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Vacation: Planning Your Restorative Recess

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Labor performed by Freelance workers continues to exert a significant influence on the global economy. Freelance professionals play a central role in leading industries on every continent, as demonstrated by the prevalence of Freelance professionals working in software development, cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, human resources, graphic design, marketing, business consulting and in creative industries, from photojournalism to landscape design. Many of you in the U.S. and around the world have built rewarding and lucrative Freelance solopreneur entities. However, it is not an exaggeration to acknowledge that many Freelance workers struggle with one ordinary, but integral, facet of working life—taking time off.

Culture and customs

Unlike W-2 employees, Freelance workers are self-pay all the way—health insurance, holiday, personal, or sick time, retirement fund and vacation time. While there can be exceptions, such as retainer clients or ongoing projects where billable hours are front-end loaded, in many cases a day or a week without work can mean a day or a week without revenue. Revenue income is directly linked to billable hours, deliverables to the client, or project milestones. It can be difficult to step away from billable hours and risk diminishing your income or, heaven forbid, undermining your relationship with a coveted, but high-maintenance, client. Precarious circumstances can instill a fear of professional risk that can override what is, or should be, a normal part of working life.

On top of that, when working in the knowledge economy, whether you participate as 1099-NEC or W-2 labor, clients or employers may have developed an “always on” expectation of the help, a custom that is common in the U.S. and parts of East Asia and is taking hold in some sectors in the Middle East. Rapid response times enabled by a constant digital presence have become the norm in some industries and, increasingly, the practice now defines the preferred client relationship. Email, instant messaging and video conferencing make it easy for clients to expect immediate feedback from their Freelance collaborator, regardless of time zone differences or observances of local holidays. Unfortunately, the 24/7 always-on business culture can erode the boundaries between working hours and personal time, particularly for Freelancers who already operate without the advocacy of a multinational corporation that can enforce fixed work schedules.

Adding to the Freelancer’s stress is the awareness that platforms such as Upwork, Fiverr, or Toptal give prospective employers instant access to your potential replacement—a talented individual who may reside in your own country or on another continent, and is ready to service those who were once your clients. Under those anxiety-producing conditions, even established Freelancers may hesitate to go off-line and take a break that exceeds a long weekend, so worried are you that even a long-standing client might explore alternative providers while you are out of the office.

Health and wellness

Still, there are persuasive health and even professional benefits associated with incorporating vacations and holidays into your Freelance work schedule. Health care professionals point out the direct links between chronic overwork, cardiovascular risk, anxiety and depression and diminished productivity associated with the neglect of taking time off to relax and refresh your energy and focus. For Freelancers, who must, on your own, juggle client acquisition, deliver excellent project results and outcomes, perform administrative duties such as invoicing and project proposal submissions and conduct strategic planning for your business entity, the risk of burnout is typically higher than for traditional employees who have team support. Your long-term success depends on it.

Rest is not merely a wellness concept; it is a performance driver. Research from organizations such as Harvard Business Review  has consistently shown that cognitive performance, creativity and problem-solving improve after periods of genuine disconnection. Vacations and holidays contribute to building resilience and even creativity. You owe it to yourself to periodically step away from the grind and allow your mind and body to rest and recover.

Budget and schedule

Because you must finance your extended holiday, build projected restorative recess expenses into your company’s annual budget. Your annual Freelance business revenue (your income, that is) should cover your non-billable time, from the administrative duties you perform to standard and local holiday observances and your personal vacation days. Step One of your time-off enablement strategy is obtaining a reasonable estimate of the amount you can afford to spend and when you can afford to do it.

Begin by forecasting your revenue (what you expect to earn), cash-flow (when accounts receivable should arrive and when accounts payable expenses are due) and calculate a reasonable vacation budget. You might feel comfortable setting up a dedicated savings account and depositing 5% – 15% of monthly revenue received to create for yourself “paid leave” fund. Over the course of a year, you may be able to finance perhaps three to four weeks of non-billable time.

Remember also that retainer agreements are an excellent system for guaranteeing your revenue stream and can preserve your cash-flow during holidays and slow periods. Client retainer agreements can accommodate time off for holidays by front-loading your client work, or even reducing the scope of the work you perform, perhaps by yourself and the client negotiating a specified number of hours you will be available.

As for when you choose to schedule a vacation, you might simply confirm the slowest business periods on your calendar—maybe the last week of December or sometime during July or August? Few key clients are in the office during those blocks of time. You will also do well to reframe your approach to holidays; they can be more than random disruptions in your weekly workflow. Open yourself to recognizing a holiday as the foundation of a week’s vacation, for example.

Tech enabling

The rapid evolution of digital tools has significantly transformed what it means for Freelance workers to take time off. Automation and artificial intelligence powered assistants and agents can now play a pivotal role in maintaining operations continuity while the human overseers step away to take a recess. Your newsletter and other marketing emails, monthly invoices, monthly financial statements and sales funnel CRM follow-up can automatically be set into motion. Project management platforms such as ClickUp, Asana and Trello make it possible to monitor progress and status, assign responsibilities and set timelines to ensure that time-sensitive projects can move forward while you are away. If you must take a (brief!) meeting during your vacation, there are numerous videoconferencing platforms that allow anyone with internet access to check in and participate.

If maintaining data security is a priority for you (and it should be), particularly for Freelancers who will travel and also monitor client work from multiple locations. When grabbing internet access from hotels or co-working spaces, the risk of experiencing a data breach or other attack grows. Security-conscious Freelancers will use a virtual private network (VPN), two-factor authentication and encrypted password managers to protect data—their own and the clients’. When travelling, it is imperative that you protect your data, especially if you’ll log-on from remote work environments.

Communication plan

So can you get the ball rolling on a vacation you’ll take sometime before this year ends? A carefully designed financial plan and a date range that can be expected to cause minimal disruption to your work schedule are all good—but will not please your clients if a sloppy communication process causes them to feel blindsided or abandoned when you, their Freelance collaborator, announce a hiatus. Timely information must be the cornerstone of your communication strategy. Put yourself in the client’s shoes and imagine how much lead time would be useful for you and your team?

For example, if you decide to add a couple of days to a holiday long weekend, giving clients four to six weeks notice should suffice; but giving clients eight to ten weeks advance notice if your out-of-office time will extend to a week or two will be much appreciated. The longer your absence, the more advance notice you should give. Freelancers who value professionalism and good manners typically inform their currently engaged clients of planned absences well in advance (depending on the nature of the work). In your communication to clients, be certain to provide precise out-of-office dates, a summary of deliverables and/or milestones that will be completed before your departure and, if applicable, response expectations you will fulfill during your vacation, along with any contingency arrangements developed to preserve workflow that will be put into place.

Thanks for reading,

Kim

Image: © AlikaObraz for Freepik. A healing hot springs soak in Loutra Edipsou, Greece.

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New Year’s Resolutions for 2022

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Happy New Year! I’m psyched to welcome you to 2022 and thank you for stopping by to read. There can be no party without you and together, we are going to make this a very good year. Because we’re at the top of the year, capodanno, as the Italians so eloquently say, I’ve decided to revive my New Year’s Resolutions tradition, something I haven’t done since January 2019. Considering what the entire world has been slogging through since 2020, you may appreciate some inspiration to get yourself in racing form.

Join a business group

Freelancers and other business leaders need community. It can be lonely at the top. You need a way to meet and interact with peers, whether or not they become your besties. Business organizations and professional associations provide forums where Freelancers and (small or mid-size) business owners can talk to colleagues who understand your challenges and motivations. Along the way, you’ll build personal connections and you may also find your way to business opportunities.

If you’re not sure where to start, visit the website of your local chamber of commerce; the chambers are great resources for B2B, B2C and B2G facing business owners and leaders. Another useful organization is The Freelancers Union, an online national group that is a good resource for all types of information, from professional development workshops designed for self-employed professionals to medical, dental and other types of insurance coverage. https://www.freelancersunion.org/

Analyze your website and social media data

Fully leveraging the potential of the digital presence of your company is unquestionably a must. Whether selling to B2B, B2C, or B2G clients, the winners are those who are guided by actionable data when making decisions and developing business strategies. If you haven’t done so already investigate Google Analytics, a free and powerful online tool that helps you discover the right approach to the customer journey and customer experience that your company offers, supplies e-commerce, call-to-action and landing page insights, plus more. https://analytics.withgoogle.com/?utm_source=google-growth&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=2019-q4-amer-all-gafree-analytics&utm_content=analytics&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIsILp4eCW9QIVDovICh2FKAT0EAAYASAAEgJPJPD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds
If you can budget about $25-$50/month, invest in a social media analytics service such as Zoho Social, Hootsuite, Buffer Analyze, or HubSpot to further enhance and refine your strategies and campaigns and measure ROI.

Become a better leader

There are multiple paths that one might take to developing and enhancing leadership skills and it can begin with reading. Reading one or more leadership themed books each year will open your mind and make you rethink your usual approaches to problem-solving, decision-making, negotiation and communication, for example. I’m a regular reader of the Corner Office column that appears in the Sunday New York Times.

You may be inspired by this tale of entrepreneurship The Unfair Advantage (2020) by Ash Ali and Hasan Kubba https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/50714359-the-unfair-advantage

You may be shocked but intrigued by this tale of commodities trading The World for Sale: Money, Power and the Traders (2020) by Javier Blas and Jack Farchy. https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/52199304-the-world-for-sale

When you join a business or professional group, you’re also likely to be introduced to leadership roles in the group (on the membership committee, for example). The chambers and also Rotary Clubs can introduce you to local not- for-profit organization leaders, who can show you how you might contribute your time and talent to a philanthropic cause that resonates and further expand your network, enhance your brand and maybe add to your skill set as well.

Prioritize revenue generating activities

Decide which of your revenue-generating activities could pay off if you plan well— then follow through and execute! Depending on your business and target clients, it could be email marketing outreach to potential prospects, attending certain conferences or trade shows, sending hard copy direct mail appeals, or running FaceBook ads. Once you know what your revenue-generating strategy will be, calculate about how much time you’ll need each week or month to gain traction and meet your financial goal. Then, get to work.

Communicate with clients

Staying in contact with clients throughout the year is good business, even when you reach out to those you haven’t worked with for a few years. Through your outreach, you remind clients past and present that 1.) you’re still in business and 2.) you may be able to help them with achieve a goal or solve a problem. A few years ago, a study by the uber-consulting firm Bain & Company confirmed what decades of anecdotal evidence shows —- that it’s easier to keep an existing customer than to find a new one.

So send a copy of your newsletter, blog, case study or white paper to clients, attached to a quick and friendly email that mentions a couple of reasons why they’ll find the read worthwhile. Also update clients when you give a talk, moderate a panel, or appear on a podcast. Pick up the phone and invite your most important clients to lunch.

Delegate or outsource

Delegating, or outsourcing if you work alone or with a small team, is essential for you to be able to have time to yourself and think about how to find innovative ways to expand your business. If you want your business to thrive and grow, you need to start trusting the people on your team, or identify other talented and trustworthy Freelancers, to take over certain tasks.

Upgrade your skills

The world keeps turning, expectations evolve and what we need to know to maintain the trust and respect of current and future clients shifts with the times, along with how we package and deliver the services we offer. What expertise do you need to own to better reach or more effectively serve your clients? What do you need to know to more efficiently run your business?

Help yourself to figure things out by reading articles that address your industry and niche within it—-what new technologies are gaining traction or what are new uses of existing technologies? What are the thought leaders in your industry and niche predicting? What are your clients doing to position themselves for future demands?

With that information in hand, you’ll understand how to upgrade your skill set. Maybe you’ll finally become truly proficient in using Excel, or learn to become more comfortable giving virtual presentations.

Nurture your health

Unless you’re up against a big project deadline, structure your time to allow yourself to have a day or two off once a week. Burnout is bad for business. Allow yourself to sleep the number of hours your body needs (adults usually need 7-9 hours daily). Eat a balanced diet that contains the basic food groups. Give yourself a daily intake of water that approximately equals one-half of your body weight in ounces. Participate in moderate to vigorous exercise at least three hours each week. Maintain your social connections by staying in touch with friends and family.

Thanks for reading,

Kim

Image: © William Stephen. Thoroughbreds racing at the Saratoga Race Course in Saratoga Springs, NY

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The Fit Freelancer

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What you didn’t know about me is that in addition to bring a Freelance strategy and marketing consultant,  I’ve also been a fitness instructor for the past dozen years.  I became a fitness enthusiast on my 21st birthday.  On that day I realized that the clock was ticking and that it would make sense to do whatever was possible to preserve and protect my health and strength.

I ran one mile.  I made myself drink 8 glasses of water (a substance that I loathed) and promised myself to drink at least that amount every day.  I began to eat vegetables other than corn,  spinach or peas.  Soon thereafter I became a vegetarian and followed that regimen for about 15 years,  reintroducing meat to my diet only after peer-reviewed studies showed that red meat is a beneficial component of our diets,  providing the best source of protein and facilitating the absorption of minerals.

There are now thousands of studies that focus on wellness,  that is the benefits of regular exercise,  a healthy diet,  adequate sleep and supportive relationships.   Over the past 15 years or so,  psychologists and other social scientists have learned that regular exercise does much more than improve our physical beings.  Exercise impacts the way we think.  Statistically significant cognitive benefits of regular exercise include:

  • Improved concentration
  • Enhanced creativity
  • Faster learning
  • Sharper memory
  • Greater mental stamina
  • Lower stress

Regular exercise (defined here as three or four 45-minute workouts/week;  one mile swims/week;  or two-mile runs/week) has also been shown to boost self-confidence and cause our central nervous systems to produce endorphins and serotonin,  chemicals that are natural mood elevators.  Exercise makes us think more efficiently,  work more effectively and feel happier,  more confident and less stressed.  May I add self-discipline to the list of exercise benefits?  It takes real discipline to pull oneself out of bed at 4:45 AM on a freezing January morning and venture out into the icy darkness a few minutes later,  en route to the gym.

Surprisingly,  the time of day that we exercise matters and according to researchers,  daytime is best.  A 2008 study revealed that exercising during work hours (or before the work day) improves the ability to manage time;  increases one’s productivity; improves our interactions with colleagues; and leaves us still feeling good as we head home at the end of the day.

I will concur.  I always did my runs in the early morning and eventually,  I came to prefer early morning exercise classes.  I like to get my workout done before the events of the day have a chance to derail my schedule and I love the energy blast that early morning exercise gives me.  What a feeling of accomplishment I have as I waltz out of the health club door at 8:15 AM,   showered and dressed and ready to take on the day!

Regular exercise benefits everyone and I feel it is especially beneficial for Freelance consultants and business owners.  For us,  achieving and maintaining mental and physical stamina are a must.  Researchers offer a few suggestions that will support those of you who are about to introduce fitness into your lives:

  • Find a physical activity that you like,  because you will not continue otherwise.
  • Get a trainer and/or take fitness classes.  Commit to learning how to work out in a way that maximizes the benefits and minimizes the risk of injury
  • Get social.  Talk to people and make friends at your gym.
  • Join a team if you like team sports.  You will be compelled to practice (exercise) and play (more exercise).

I offer you my suggestions,  based on many years of gym membership and 12 + years of teaching fitness:

  • Join a gym that is convenient to your home or office,  to make it easy for you to get there.
  • Early morning is probably the most convenient time to exercise.  Develop your early morning exercise routine in spring time,  when mornings are brighter and waking up will be easier.

Thanks for reading,

Kim