My So-Called Freelance Life - Michelle Goodman [10]
Maybe you’re worried about the isolation. Or the ten trillion distractions. Or the tendency you have to fall asleep when you’re within a fifty-foot radius of your bed. But in your early days as a self-employed person, unless you’re a physical therapist or marriage counselor or financial planner who needs to meet with clients in a professional setting, I suggest you give working from home the ole freshman try before rushing out to rent an office.
For one thing, your home is the cheapest office space around. And as a new freelancer, one of your primary missions in life should be to keep business costs down until you know that (a) you have the financial leeway to increase your business expenses, (b) you absolutely cannot go another day without a particular business expense (such as a rented workspace), and (c) you like freelancing enough to not run back to your former boss, throw your arms around her legs, and wail, “For the love of God, please take me back!”
You might also find that you like working from home. As someone who tinkers with words for a living, I relish not having anyone else around while I’m wrestling with a paragraph that’s been plaguing me for three hours. I love that I can’t hear anyone else’s cappuccino orders or client negotiations. I need that peace and quiet to get my work done (not to mention the freedom to dance around the house in my union suit every now and then to shake the cobwebs loose).
But it’s not just me. In 2007, the U.S. Census Bureau reported that almost 4 percent of Americans work from the comfort of their own home. For some, like visual artist Nikki McClure, working at home is a necessity. She and her husband, a furniture builder who’s also self-employed, take turns watching their three-and-a-half-year-old son, Finn, during the workday. Mornings, Nikki works in her backyard studio, when she’s at her creative peak and “the light is best.” Afternoons, she’s on Finn duty. In fact, when I called her up around lunchtime midweek, Finn was in her office “playing mail” and helping her organize her tax receipts.
Before having Finn, Nikki spent eleven joyous, prolific years working at a rented studio in a downtown building bustling with other indie artists and musicians. But now that she’s a mom, working at home gives her more time to actually work. “Now I can get another half hour here and there,” she says. “It adds up to a couple hours a week.”
People always ask how freelancers like me and Nikki pull off working from home. But it’s just like riding a bike. Everyone knows how. In your 9-to-5 life, didn’t you ever bring work home from the office to finish after dinner so you could meet a big deadline the next morning? Freelancing from home is no different. Finish the report for your boss, stay on her good side. Finish your work for your client, get paid. Don’t finish the work in either scenario, and you get fired.
There’s a halfway decent chance you’ll discover you’re more productive working from home than you were back in your 9-to-5 days. Remember how in your employee days, you were always getting sucked into three-hour meetings to dissect the previous day’s three-hour meeting or to outline what the next day’s three-hour meeting would cover? Unless your cat is extremely demanding, trust me when I say that when you work from home, this won’t happen.
Mark Your Territory
Once you decide to work from home, it’s critical you set up a base camp. You don’t want to be a nomad, constantly in search of your pens, paints, or PDA each morning. A workspace of one’s own is what you need, complete with a desk/drafting table/laptop docking station—just like you had at your 9-to-5 gig—so you can quickly dig in to each day’s to-do items. (More about outfitting your office in the next chapter.)
Claim as much space as you can, preferably in a room that doesn’t double as your relaxing, sleeping, or romancing quarters. Also nab yourself a workspace with a door that shuts, even locks. Alcoves, walk-in