employed folk will have experienced and encountered during their whole 'not having a real job' thing, but these were the ones that shouted loudest in my head when putting this blog together.

Oh, but I can't sign off without raising an exception to the point about competition. The person who trawled and trolled through a six-month selection of my blogs in a 3am to 4am period one Friday night/Saturday morning, commenting with increasing disdain and disgust for my musings, and working up to a rage to declare me a "fucking majestic bitch"... yeah, that was a fellow freelancing copywriter.

To be fair, she's actually very good, because I couldn't have written a better introduction for myself if I tried.

*Transpondster - enjoy :)

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