"The company is not good, job-hopping is too difficult. It is better to be a freelancer! " Give you seven practical suggestions.

? Through darkness and confusion, I will grow up with you.

Author | Xia Jiujiu

5000 words of dry goods, estimated reading time 10 minute.

My friend Qiqi is a precious mother, and her child has been more than five months. In a blink of an eye, when maternity leave ends next week, she will go back to work. I got a call from the company's administration two days ago, and I have to handle the handover on my first day back to work. It is not that she was fired, but that the new colleague who took over her job is leaving. At the same time, another old colleague of the department has also left. The company is undergoing business changes again, and there are many things.

Qiqi is very upset. She is still hesitant about going back to work. After all, the child is still young and will soon be a wet nurse. It takes a lot of time on the way to and from work every day, but they are still a little uncomfortable. The key point is that she started to do sideline business more than a year ago, and now her income has steadily exceeded her main business. According to the current situation of the company, I'm sure my life is under great pressure, but my income is not as good as my sideline. Do you want to go back to work or quit your job and do freelance work?

My other friend Nai Nai is even worse. He went to naked resignation at the end of last year. When he met a bottleneck, he felt very confused. He wants to have a good rest and wait for a year before jumping ship and starting over. Unexpectedly, the epidemic broke out, and this rest lasted for a whole quarter. He began to send resumes everywhere in March to find a job, and so far he has not received a decent offer.

Speaking a few days ago, he said a little angrily, "If you can't find a job again, it's a big deal to do freelance work." I wanted to say at that time, do you have any misunderstanding about freelancing? According to what I know about her, she is not suitable for freelancing. As for why, you will know after reading this article.

However, Nai Nai's words are a response to the current trend. Due to the epidemic, freelancing has once again become the focus of attention. However, everyone lacks a clear understanding of whether they are suitable, whether they can do freelance work and how to make the right choice.

As we all know, I took maternity leave a while ago, but I didn't stop working during the maternity leave, which means that my main business stopped but my sideline business was still in a state of high saturation. So as a person who has worked as a freelancer for half a year and has done some research on freelancers, here are three things you need to know about freelancing:

● What is freelancing? What is the essence of freelancing?

● What kind of people are suitable for freelancing? What preparations do you need to make to become a freelancer?

If you decide to be a freelancer, what should you pay attention to?

? What is a freelancer? What is the essence of freelancing?

In the eyes of many people, freelancing means having the ability to earn money and have leisure, working whenever you want, and leaving when you want to rest. Is that really the case?

Although many freelancers seem to have embarked on the road of "freedom" in their work, this road has also brought them pressure that ordinary people can't understand.

If you really look closely at the freelancers around you, you will find that it is completely different. I know a treasure mother who has been freelancing for almost three years. While taking the baby at home, she made her own self-media, writing 3 articles every day and distributing them on the whole platform. Hot spots should be chased at midnight. It's hard, because if you don't fight, there will be no income.

A friend of mine, who is a designer, took the order and worked overtime to revise the manuscript more than ten times. Freelancers are not as glamorous as you think.

What exactly is a freelancer? Freelancer's English is self-employed, which means to hire yourself, not belonging to any organization, but working for yourself. In fact, English expression is closer to the essence.

The classical teacher said well, "Freelance is not a profession, but a state of ability. It is not so much a freelancer as a "freelancer model". The "freelance mode" also shows the essence behind freelancing-you can take your own ability as a product and form a complete business closed loop.

The core of free occupation is occupation, not freedom.

As a profession, the biggest feature of freelancing itself is that you have finished all the product chains of professional competence, that is, you can turn professional competence into products or services, and then price, publicize, sell, upgrade and make good financial guarantee. To put it bluntly, freelancing means starting a business by one person.

Having said that, you should also understand that to be a freelancer, you need to meet a hard standard, that is, you have strong professional ability.

The freedom of freelancing is not the freedom to resign, but the freedom to choose.

And the freedom of choice needs your personal ability and strength to support it. A person is a team. What abilities do freelancers need? Including the ability of self-management, self-marketing and self-evolution. There is also the ability to manage money, that is, to learn to manage your own money.

? What kind of person is suitable for freelancing? What preparations do you need to make to become a freelancer?

Not everyone can do freelance work. At least the following five conditions must be met.

1. Have a skill or a certain ability to directly provide products or services.

The Report on the Survival and Development of Freelancers (20 19) shows that when asked why they choose freelancing, 43.8% people choose "having a skill". When asked, "What kind of professional skills do you have?" The three most frequently chosen skills are music art (43.8%), fine arts (43.4%) and copywriting (38.4%). 72.6% people have more than one skill, while 39.8% people have more than two skills.

One or more of your skills and abilities can be productized, a specific deliverable product or service.

For example, if you are good at visual design, you can draw illustrations for people and make hand-drawn cards. You can do PPT, edit videos, or do it with such an outsourcing list. You can also turn your abilities into courses, such as many visual note-taking courses, PPT courses and writing buses on the market. You sell this as a lecturer's fee If you turn your ability into a plan, such as making a course design plan and planning an activity, you are selling a planning book. If you turn your abilities into one-on-one consultants, you are selling consulting services.

Freelance requires that everyone must be able to independently produce independently packaged products or services. Service providers in arts and crafts are born freelancers, but it is difficult for industrial workers to be freelancers, because in today's industrial field, one person can't do things.

For example, writers, authors of novels and self-media workers can all work freely, but editing is not enough, and art design is more difficult. Once any work involves mass production and you are only one of them, you can't do it independently, so you can't engage in freelance work.

How to judge your own ability, or whether this skill can be productized and marketized?

You can do a test to verify it. How? Make a "minimum feasible product". This concept comes from the book Lean Entrepreneurship. "Minimizing feasible products" means making products with the least resources, releasing them as soon as possible, and optimizing them through customer feedback.

For example, your skill is to read quickly, read a book for an hour or two, remember, and apply what you have learned. So you want to do a fast reading training camp. But you don't know if there is market demand for this, so make a poster and send it to a circle of friends to see if anyone has signed up. Even if you sign up for a few, it means there is market demand. After you finish, you can ask the participants' opinions and suggestions, then do optimization iteration and launch it after the next upgrade.

If you have been able to earn money to support yourself through this skill, then you have the entry threshold for freelancers.

Second, cultivate strong self-management ability.

If you can work continuously at home or in a coffee shop for three months, you can work continuously and efficiently without procrastination, laziness and supervision, then you have passed the point where freelancers need self-discipline.

But this is not just a question of self-discipline. This is a systematic project, collectively referred to as self-management. This includes time management, energy management, life and work coordination and so on.

If you have a family and children, you should consider whether you work from home or go outside to find a mobile office space. If you are at home, telecommuting from home during this epidemic is a good test. If you adapt well and work efficiently, that's good. If you can't handle the whole process well, it will be a great challenge for you to be a freelancer.

At the beginning of the article, I said that my friend Nai Nai is not suitable to be a freelancer, because she is lazy, a little complacent, lacking in self-discipline in her usual work. Although she has a skill and core skills, as a freelancer with unstable income, it is difficult to continue without strong self-management ability.

Third, improve self-marketing ability and try to get customers.

Freelancers need to sell their products and services, so they must find ways to get customers, and have the ability of self-marketing to let customers choose you.

Nowadays, writing is a shortcut. Many people gain fans (customers) by being self-media, and publicize themselves and their products in words by constantly posting various dynamic news on social platforms, so that more people can know what you are doing and what you have. So as to attract customers' attention, accumulate the next batch of customers, and continue to spread through word of mouth and self-media, so that more and more people can find themselves.

Fourth, expand the interpersonal network and accumulate resources.

A good interpersonal network can not only help you get customers, but also help you do many things. To be a freelancer, you need not only customers, but also some outsourcing. When you receive a big order with your partner, you also need to integrate all the resources, which need your network to achieve. People who don't like being alone are unlikely to become good freelancers.

If you are still working, when you decide to be a freelancer, you should also have a good relationship with your original company, because a survey shows that there are about 1/4 freelancers, and their first order is to cooperate with their original boss.

Speaking of resources, what are resources? It's not who's phone number or WeChat you have, nor who you know. Resources are abilities that you can mobilize. What you can mobilize is resources, otherwise it's just information. For example, someone told you today that he was rich in resources, and then sent a photo of his office, which was very big and luxurious. This is not called strong resources. Unless he tells me who is behind this office and what great enterprises and institutions are around, it is impossible for ordinary people to rent it here. We rented it. The rent was discounted. It's called resources. Think about what resources you can mobilize.

? ▎: Are there any precautions before deciding to do freelance work?

If you meet most of the above conditions, you think you can still do it. Before you decide to take this step, there are three important suggestions for you.

First, make sure you see the truth about freelancing first and do a scene rehearsal.

Freelance is a business form that lives on one's own professional ability. The first thing you have to think about is whether you really want to focus on this field and have a chance to win, and then do you really like the form of freelancing you choose? Before deciding, ask yourself repeatedly whether you really want to enter this field. Don't just look at other people's circle of friends, look for real freelancers, especially those around you, and have a chat.

Be sure to do a scene rehearsal after the chat. The so-called scenario rehearsal means asking yourself what your life is like after making this choice. Are you willing to look forward to this state of life? This can be related to whether you will make this decision and choice more firmly in the end.

There is a safer way. You can try to do a sideline job in your spare time while you are working, and see if you like it or not. If you can make money from it, you will know the answer soon. If the sideline has not only started, but also done well and you like it, it is not too late to consider whether to turn the sideline into a formal job and become a freelancer.

Secondly, estimate the possible risks, think about the retreat and stop the loss in time.

The Report on the Survival and Development of Freelancers (20 19) shows that when asked about the disadvantages of freelancing, "unstable income", "unstable security" and "unable to form a long-term plan" are still the three major obstacles and disadvantages of freelancing.

Estimate possible risks, evaluate what risks you can bear, and think of a way out for yourself. Where is the retreat of freelancing? There are actually only three groups of freelancers.

Some of them are early adopters. After a period of internship, I feel that my ability is insufficient. If a person feels lonely or the novelty has passed, they will choose to find a new place to go back to work.

Some of them have done well and will further evolve into entrepreneurs in the competition. For example, many people do paid training camps. There are more and more similar training camps, and the competition is getting bigger and bigger. Or if you want to expand the scale, you will definitely find a few assistants or outsource them to help you do it, and you will become an entrepreneur by doing it.

There are still some people who will do freelance work forever, especially those skilled jobs whose business units are too small to be outsourced, such as performance, design, art and so on. They are born freelancers.

Third, learn to do financial management and planning, and have the ability and awareness of business cooperation.

The economic income of freelancing is unstable, so you must have a financial plan, a certain amount of surplus grain and savings, and you can't rely on a monthly salary to manage your finances. Moreover, you should have certain business cooperation ability and awareness, have the ability to protect yourself in the face of disputes, and know some legal knowledge. If you can't sign the contract at all and dig a hole for yourself, you will probably lose all the money you earned before.

Another point, and many painful lessons, is to buy social security. For freelancers, this is a very important and worthwhile means of self-protection. Children will have less trouble studying, buying a house, buying a car and going abroad. So you remember to be a freelancer, you must pay social security in a company.

Going back to the situation at the beginning of the article, whether to continue working or freelance depends on how well we know our abilities, resources and personality. In other words, it depends on your ability to resist risks. Strong anti-risk ability, you can choose whatever you want. Otherwise, let's take the old path of most people first.

Fortunately, there is a sideline as the foundation, a certain accumulation, and the ability to resist risks is still there. But Nai Nai is naive. If you can't even find a job, how can freelancers find clients?

When exploring their own feasible paths, many people either take too big and radical steps, have not done market research or have done several projects in this field, are eager to go to work and devote themselves wholeheartedly. This method is not completely wrong. There is an idiom called last resort, but it obviously fails to make a full assessment of the risks that will be faced in the future.

To be a freelancer, you need to prepare for these four points:

1. Have a skill or a certain ability to directly provide products or services.

Second, cultivate strong self-management ability.

Third, improve self-marketing ability and try to get customers.

Fourth, expand the interpersonal network and accumulate resources.

First, make sure you see the truth about freelancing first and do a scene rehearsal.

At the same time, do these three points:

First, make sure you see the truth about freelancing first and do a scene rehearsal.

Second, estimate the possible risks, think about the retreat and stop the loss in time.

Third, learn to do financial management and planning, and have the ability and awareness of business cooperation.