Finally, A Career Guide For Freelancers

By Mylene Kasilag

There are no magic bullets, no magic formula. Those of us who have been there through sun and storm, can only smile at the fact that everything starts with a burning desire to succeed. The craft of freelancing takes years to shape and a lifetime to perfect. We are very fortunate - the Internet has redefined the word "freelance" and has made it a lucrative career for almost everybody with specialized information. Now, with a little guide and a lot of practice, success at freelance is more of a reality today than it ever was before the Internet was mainstream. It may take a lot of hard work with long hours, but in the end, it really is possible to have comfortable income through online freelance work.

To help you remember the Quick Guide, I came up with the perfect acronyms - SKIN, GOAL and LEVEL. Please do your best to memorize the acronyms because they definitely will come in handy and create milestones for you. After all, it is your life's career on the plate.

Phase 1 - Identify your S-K-I-N
• Skill
• Knowledge
• Interest
• Network

Phase 2 - Set your G-O-A-L
• Generate your product/ service
• Organize a business system
• Accelerate your sales
• Leapfrog your way to the top

Phase 3 - Bring yourself to the next L-E-V-E-L
• Leverage on joint projects
• Enrich others to enrich yourself
• Volunteer for visibility
• Earn sponsorships and favours
• Live a simple life

Let us start with Phase 1 - Identify your S-K-I-N

The objective of Phase 1 is to establish the foundation of your career. By identifying your skill, knowledge, and interest, you will also be able to recognize existing conditions, concerns, constraints, or even weaknesses. Through some exercises, you will be able to formulate decisions that will dictate the future intensity and consistency of the rate of your progress. After finding out your skill, knowledge, and interest, we will proceed to explore ways to build your network.

Follow these steps:

1) Make 3 columns on your paper and mark each column with the headings - SKILL, KNOWLEDGE, and INTEREST. Make your lists following the criteria below.

2) Study the lists and weigh the possibilities when you have to choose only one item from each column.

3) Finalize and make your conclusion as shown from the examples below.

4) Generate a random idea of the kind of freelance business you can pursue.

• SKILL

The skills we refer to are the "God-given skill". These are the skills that were given to you when you were born. If you were stripped naked from all resources - money, friends, education, etc., what is it that you can do on your own without help?

Is it the ability to sketch people in detail?
Can you make up fascinating stories?
Can you write travel journals?
Are you a born salesman?
Born teacher?
Can you make children laugh?
Are you a math wizard?
Can you compose songs?
Do you easily grow flowers?

• KNOWLEDGE

By knowledge, we mean "specialized knowledge". These are special information that a niche market may find valuable. Specialized knowledge can be about sunset photography, furniture designing, copywriting, wood varnishing, basket making, animal breeding, interior decorating, flower arranging, bread making, software programming, web designing, business plan writing, video making, online marketing, SEO writing, and many others.

Oftentimes, we do not recognize the specialized knowledge that we already have for so long. Specialized knowledge may be as simple as knowing so much about caring for the elderly or preparing everyday meals for a diabetic child.

• INTEREST

In a lifetime, there could be a range of interests that keep us occupied. The interest we are looking for is the one that you are so passionate about that you do not notice the time spent in the task. In fact, you may not be producing great results but you keep on it because "passionate interest" is therapeutic and stimulating.

Now, study your lists and whenever you are certain about your personal evaluation, identify the following aspects for building your career. Take your time...

GOD-GIVEN SKILLL _______________________________
SPECIALIZED KNOWLEDGE _______________________________
PASSIONATE INTEREST _______________________________

Sample conclusion No. 1

God-given skill is "writing"
Specialized knowledge is "preparing salad recipes"
Passionate interest is "growing vegetables from the backyard"

Random idea: You can blog about your day to day experience on growing vegetables from the backyard. Talk about preparing the soil, which crops grow under the shade or sunlight, etc. Describe the tools you use. Excite the readers by showing videos. Solicit sponsorship from possible advertisers. Make an eBook on "Salad Recipes - Fresh from the Garden". Place brand ads of olive oil, vinegar, mayonnaise, etc. On the eBook and distribute for free when they subscribe to your blog.

Sample conclusion No. 2

God-given skill is "selling"
Specialized knowledge is "computer repair"
Passionate interest is "computer games"

Random idea: Possible online business is to write your reviews about different computer games and get advertising sponsorships. Make recommendations suitable for each age group. You can also write about ways to upgrade the hardware specifications to optimize the performance of the desired software game. Tie up with computer dealers as your supplier. Create your own bundling promo package for software games and sell online.

Sample conclusion No. 3

God-given skill is "teaching"
Specialized knowledge is "publishing books"
Passionate interest is "playing with children"

Random idea: Obviously, you can teach illustrators and writers how to create entertaining educational books that children would respond to. Get samples of books from various publishers and offer to conduct random survey to see which book a child will choose to pick up based on the front cover, etc. Document the process on video. You can write reviews of children's books and make recommendations on how to improve them. Publishers will happily pay you for the survey results before they send the prototype to the press.

Generating a random idea of what your freelance business is a great way to visualize yourself in action. Do not worry about the details because a lot of these will change over time as you become more confident about your goal and vision. As you dedicate more energy and focus to your God-given skills, specialized knowledge, and passionate interest, the more you can propel your career to success.
Lesson 2 of our Freelance Career Guide is all about identifying your NETWORK. Network is also known as our "Market" or "Prospective Client".

You can not even begin to think about "building your network" if you have not clearly identified the S-K-I-N as a whole. If this is the case, you need to review:

• Skill - God-given
• Knowledge - Specialized
• Interest - Passionate
• Network - Money-making

Your network is the list of people you can sell to (and if you are looking at multi-level network, then your network can be defined as the tiers of people you sell to).

The quality of your network reflects who you are. If you sell "get-rich-no-work" business scheme then the network you will attract are those who want fast money without having to work. If you sell online casino membership, then you would attract the network who would rather invest their time on "luck" rather than "hard work". There is no"right" and "wrong" network. It is just a matter of choice.

You can build your N by first announcing and advertising your S-K-I. The fastest way to do this is by starting a blog. It may sound weird at this point but a well-visited blog is the easiest strategy and most economical venue to showcase your skill, knowledge, and interest worldwide. Only then, you can attract like-minded people, build relationship and trust over a short period of time, and eventually convert your S-K-I-N to a sales machine. In the following lessons of Phase 2, we will discuss in detail the ways to build your network based on your business plan. For now, let us focus on finalizing Phase 1.

Let us pick-up our sample scenario from Lesson 1 to give you an idea:

• God-given SKILL is "writing"
• Specialized KNOWLEDGE is "preparing salad recipes"
• Passionate INTEREST is "growing vegetables from the backyard"
• Money-making NETWORK is a list of buyers interested in salad recipes, salad dressing concoctions, spices, organic fertilizers, gardening tools, and other products related to your knowledge and passionate interest.

Random idea for the business plan:

You can blog about your daily thoughts on growing vegetables from the backyard. Talk about preparing the soil, which crops grow under the shade or sunlight, etc. Describe the tools you use. Excite the readers by showing videos. Solicit sponsorship from possible advertisers. Make an eBook on "Salad Recipes - Fresh from the Garden". Place brand ads of olive oil, vinegar, mayonnaise, concoctions, etc. On the eBook and distribute for free when they subscribe to your blog. Look for other products to sell. Create an e-commerce catalogue.

Now, you may say, "but where will I get the products to sell?" Do not worry, we will go through all the important aspects, step-by-step in Phase 2 of our Freelance Career Guide.
Take a moment to study your S-K-I-N conclusion. Are you happy with it? Can you visualize the big picture and feel the excitement of the random business idea? If you feel inspired by your S-K-I-N, then you must be gearing for the right direction.

You need to be very certain about your S-K-I-N because all your future undertakings will depend on them. Any slight changes can affect the total business perspective. As much as we are leveraging on your strengths and assets, you also need to keep in mind the personal weakness that you need to work on or work around with. Working on your own can lead to crazy, lazy work habits that you would never get away with if you are employed. Remember, you need to be making money every single day.

Take your time to assess yourself before proceeding to Phase 2. Take your time - as much as your personal resources can accommodate. Take up short courses, accept freelance jobs, join hobby clubs, forums, workshops, and seminars.

Continue to maintain a blog to get used to writing down your thoughts. You will also get comments that may inspire you to write more. By the time you are ready to work on your own plan, you would have improved your communication skills - an essential tool for success.

Close your eyes. Imagine that the current date is five years from now. Where do you want to be? Will you be running a job or business that hasn't increased significantly in size? Will you command a rapidly growing network? Will you continue to expand the opportunities or would you have already cashed out and be relaxing and enjoying your hard-won gains?

Answering these questions is the first step in building a successful career plan. In fact, without knowing where you are going, it's not really possible to plan at all.

Why should you freelance on God-given skill?

My answer is simple: God-given skill is something that you possess no matter what happens. More importantly, it is yours freely without having to ask for it. There must be a very good reason why YOU and not everyone else in this world were given the privilege of having this particular gift. It is entirely up to you to figure out how to make good use of it.

It is both logical and practical to plan any career with that in mind. Doing freelance can get lonely at one point. Work buddies can come and go, projects can go wrong, release of fees can get delayed, your business can collapse overnight - a lot can happen that could discourage and confuse you. And when you do not have friends, money, or anything else to hold on to, you can always pick up on your God-given skill because it is truly yours free. A career charted by God-given skill can reward you a profession built on solid ground - no matter how many times you fall.

Career Choices - 4 Steps to a Fulfilling Career

By Lisa McGrimmon


Understanding how to make smart career choices is a life skill that everyone needs. The decisions you make about your career have a profound effect on every aspect of your life. The more good knowledge and resources you have to make informed decisions, the more control you'll have over your career and your future.

Unfortunately, plenty of people believe that career choice is a one time event that happens naturally, without a lot of thought, some time in early adulthood when you're about to leave high school or apply to post secondary programs. Smart career management actually happens across your lifetime, and we continue to make consequential career choices over the years.

Whether you are looking for a new job, aiming to take the next step in your current job, completely changing your career or planning your retirement options, you are making career choices, and using good resources and the guidance of a career counselor can help you to make those decisions well.

So often when people find themselves at a career crossroads, the first thing they do is jump right in and create a new resume without putting any thought into what their next steps should be. Smart career management and job search is about so much more than writing a great resume. If you take the time to learn about, think though and act on the four main areas of career management, you will be rewarded throughout your career.

1. Understand Yourself

Your interests, abilities, values and personal needs and realities should all be taken into account in any career decision making process. You spend hours at work, and it impacts your life in many ways. It makes sense that you should be fully informed and aware of your personal needs, strengths and possible challenges before making such profound decisions.

2. Understand Your Options

Do you know how many different career choices are available to you? Both The Dictionary of Occupational Titles (American) and The National Occupational Classification (Canadian) list well over 20,000 different job titles. Unless you have actively explored a variety of career choices, there is a very good chance that there are great career options available to you, and you don't even realize they exist.

3. Connect Your Information

Match your self knowledge with your understanding of the labor market and possible career options. Once you have developed a good understanding of yourself, you will be able to combine that self knowledge with your career and labor market research to determine potential career choices that are a great fit for your strengths, preferences and personal needs and goals.

4. Make it Happen

Finally, now is the time to start applying all of your job search strategies. You actually don't get to the resume writing stage until step four. When you have made a well informed career choice, then you're ready to make it happen. Making use of good career guidance and resources will help you to acquire the education, skills and experience needed to get the job and learn and implement effective job search strategies.

Avoid taking the "ready, fire, aim" approach to making career choices and job searching. Time spent understanding your needs, researching your career options and developing outstanding job search skills, guided by great career resources, is a powerful investment in your future.

Career Choices - How to Choose Your Ideal Career

By Lisa McGrimmon

A big part of making smart career choices and gaining control over your career lies in understanding yourself. That means having a good sense of how your personality, abilities, and values work together to impact the type of career that is ideal for you.

Career and Personality Match

Ensuring a good career and personality match is an important step in building a satisfying and fruitful career, while a poor career and personality match can hold you back in your career success and happiness.

Imagine the difference between a sales professional who is extroverted and agreeable and one who is introverted and indifferent. Sales jobs tend to require an extroverted, agreeable personality profile, so that person would be more inclined to be a top performer on his or her team and truly enjoy the work. On the other hand, the introverted and indifferent individual would more likely struggle with inferior job performance, job dissatisfaction and possibly even career burnout.

A simple and effective strategy for understanding the ways your career choices and personality interact is through a valid personality assessment. Unlike simplistic, just-for-fun tests you may see in popular magazines, valid personality assessments are developed through vast amounts of objective scientific testing and volumes of psychological research to ensure they are a truly accurate measure of your personality and career options.

Match Your Career Choices with Your Natural Talents

An aptitude test can be used to assess your capacity to learn a variety of different skills. It can help you to understand the types of skills that you will likely learn easily and those that will be more challenging for you to learn.

Depending on the test that is used, aptitude tests can be used to assess everything from spatial perception to verbal ability to finger and manual dexterity. Most commonly, aptitude tests are used to assess general learning ability (your overall ability to learn and understand), verbal ability (language) and numerical ability (math).

A career aptitude test does not rely on skills that you have learned in the past. Although skills and aptitudes are related, your skills are things you have learned to do in the past. Your aptitudes are things that you have the ability to learn. So, even if you have not studied math at an advanced level, an aptitude test could still predict that you have the ability to learn math without undue difficulty.

Like interest tests, good aptitude assessments are developed using extensive objective scientific testing and research. A valid career assessment can provide useful information if you are considering training for a new career. The test will help to show areas of strength and forewarn you of areas where learning new skills may be more challenging.

If you do decide to take a career assessment test, it can help you to build a career around your strengths. You will understand yourself better, and be able to work with, promote and feel confident about your strengths.

Match Your Career Choices with Your Values

Matching values and career choices is an often overlooked aspect of career planning. Considering that the leading cause of job burnout is a mismatch between your personal values and the realities of your job, it's important to assess your values and the ways they will be expressed in your career decisions.

It can be easy to slip into pursuing career rewards that do not fit with your own value system. Society tells us to value prestige, power and a high income. If those career accomplishments are within your own personal set of values, then pursuing those things will likely contribute to your happiness and career satisfaction.

However, if you value family friendly flexibility in your work schedule, creativity and helping others, then you'll find more career satisfaction in pursuing those career goals. That doesn't mean that you're destined to be unhappy in a high paying job if high income is not one of your core values. However, it does mean that if earning a high income is not one of your primary values, that income will not make up for the shortcomings a job that goes against your own personal values.

If you decide you use a values inventory test to help you think through your important work values, keep in mind that, unlike interest and aptitude assessments, a values inventory is not a formal tool that has been validated through objective research. However, a values inventory is a great brainstorming tool to help you to assess things that motivate you and your needs as they are related to your career choices.

Often people struggle to state what they want out of their work (beyond an income), so a values inventory can help by prompting you to think through many possible work related values.

As you make your career decisions, keep in mind that some factors affect career choice in ways that are profound, but not immediately obvious. Matching your career choices and your personality, aptitudes and values is a smart step towards your career success and satisfaction.

A Positive Approach to Redundancy

The current economic environment is a tough one to navigate through, with cuts seen in public funding, the double dip of recession affecting many private companies across the sectors, and a high level of unemployment hanging over the country. For many, this means having to face the prospects of redundancy. Everyone is affected differently by redundancy. For many people it can be highly traumatic, but as with most things in life; there are two ways to try and look at redundancy if the situation arises for you; see it as a case of victimisation or take it as an opportunity to re-evaluate your career.
Even the most positive individual will feel some form of denial, anger and loss of confidence if they find themselves facing redundancy. This is perfectly naturally. But after a period of feeling low, try to regain some focus and work towards seeing this as 'an opportunity to re-evaluate your career path'. Here are some top tips:
- Treat your new job search as a project - it will require that much full time dedication anyway!
- Draw up a plan of action; include important actions that need to take place, review dates, and an anticipated 'end date' for the project.
- Take stock of the resources that are available to you, and use them as much as you can. Do you have access to an outplacement scheme? Fantastic! Engage with it early. Is it worth investing in a career coach? Think about each of the resource options available to you, even if you just dismiss them all at least they have been considered.
- Review your finances. Think about what you 'need' to earn as oppose to what you were earning. This can make you re-assess your priorities, values and even your preferred career path.
- Try not to just take up the first role that you are offered, 'just because' you are happy to have been offered something, to feel valued and to have a sense of security again. As Steve Preston says, "if you plan your campaign right, you will get offers of jobs you really want or you may decide to set up your own business or develop a portfolio career."
- Think outside the box when it comes to sourcing job vacancies. Don't just use publications, job websites and agencies; also try online and offline networking.
- Think about the individuals you have around you, and use them to as a support network; after all they will only want the best for you so surround yourself with their positive vibes, knowledge and experiences.
Above all, keep focused and motivated and learn to overcome knock backs. Good luck.
By Josie Kehoe

Five Career Decision Making Secrets

We live in a black and white, yes or no society. Often when faced with a big career decision, that built-in bias causes us to stop at two either or options. That's a mistake.
Hindsight proves that there are often multiple options available to us and just by looking at your career change in different ways and from different approaches you'll see more of those options.
Here are five decision-making secrets that will help you to see your optimum choices in foresight rather than until it's too late.
1). You know far more than you think you do.
You've been recording observations subconsciously for your entire life. You've taken in and retained much more than you think you have. You're also connected to all the wisdom in the universe. So, you often don't need more analysis or research. You do need to pull everything together that you already know and make your best decision possible from where you are with what you have.
2). Readiness to act on a new direction is more based on the existence of confident feelings than on any group of facts.
Where does confidence come from? It comes from remembering your competent experiences. Let go of your career change mistakes and look at your accomplishments. They will put you in a much more confident and hopeful frame of mind. Examine all of your options from that frame of mind.
3). Engagement clarifies. Action intensifies clarity.
By choosing your best bet and getting into action you can't go wrong. Perspective is enhanced via movement. Often you won't see your best career options until you take a couple of small steps forward. Look for ways to do that without fully committing to a new direction.
4). Write down multiple options and sleep on them.
When we live with a good question even for 24 hours our n mind seeks a solution. Often by coming back the next days and asking these questions you'll see what you couldn't see the day before. What am I missing? What else? How would a genius arrive at the optimum choice?

5). Decide on the day and time that you will commit to one option.
It's not decision- making that bothers you and causes distress but the lack of making decisions. All unmade decisions eat away at your sense of self-respect and drain your energy. By setting a firm decision date and following through, you will make the decisions and increase your feeling of competency.
ANY decision that you can see in hindsight was there and available for you to see in foresight and you'll increase the probability of seeing it by expanding your options to at least five viable options before you make the decision.
Actively use these secrets to increase the probability of making the right decision for you, the first time.
But also know this. Making decision-making mistakes is a normal part of the self-actualization process, the business building process and yes of the career decision process.
It's actually valuable to recognize our mistakes. Without mistakes we would have nothing from which to adjust and make follow-up decisions. It really is all good and by deciding and acting frequently you'll get better and better at doing what's right for you.
By Tom Volkar 

Determination Makes the Difference in Personal Development

Today I want to focus on the role determination plays in your personal development. There are many factors to being successful as you well know, but determination is one of those difference makers (one of those elements that distinguishes those who succeed from those who fail).
Have you ever put together a particularly challenging puzzle? One with a thousand or more pieces that took many hours and several days to complete? One that you wanted to keep together once it was finished?
I can remember working on a few puzzles like that with my wife and children. At the time I don't think I realized the connection to personal development, but now I do.
When the puzzles were finished we would leave them out on the table for a few weeks so we could admire our handiwork each time we passed by. Sometimes we discovered there were pieces or whole sections of pieces mysteriously out of place (possibly moved by our curious cat, or one of the kids). After a few careful reconstructions we would decide it was time to glue the puzzle onto some cardboard to make sure the pieces would stay in place.
Well, working to achieve a goal is kind of like putting together one of those puzzles. Whether it's working on a degree, setting out on a new career path, improving a relationship, building a business, losing weight, or training for an ironman, it takes a lot of hard work and time to make all the pieces fit. Once you're well on your way to achieving the goal, it's nice to step back and admire your handiwork and feel proud of yourself. But then, as time goes by, some of the pieces get out of place, and some can go missing completely, resulting in more time and effort picking up those pieces and making them fit once again.
Determination is the glue that holds the pieces of your puzzle together. Determination is what keeps you in the action mode, consistently doing the tedious, unpleasant or difficult, daily tasks that move you closer and closer to the achievement of your goals. Webster defines Determination as "the act of coming to a decision" and a "firm or fixed purpose".
When you put your pieces together, if you want them to stay there, you'll need to add the glue. Make a decision to secure those pieces together permanently. Fix your purpose and remain in the action taking mode. Determination is a difference maker - let it make a difference in your personal development
George Morse

What Are You Worth? Career Salaries Determining Your Worth

Have you ever tried asking your employer how much you are worth? They would most likely say '50k' or '70k' or '150k'. They are telling you you are worth what they are willing to pay you. Do you feel like you are worth more? Of course - it's because you value your time greatly. And you should. Time is all we have, and before you know it, it is all gone.
Your employer is determining your worth - but is this right?
Should you be basing your worth on what other people are willing to pay you? Should your time be worth your career salaries?
The answer is no - you are worth what you think you are worth. But what does this mean? It means that if you think your time is too important to be sweating the small stuff - it is. Every time you have missed an event because you were working your day job, or you have looked out the window and realized that time is marching on - and you are still trying to schedule time in to smell the roses - you need to value your time more.
But is it that easy?
No - you need to learn to value your time. You have to work out how much you need to earn to live, and then spend the rest of the time doing the things that you want! Your career salaries may be a status symbol, but all you really need is money to live - and then the freedom to live!
You need to pay yourself a wage - pay yourself to live! You ask any small business owner, any person who works from home. They will tell you that the benefit for them is that they own their own time. They have the freedom to live and do what they want to. They get paid any amount they earn - rather than what other people tell them they are worth. They decide their own career salaries!
In 2010, people are not choosing the traditional route - in fact it is only one route of many! Choosing to work from home enables you to live each day - enjoy the sunshine and feel like you have really lived!
Choose you as the number one person in your life - and determine your own worth.
Clare Sharples