Tag: freelancing

Freelancing is thriving in software outsourcing industry. But it should not be done. Though it may give additional income in short run, it has subtle negative impact on the life of freelancer in long run. This topic is applicable to any type of freelancing followed by a Day Job.

Freelancing Takes Away your Time.
Human is not a working machine. We are working to live or living to work? If you do freelancing along with your day job, your whole time is taken away. Even after coming from office you have to sit in front of your computer and continue the work till midnight or full night. You will not have time to spend with your family, friends. You will not have time to spend with what is interesting to you.

If you have any hobby, you cannot engage in your hobby. Keeping too busy may be a center of attraction for a short while. But in long run you miss out your human circle or your family, friends may forget you.

Freelancing gives More money without time to Spend it.
You will have more money but without time to spend it. It is meaningless. A money which not spent is practically does not exists. Earn money along with the time to spend it. You live when you spend your money.

Freelancing Create Tension.
Those who do not have computer in their home, try to do freelancing works secretly in office. In between office works they do freelancing works. This creates tension and fear. You should be fearing about what will happen if anybody trace your activity. Moreover, you will have more work load in short time (both office and freelancing work), which ultimately reduce your quality at both office and freelancing.

Do not depend on Freelancing Income.
Freelancers slowly develop confidence over their freelancing income and customers. They slowly under estimate or starting to neglect their day job responsibilities. Start thinking they can start a company on their own. Thinking of even giving up the day job, irresponsible to their immediate boss at office. You become rebellious or uncontrollable in your day job office.

Practically, freelancing income is not a residual income. If you stop freelancing or if you do not get a client, you will not get additional income. Additional income is charm full when you have main income. If you do not have main income, you can not live within additional income. Always give top priority to your day job. Freelancing is not a residual income. Do not depend on it. It may disappear at any moment in your life.

Freelancing may Create a Guilty Feeling if your Day Job Boss is Kind and Honest.
You are accepted by your Boss as you are. Your heart beat is not changing when you see or speaking to your Boss. You are paid regularly and promptly. You have a good rapport with your Boss. In this case, you will have guilty feeling when he comes to know your freelancing activity. Damn sure you will have guilty feeling.

Conclusion.
Work without rest, less sleep, tension, fear, over confidence, money not able to spent, and Guilty feeling will reduce your quality of life in long run. It will affect your self-esteem too. So avoid engaging in freelancing. Freelancing is not a financial security or residual income, it is a trap. Do not freelance.

Newbies in freelancing will break their head for Project Price and Time Estimate for project. Of course, pricing and time estimate is one of the deciding factors in winning the project bid. How to quote correct price and time estimate in freelancing? Is there any logic or easy solution for price and time estimate?

Time Estimate:
There is no standard time estimate for any software projects. It is the programmer who asses the time as per his experience, skill set and pursue the client by convincing why he require such time. The more experience , skills, and confidence level the programmer has, will require less time at higher cost.

Follow your experience and instinct in estimating time. If you have already done projects which are similar to the requirement, time estimate will be easy for you. You can replicate the same time here. If the requirement is new to you, use function point analysis or use case analysis.

Honestly, what is right to you mention it. Never think if you commit for short duration, you will get the project in freelancing. Even if you mention long duration to complete the project, there is no rule that you will loose the project. All you have to do is give proper reasons for the time you required. Why do you require such time. Justify your stand. Break up the overall duration into simple units will be easy for the client to assess you.

If the client pressures you for short duration, never agree or skip the project. Finishing the project earlier than the agreed duration will earn you good feedback rather agree to short time and complete the project in extraaaa time. Your reviews/rating are important in long run.

Use your experience or use case model approach to estimate time. Be true to yourself and educate your client why you need such time duration to get the project done.

Project Pricing
Do not think if you quote lower than other bidders, you will win the project. Do non think if you quote higher than all the bidders, you will loose the project.

You need to finalize what is your rate per hour. Depending the experience, skill set, location, working time, you can fix your cost per hour. For a beginner $5 per hour or less is best deal. The more reviews you have, you can increase the per hour rate to $10 or $15 or more.

Multiply your per hour rate with the time estimate. Without any inferiority complex as whether you are worthy of such price or etc. quote the price.

Price Negotiations:
If you are dear need of project/income, you can negotiate your price upto fifty percent. Instead of doing nothing do something atleast get under paid.

If you are busy with project(s), you have sufficient bank balance and regular clients, never negotiate the price.

At any point of time never negotiate the time you estimated. You will be in stress if you negotiate project duration. Moreover even you reduce the cost for winning a project without reducing the time, you can manage the loss by getting other small projects in buffer time. You can work in two projects – one big project and one small cum easy project. Such way you can meet your cost, reduce at one place and gain at other place. By any means, keep the ball rolling.

Same task can be done at different timings and pricing depending upon the programmer’s expertise. For example: WordPresstheme customization: This can be done within 15 hour by an Joomla expert. The same can be done around 1 week or more by a Joomla learner. Both can complete the task in their respective duration. Both have their own costing difference.

Client will choose bidder as per his budget and urgency to get the job done. If he needs Joomla them customization to be done within 2 days he will choose the expert irrespective of the price. If he does not worry about the duration (let it takes 1 week or more to get the job done), but his concern is price, he will choose newbie at lower price.

Both expert and newbie have equal chance in winning the bid, depending upon client’s situation and how truthful are they to them self.

Do not avoid projects(?) whose cost is very low. I won a project, its cost was $5. It was a complex bug fix in javascript. The client was from UK. When I fixed the bug, my client released the payment, I received around $3 after deducting commission. I was not fed up. The client contacted me again directly and asking me to fix other bugs. Slowly the relationship developed. Later my client did not post projects in bidding site or forums. She contacted me directly over to my email or chat. She paid me directly, so no commission deduction. Later on, I billed her around $300 to $400 per month. The business lasted for a year. Later when I moved to higher salary, I handed over my client to my friend who was a newbie in freelancing and struggling to get a project outsourced.

Some clients want to test the skill and reliability of the freelancer. So they come up with simple budget. Do not ignore them. It is like an ice berg. You may be seeing the tip of the ice berg.

As a freelancer, you should be aware of your skills, quote according to it. Never fake the client. If you fake, you may win the project, but you may not get paid. Never never never fake your client.

Outsourcing and freelancing succeeds across the continents when reliability and relationship established, not because of price or time estimate alone.

This is about software freelancing. How do get software work from US, UK, CANADA, UK, Australia and other developed countries.

Many of my friends who got fired or laid off from their companies. They asked me about how to do outsourcing as a freelance programmer. My platform is LAMP(PHP, MySQL). Here I will share my outsourcing experience as Web Application Programmer. I may not write things in a organized way, but sure you will get a better idea about outsourcing.

Here is the checklist to start your freelancing:

3 years of professional Experience
Your platform may be anything, but you must have 3 years of experience in your domain to be successful in freelancing. You must have minimum 3 years of regular/professional work experience from a company.

Three years of real time programing/project experience. Which means you must complete at least 3000 hrs of programing. Your bench period should not be calculated.

Self-Started
You must work independently at least for a year. Without the support or technical help from your senior/team-tech lead/friends, etc. You must be self-starter. No one should trigger you do start or do the work. This self-initiation is very important in freelancing. You must be a ‘commando’ in your domain without any supervision.

English Language Proficiency
You should be comfortable in your written English(reading and writing). You need not possess very high standard in English language, but you should be able to convey what you like to say.
I hope if you are able to understand my English, you can understand your client’s written communication.

Infrastructure
You must have good computer with a high speed broadband internet connection. You should be familiar with Skype, Whatsapp, and other chat engines.

If you are working and need to do freelancing for extra income, never never never use your office infrastructure and office hours for your freelancing. It will create fear, tension and reduce you quality and productivity both in office and freelancing.

When you need to do freelancing/Outsourcing

Do freelancing when you really need to do it. Successful freelancers, either freelance or go to job. They do not mix both. If you are going to a job and your salary is sufficient then do not freelance. Combining both will create stress and affect your quality of life.

Please do not freelance if your salary is more than enough to fulfill your material needs of your life. Spend your ‘after office hours’ with your friends, family, and other activities which you like to do without expecting any return.

I either freelance or go to job. My friend who is successful in both job and freelancing, either pursue a job or freelance, but not both at a time.

The best practice is do freelancing when you do not have job or your salary is insufficient to fulfill your basic needs.

What I have mentioned here are Maturity, Attitude, Expertise, and Infrastructure. You may posses all or lack in something. Even you lack in something, you can start outsourcing if you are in dear need of money. Need is Skill. Sooner or later you will automatically develop the skills needed to be a freelancer if you keep trying.

Hi geek, if the information provided in this page is not sufficient to you, please look in other pages.