Organizing Your Freelance Writing Career
Posted on 21 August 2008 by Sharon
When I published the readers’ interview the other day, there was a follow up question from Melissa, who said: ‘I was hoping to find out how you schedule your time and keep organized’.
This is a difficult area for many writers, especially those who are juggling multiple commitments. In the past, I’ve done the ‘work till you drop’ thing, but it’s not good for me personally, nor is it good for family life. To create the life that I want while keeping my writing career going, I’ve had to accept that I can’t do it all. So what does that mean in terms of getting organized?
Key Tasks For Writers
There are several key tasks that writers have to do to manage their writing careers successfully. Only one of these is the writing. However, getting work in and attracting new clients are also important, so it’s essential to set some time aside for these tasks. When you work at home, you may need to get some human interaction from time to time. That’s where social networking, forums and online chats come in. These are not timewasters, but essential parts of keeping yourself healthy and balanced.
Maxmising Productivity
One of the advantages of the freelance lifestyle is the ability to adapt to changing priorities. Generally, I take a disciplined approach to my work. I usually start writing by 8am. Before that, I have already checked and responded to urgent email and spent some time with my friends online. Ideally, the next task should be bidding for work, but since I write best in the morning, I usually leave any simple bids till the afternoon. This means that I use my time productively.
I write until lunchtime, take a short break, and continue writing (including bidding for new work) till it’s time to pick my daughter up from school. Then it’s family time until she goes to bed at 7pm. I usually do another email check and spend some time with my friends online. Depending on whether I’m expecting anything urgent, I may do another check before going to bed.
Marketing And Promotion
There are also lots of tasks that I slot in when I need a change of pace or have some down time. These include promotional tasks such as updating my online portfolio, doing some article marketing, changing profiles on sites, submitting blog posts through the social media, entering blog carnivals, writing guest posts for blogs and much more.
Achieving Balance
Is this the most efficient way of organising my time? Who knows? It allows me to write at my best writing time, slot other tasks around that and still spend time socialising online. I get to spend time with my family too. I’m not claiming to be the best organised writer in the world, far from it, but I think I’ve achieved a reasonable balance.
Photo: mconnors
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Tags | freelance writing, writing, writing career
August 21st, 2008 at 12:21 pm
“When you work at home, you may need to get some human interaction from time to time. That’s where social networking, forums and online chats come in. These are not timewasters, but essential parts of keeping yourself healthy and balanced.”
Strange as it is, but by human interaction I usually understand real-world human interaction. As in “going out”, “talking to live people face-to-face” and “meeting with friends”. Guess after 15 years in cubicle I value real-world human interaction much higher then anything done online.
Vlad’s last blog post..More Gadgets, Less Fun
August 21st, 2008 at 1:18 pm
Great post Sharon. I am not a very good organizer, because I seem to do my best work in semi-organized chaos. I would say finding balance is still the hardest thing for me.
Amy’s last blog post..Counting Sheep (Or, Sleepy Chick Joins Twitter)
August 21st, 2008 at 3:28 pm
I am trying to maintain a pretty regular writing schedule - but it’s really hard for me sometimes because I’m easily distracted. I agree with you about the adaptability of the freelance life being a major benefit - it can’t be beat!:)
Kimberly Ben’s last blog post..Freelance Writers Need to Create a Residual Income
August 21st, 2008 at 8:28 pm
Vlad, I was talking about recreating the office water cooler in a way. Since I work online, most of my colleagues are people I have never met face to face. We’re still friends, though. And I have plenty of social interaction offline, too.
Amy: my desk is always covered in paper, but it still works.
Kimberly: Keeping a schedule is essential, I find, even if you sometimes break away from the routine.
August 22nd, 2008 at 4:43 am
Finding a schedule I can work with has been really difficult for me. One of the challenging things about writing from home is that others don’t always respect our work hours. You have to have the courage and confidence to say, “Look, these are the times I am ‘at work’, please respect that and I would be happy to (whatever) when I am not working.”
Of course, much of this is far easier said than done.
Rebecca Laffar-Smith’s last blog post..Book Review: Save The Cat
August 22nd, 2008 at 2:39 pm
It can be a challenge figuring out which tasks are worth the time. One of my biggest challenges is actually keeping my paperwork organized. Five years after I started my career, I still struggle with this. Thanks for posting your insights!
Katherine’s last blog post..Taking Care of Your Body for a Stronger Mind
August 23rd, 2008 at 10:59 pm
I find switching from one task to another (marketing to writing to querying) very difficult after noon. I have to get as much as I can of the small stuff done in the morning and then settle into one task (writing, blogging, marketing etc.) for the afternoon. I guess everyone has their own groove to get into. Great blog BTW!Cheers,April Freelance Editor, Copyeditor, Journalist and Designer
August 24th, 2008 at 3:43 pm
Sharon, these are helpful. Thanks! Can I ask for more details? Like, do you have a specific time when you work on your own blog? (my blog is sadly neglected in favor of work I get paid for . . .) How do you find a balance so you don’t have a situation where you have too many projects to get done in a given week? I’m always afraid that I’ll have a job I bid on a month ago suddenly pop up when I thought they’d found someone else and then crash right into some other job I’m currently needing to finish — does that ever happen and what do you do? Do you plan out how long you think it will take to get something done (and if so, how?) or do you just do what I do and write as fast as you can and hope for the best?
I think I must need more sleep than you, I can’t ever seem to start work by 8 a.m. ::::sigh::::
Melissa’s last blog post..
August 25th, 2008 at 6:49 am
this was a really informative post. I think i’ll take the time today to get better organized. since i’ve been blogging i’ve got notes everywhere….on the dresser, “in” the bed, under the night stand, in this folder, in that planner. I need to get centralized and get focused..it just makes life easier.
roschelle’s last blog post..ObamaBiden2008
August 25th, 2008 at 9:22 am
You’re right, Becca. Not everyone respects your schedule. Sometimes I have to get pretty insistent.
Katherine: I loathe paperwork and find it far easier to organize my electronic files than the bits of paper. I’m still waiting for the paperless office to arrive. That would be heaven …
Melissa: I think I answer some of these questions in my Freelance Writing Series. (http://getpaidtowriteonline.com/freelance-writing-questions-setting-rates/) Have a look and let me know if there’s anything else you want me to answer.
Roschelle: It’s essential to have some level of organization. A good start would be collecting those bits of paper in one place or transferring them to electronic files.
August 25th, 2008 at 6:26 pm
Sharon,
You seem to have found an excellent organizational method that works well for you! That’s fantastic! The tendency to overwork can be so tempting at times and real balance so difficult to achieve. Balance is extremely important though, if we hope to avoid the inevitable burnout that waits down the road for those who continually overwork, overcommit, and under-plan, while perpetually ignoring the warning signs of what lies ahead.
Thanks for sharing your personal recipe for organization–and through it, offering us all some valuable advice!
Jeanne