[HN Gopher] I don't want to grow my freelance design studio into...
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I don't want to grow my freelance design studio into an agency
Author : taubek
Score : 309 points
Date : 2023-09-03 15:16 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (neladunato.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (neladunato.com)
| swayvil wrote:
| Tight logos. Nice work.
|
| Yes, respect your process first. Clearly.
|
| All dreams of growth are insubstantial, comparatively.
| iLoveOncall wrote:
| > I work for a couple of hours and then make lunch. Depending on
| my workload, I may go back to my office and keep working for
| another couple of hours in the afternoon, or take the afternoon
| off.
|
| It's hard to get engaged in a post when it follows the TikTok
| trend of sharing a totally fabricated story that doesn't
| represent any reality.
| Zetobal wrote:
| I do basically the same sometimes I have days were I don't work
| at all. You don't have to hustle your whole life away if you
| don't want to.
| matkoniecz wrote:
| That is not unusual for freelancing.
| ncallaway wrote:
| The company I run asks employees to work 20 hours per week.
|
| Just because something isn't the norm doesn't mean it's
| fabricated.
| HtmlProgrammer wrote:
| I do this as a remote 9 to 5 dev, you just need to be
| delivering and not tell people how much free time you have
| jokethrowaway wrote:
| I think it's a perfectly valid choice but I don't think it's
| quite as binary as the author puts it.
|
| I've been in agencies, in bloated product companies and they were
| all terrible experiences.
|
| I did some freelancing and enjoyed it, but I could make
| significantly more money with less effort contracting. I liked my
| solo contracting days albeit they quickly resembled little
| employments.
|
| But when I run my own company or when I worked in some startups
| with enlightened leadership, it was great.
|
| I think you can absolutely create an agency (or a product
| company) where a work pattern like yours is acceptable and where
| people can work flexibly and be happy about it. I used to work in
| one of the few remote first company before COVID and everyone
| loved working there because of it. Async as much as possible is
| crucial.
|
| If you're worried about people not putting their 100% because
| they're employed and not making more money the more value gets
| created, you can setup a structure with low base pay + amazing
| bonus on success and you can get the same incentive (and risk)
| you have in your solo work - but with friends and scaling up your
| business into something that can make more money.
|
| It's easier to have large margin as an agency than as a solo
| grifter.
| mettamage wrote:
| > Realizing that I don't have to work 8 hours every day was
| pretty groundbreaking. I still get work done, and have lots of
| personal time. I do occasionally take on an ambitious project and
| work overtime for a few weeks, but then I try to balance it with
| more rest so I don't burn out.
|
| Wait, how do you get to not working 8 hours per day?
| k8sToGo wrote:
| I would love to try out being an independent contractor. But I
| feel overwhelmed. Where do I even start to find work?
| towawy wrote:
| Reach out to other contractors who you've worked with directly
| (e.g. worked on the same project at a former employer) and
| valued/praised your work.
| Nextgrid wrote:
| A starting point could be to target contractor positions posted
| by companies and/or recruitment agencies. Those are sometimes
| really close to permanent employment (except the job security
| and employee-specific perks) but will at least get you started
| in the game.
|
| Be mindful of laws around disguised employment with those types
| of engagements. You need to make sure you are in the clear
| legally by paying the appropriate amount of tax for your given
| situation (in the UK the regulation is called "IR35" and tries
| to specify what falls under a legitimate B2B arrangement and
| what counts as "disguised employment" and incurs taxation
| equivalent to conventional employment).
| tennisflyi wrote:
| I have a similar vision. I want to hire _one_ person and pay them
| well. Culture will definitely be very easy to maintain. I only
| want to net like $20k /month.
| jimkleiber wrote:
| > Show other people that a different way of life is possible.
|
| Often I'll question the ab-normal ways I've been choosing to live
| my life and I loved how the author summarized one major benefit
| for doing so.
| wslh wrote:
| I sympathize with the sentiment of working on your own way
| instead of following the growth, or others mantra.
|
| But I think Nela should also understand that she is an outlier
| deciding to work ALONE: what happens when someone decides to have
| children? Do a single person has the skills to manage the
| complexities of a business? Be ready all the time? I don't
| underestimate Nela skills, just saying, again, she is an outlier
| and should balance her own mantra.
| matkoniecz wrote:
| > she is an outlier and should balance her own mantra.
|
| Maybe I missed something but she nowhere claimed that everyone
| should work in this way.
|
| > what happens when someone decides to have children? Do a
| single person has the skills to manage the complexities of a
| business? Be ready all the time?
|
| None of that would be solved by transitioning into agency.
| manicennui wrote:
| How is a useful thing to write? All advice is circumstantial.
| There is no reason to apologize for nor temper one's opinion
| because it doesn't apply to everyone.
| LapsangGuzzler wrote:
| Her arrangement gives her the freedom to make all of these
| decisions, which is the way it should be.
| thecupisblue wrote:
| Why wouldn't they? While sometimes it takes more time than a
| normal job would, it also offers a larger amount of freedom
| than a 9-5. And if you have a great reputation and a constant
| stream of clients, it is even better since you can pick
| projects and decide when to do them and in what manner.
|
| On another note, Nela is quite an outlier! I've been following
| her work for close to 20 years now I think, starting from her
| HTML&CSS tutorials long time ago. Her blog was basically CSS
| Zen Garden for my generation, teaching us how to achieve
| beautiful things with HTML&CSS back in the age of Dreamweaver,
| inspiring many future developers and designers. She gave so
| much to the community through the years with her knowledge
| sharing that it still inspires me and motivates me to this day
| to share more. Nela, if you're reading this, thanks for all the
| great work!
| wslh wrote:
| My criticism is about not taking this as general advice.
|
| > And if you have a great reputation and a constant stream of
| clients
|
| If you have a great reputation and a constant stream of
| clients that is sustainable for decades you are an outlier.
| thecupisblue wrote:
| It's not a prerequisite tho - I've arranged with multiple
| clients to work either 3 days a week or just a set amount
| of hours whenever I choose. And most of others I know who
| get into freelancing do the same - if you have offer for
| another project, and they can't wait until you're free, you
| can always recommend them to a friend/colleague.
| pictur wrote:
| It's funny how people take what they do so seriously. This is all
| about a decision. It's weird to write a long article about it and
| try to explain it.
| tekla wrote:
| Main character syndrome.
| SCUSKU wrote:
| Respectfully, it is her livelihood, so it has a meaningful
| impact on her life. Also, you can just not read it if you
| dislike it.
| pictur wrote:
| I found it funny that the situation was romanticized.
| system2 wrote:
| She might be a beginner and excited about proving herself
| to the world by writing and feeling serious about it. Who
| knows. Some people write, some people don't. She just
| discovered what 99% of the freelancers feel already but 99%
| didn't write about it. Just another blog post.
| [deleted]
| mattgreenrocks wrote:
| I found it extremely refreshing to read about someone who
| defied the corporate-centric work model and came out ahead in
| both time and money.
|
| Is that not interesting to you?
| pxue wrote:
| You'll be surprised by how many people want what she have.
| louwrentius wrote:
| > I just have a low tolerance for capitalist pressure and
| workaholism, because I was born with a brain that can't thrive in
| that environment.
|
| She's far from alone and for no other reason than my seething
| hatred of capitalism, I believe it's true for most people.
| xupybd wrote:
| I suspect I have a different understanding of capitalism. To me
| it simply means free markets. Something the author is taking
| advantage of to build the life she wants. But she seems to
| dislike the hustle culture that has formed within our current
| economic system.
| xwdv wrote:
| Can someone explain what the appeal of solo freelancing is in the
| age of bountiful remote work?
|
| My typical day as a remote worker is not that different from the
| one described: a couple hours of work per day and mostly leisure
| the rest of the time. And I probably still make more money than a
| freelancer. Consistently too. Is chasing down new clients all the
| time and working on multiple projects really that desirable to
| people? I think this article is just cope.
| hattmall wrote:
| You're more easily replaceable as a remote worker, you're also
| dependent on the whims of your employer. It's easier and more
| beneficial to develop the skill of chasing down clients vs
| chasing down jobs in a remote work environment. You also don't
| have any options for residuals and your working largely to pad
| someone else's pocket and not your own.
| matkoniecz wrote:
| > Can someone explain what the appeal of solo freelancing is in
| the age of bountiful remote work?
|
| For start, remote work is not so bountiful.
|
| At least it is pretty hard to find companies paying around
| UK/USA salary to people employed in Poland.
|
| In my solo freelancing I charge a bit less than UK/USA salary,
| depending on who is hiring. So far all companies refused such
| salary and wanted to pay at most 200% of typical local salary.
|
| Also
|
| > I work for a couple of hours and then make lunch. Depending
| on my workload, I may go back to my office and keep working for
| another couple of hours in the afternoon, or take the afternoon
| off.
|
| can be done without deception/lying/swindling.
| devjab wrote:
| Unless you're ridiculously well paid I think you're
| considerably underestimating what many independent contractors
| end up earning.
|
| I can only speak about my anecdotal network but everyone that I
| know who went the independent contractor road is making around
| a million or more a year. They didn't start out like that, and
| I'm not sure how easy the road would be in the current economy,
| but the people who started out 10-15 years ago have it made for
| them. They did work a lot more than us who went into the
| corporate mill, but they are frankly going to "win" anyway
| considering some of them are basically set for retirement at
| age 40-45.
| doctorhandshake wrote:
| What industry is this where all of the ICs you know are
| making a million or more?
| satvikpendem wrote:
| Likely niche consulting and implementation on unique or
| domain-specialized knowledge. While I've made a few hundred
| k off React and Node work, the people I know who make the
| big bucks are experts in a particular field.
| sidlls wrote:
| This is similar to the FAANG salary phenomenon: for every
| individual contractor pulling $1MM in annual revenue, there
| are thousands who might barely be making minimum wage when
| expenses are factored in. Very few independent contractors
| end up earning enough to equal full-time employment doing
| similar work.
| capableweb wrote:
| Biggest difference is that you get to 100% chose exactly what
| you want to work on, and all the profits generated by the work
| goes to you. You're not beholden to anyone but yourself.
|
| > Is chasing down new clients all the time and working on
| multiple projects really that desirable to people?
|
| Chasing down new clients is probably a thing mostly affecting
| new freelancers without much experience. When I've done
| freelancing in the past, I've never had to look for any clients
| besides posting "I'm available to help out people on a
| freelance-basis" on various social media, and then I get more
| work available to me than I could realistically do.
|
| I think most established freelancers "suffer" from the same.
| Once you're available for work, it fills up quickly.
| nickjj wrote:
| > Can someone explain what the appeal of solo freelancing is in
| the age of bountiful remote work?
|
| Income multipliers, flexibility and being treated like an adult
| are a few reasons that come to mind.
|
| For example, with salaried work your income is mostly fixed
| (minus a pre-defined'ish bonus or options, etc.). With contract
| work you might land a $30,000 contract that takes 2 weeks to do
| because the focus is on providing value that allows your client
| to 5x that in a few months so it's a no brainer. This is
| different than salaried work where you're expected to be
| available for 40-45 hours a week.
|
| You may decide to spend a year traveling the world while
| maintaining existing work and working whenever you feel like
| it. As a salaried worker I don't think you'll be able to work a
| few hours a week for 6-12 months in a row and still be employed
| unless you had an exceptional situation.
|
| With a number of salaried positions, especially with companies
| that receive funding or are growing a bit past early startup
| stages you often lose all freedom to make decisions that you're
| qualified to make. Such as having to ask permission from
| multiple people to store $0.01 / month worth of files in an S3
| bucket where the discussion to get this approval literally
| costs 10,000x to 20,000x more in engineering time.
| manicennui wrote:
| We can all admit that here anonymously, but how would your
| employer feel if they knew this?
| ozim wrote:
| For me it is mostly freedom. Employment contracts usually go
| into "all your code belongs to us", "we own every piece of
| thought you ever had", "if you want to make PR to a project you
| like first write an email to your manager with approval, then
| you have to forward approval to owner of project".
|
| If I want to make a side project I don't have to worry there
| will be any issue with copyright or god knows what. Because I
| am my own company and single customer cannot include in
| contract that I cannot do any other work.
| zerr wrote:
| Nbr of digits in the hourly rate? Remote work is usually two
| digits number while freelancing on short term projects would be
| at least three digits.
| bombcar wrote:
| Agencies charge like a very good contractor but use midrange to
| lousy contractors/employees to do most of the work, and bring the
| good ones in only in need.
|
| It's selling the difference between the two.
| freitzkriesler2 wrote:
| One guy I worked with spent a lot of effort evaluating
| Ukrainian and south American talent who had fluent or at least
| business level English.
|
| It took him awhile but the devs he fed work to were solid
| engineers, almost FAANG tier but he paid them s*t or good for
| their locations. I've kept their names handy because poaching
| them would be dirt easy.
|
| Knowing this as well as what you said, I avoid agencies now and
| simply assemble teams of individuals for this reason alone.
| They're easier to evaluate and you can let them go easily as
| opposed to a full service agency.
|
| However, what annoys me the most about Upwork are agencies
| larping as solo guys. Anytime I evaluate a guy who has a solo
| freelancer account and then mentions he has guys he works with
| that bill through him, I cut them lose. This is easy to spot. I
| wish uowork would ban these guys.
| pmontra wrote:
| I'm a solo freelancer and I happened to get contracts that
| needed more than one person to work on. Sometimes the
| customer paid everybody separately, sometimes they paid me
| and I paid the others.
| rcarr wrote:
| > However, what annoys me the most about Upwork are agencies
| larping as solo guys. Anytime I evaluate a guy who has a solo
| freelancer account and then mentions he has guys he works
| with that bill through him, I cut them lose.
|
| In the UK, you need to collect evidence that you are a
| contractor and not an employee of a company. One of the ways
| you can do this is by hiring people to do some or all of the
| contracted work on your behalf. It might be unlikely given it
| is Upwork, but if those freelancers are repeatedly doing big
| or long jobs for the same client(s) then this may be a
| legitimate tactic to avoid falling foul of the taxman.
| spyke112 wrote:
| It's the same in Denmark. It's really annoying because
| companies will not commit to top tier salary, but are happy
| to pay for a freelancer. I guess it's hard for middle
| managers to hire engineers that should paid a lot more than
| them. The result is that all the FTEs are mediocre, and
| freelancers are where the talent are.
| Aurornis wrote:
| Respectable move. My primary complaint with solo-turned-agency
| people is how grifty they get.
|
| As a solo, the job is to add value and make the customer happy so
| you build your reputation. There are definitely solo contractor
| grifters out there but they usually struggle with the reputation
| issue.
|
| Agencies develop a grifty dynamic where they realize that their
| job is to sell themselves and as many headcount and hours as they
| can squeeze into a contract. Now instead of hiring that solo dev,
| they're forcing you to pay 20 hours/week to the project manager
| and to have two devs minimum on it, one or more of whom are
| complete juniors who will spend incredible amounts of hours
| solving simple problems, but that's okay because that's what they
| want.
|
| Agencies rely on their status and size to impress clients, which
| short circuits the reputation issue and opens the door to these
| shenanigans. They also target bigger companies where wasting time
| and moving slowly might be the norm, or at least something they
| can gloss over by sending the sales people out to schmooze the
| execs over dinner again.
|
| I knew some excellent devs and infosec people who turned into
| agency operators who just tried to milk companies for contracts
| and run a revolving door of junior hires who they can squeeze
| hours from until they quit. It's sad to see.
|
| To be fair, I know a few good agencies as well. They tend to be
| in such high demand from reputation that they're always booked
| without even trying. It takes a long, long time to get there
| though.
| 93po wrote:
| I've unfortunately done studio/agency work my entire career and
| they've all been pretty small (around four devs) until my last
| employer, which was closer to 70 people and exactly what you
| described. It's like you were describing them specifically. I
| left that job because it ran the capable people ragged and also
| generally felt dishonest to our clients despite financial
| transparency being one of the biggest public selling points
| grecy wrote:
| This resonates 100% with my experience.
|
| Telco I worked at spent 6 months choosing an agency, end up
| spending 3 million for what turned out to be a new Color scheme
| on the public website. Mind blowing, but completely normal for
| them
| dmje wrote:
| 12 years into running a tiny digital consultancy with my wife.
| We've used an "associate" model for all that time - a posh way of
| saying "a network of trusted freelancers".
|
| We've deliberately chosen not to take on staff. We could have
| grown at many points along the way but haven't wanted to. Instead
| we've stayed small, focused and profitable.
|
| The benefits to growing would have been being able to take on
| bigger gigs, but we have always aimed for family first. The
| business has always been a means to a sustainable, balanced and
| loving family - and not an end.
|
| I have friends who have taken the growth route. Some are doing
| ok. Others are desperately stressed. One has split from his wife
| in part because of the financial burden of maintaining a 5-10
| person team.
|
| We've never regretted taking the route we have. We have been here
| for our kids and we've been able to be flexible with our time in
| large part because we're able to scale our own work up and down
| in response to changing times without having to worry about
| paying salaries.
| matthewcford wrote:
| I've run a 15-person agency for 14 years (bootstrapping), and
| the stress can't be underestimated.
|
| I know plenty of agencies who have either switched to products
| or just sold up / closed.
|
| Using associates is a good option if you have a good network,
| however, it can be just as stressful if they don't deliver.
| devoutsalsa wrote:
| I had 15 people, including myself, at one point. I wasn't
| terribly good at marketing, and all of our business was word
| of mouth in a cyclical industry. It was always stressful to
| not know where future business was coming from, and the
| overhead meant I often kept less, rarely more, than I would
| have by just remaining a solo entrepreneur.
| j45 wrote:
| Paying wages can be a less well known side of wage slavery.
|
| An associate model is great, allows everyone flexibility and
| participate in killing what they eat along and together
| gochi wrote:
| Whatever the choice, it has to be deliberate. So many are
| people pleasers in disguise. They grow not because they
| actively choose, but because they can't say no. It causes that
| desperately stressed life when you're not active about these
| choices and boundaries. They're always in survival mode,
| chasing more more more, without ever being deliberate and
| reflective about their actions.
|
| It winds up being the end of a lot of businesses, whether or
| not they actually did grow. They took on a contract that was
| just too big for them, despite their intuition telling them not
| to. Or they hired too many people despite not wanting to but
| was talked into it by a friend.
|
| So good on you for knowing what you want and being deliberate
| about it! You and your wife have avoided a lifetime of stress
| by doing so!
| idopmstuff wrote:
| The biggest advantage to owning your business is that you can
| optimize it solely for what's best for you. If growth is all
| you care about, go nuts, but if you've got it humming along
| making decent money with just the right amount of work, there's
| zero pressure to change it.
|
| I think a lot of people forget that and think that they need to
| push to be more "successful" - kudos to you for doing in the
| right way for you.
| abraae wrote:
| > The biggest advantage to owning your business is that you
| can optimize it solely for what's best for you.
|
| Another great advantage is being able to fire bad clients.
|
| It's not something I've done more than once or twice but the
| freedom not to be brought down or stressed by someone else's
| insane demands is worth gold.
|
| Related is the ability to pick and choose your clients in the
| sales process. e.g. plenty of small consultancies have formal
| or informal policies not to bid for government work because
| of the effort and frustration involved in responding to
| public sector RFPs.
| boredemployee wrote:
| Had a similar experience for 6 years. But the downside of not
| being big is that your business can die in big crisis , as
| happened to mine when covid started.
| ilamont wrote:
| _For years I've felt "weird" and "wrong" for working this way._
|
| I still feel guilty when telling people that I am only open for
| meetings from 11 am to 5 pm. The only exceptions are people in
| distant time zones.
|
| It can also feel wrong if your SO is on a regular 9 to 5 and you
| are getting up without an alarm clock, going shopping and making
| appointments in the middle of the day, and generally setting your
| own work habits according to your own preferences. Last night I
| was working at 1 am because I couldn't sleep and there was
| something I wanted to get done.
|
| OTOH, she never has to go food shopping and I have always been
| there for the kids in ways that are not possible for her - helped
| my adult child load and unload a moving truck last Wednesday
| afternoon, and over the years took both kids to school
| activities, driving lessons, and other events that my spouse
| couldn't attend.
| Kaibeezy wrote:
| "Tiny unicorn" is what I call this kind of business. I've been
| working like that for 30+ years. Avoid failure to the left of
| you, greed to the right. It's a strait, narrow, rocky and easy-
| to-lose path. A constant onslaught of people and chaos trying
| to push, pull, trick, trip, invest and otherwise knock you off
| it. Stay on target and you get to be... yourself.
| pxue wrote:
| As a solo dev contractor who got my business to $500k/year during
| the pandemic - I echo a lot of the sentiment in this post.
|
| An extension to the post I want to touch on is that VC funded
| startups are not the only way to break free from the dreadful
| corporate games.
|
| Working for yourself at your own pace is.
|
| As an industry we're surprisingly very behind in normalizing
| this.
| LapsangGuzzler wrote:
| > As an industry we're surprisingly very behind in normalizing
| this.
|
| Given the fight we've seen over WFH, I'm very inclined to
| believe that this is intentional by the industry. By focusing
| on paying top dollar for FTEs and demanding incredible amounts
| of time and energy from them, companies maintain a level of
| control that they wouldn't have by working with a fractional
| engineering team.
| manicennui wrote:
| I find it humorous that anyone thinks they are capable of
| forcing talented people to do more than they want. Most of
| the people who feel pressure to make their corporate masters
| as happy as possible are either desperate or barely
| competent. All one must do is appear to be slightly better
| than all of the dead weight in the corporate world. No need
| to work hard.
|
| * I wanted to add that I am referring to software developers.
| Creative types like the author of this article are always
| shit upon by corporate types unfortunately
| beezlewax wrote:
| Maybe I'm doing it wrong but I feel I work harder than most
| people on my team. I always go for stories in areas that
| are more complex than the rest or areas that are new to me.
| I'm always trying to learn more to keep ahead of the rest.
|
| My performance reviews are always "exceeds expectations",
| but I haven't seen how this benefits anyone other than the
| company so far.
|
| Maybe I should just take it more easy but I feel like I'd
| float under the radar for possible promotion then.
| manicennui wrote:
| I think my employer is a bit unique. They don't have a
| lot of the problems that other companies have with long
| hours and asshole managers. I've gotten great reviews and
| bonuses for years and I've been promoted a number of
| times. Most of my value is in just making decisions for a
| bunch of indecisive people and having a deeper
| understanding of most things. They have pretty high
| turnover because no one cares about what the company does
| (lending), they aren't the highest paying employer for
| average employees, and the work isn't exciting. They put
| a lot more effort into retaining a small number of us.
| abduhl wrote:
| How many employees does your company have? Less than 50,
| ok maybe push the limit but honestly if it's more than 25
| people across the company your ability to get recognized
| is hamstrung by bureaucracy. Anything more than 25 people
| should honestly be met by "just good enough to be better
| than the other guys" and the realization that tenure and
| political pull, not talent, is rewarded.
|
| If you want to stand out then you need to go somewhere
| that you can.
| jokethrowaway wrote:
| Put that energy in side hustles / side projects, my
| friend.
|
| Or threaten to leave and get a real raise
| singpolyma3 wrote:
| Every exceeds expectations review that does not come with
| cash (or at _least_ stock) you need to ask why.
| cultofmetatron wrote:
| > Maybe I should just take it more easy but I feel like
| I'd float under the radar for possible promotion then.
|
| Few companies have sane compensation policies. by all
| means put in extra work when you have an opportunity to
| learn some new skill from it. but once you get to a pint
| where your skills are valuable, either jump ship to a
| another company that pays commisserate to your new skill
| level or start or join a startup where you get enough
| equity to eat at the adult's table when the ipo or
| acquisition happens
| candiddevmike wrote:
| Not to be discouraging, but promotions rarely go to top
| performers in the sense of what you're doing. They go to
| movers and shakers, folks with heavy soft skills who
| routinely interact with skip levels and the like. Their
| work output is marginal to the influence they command.
|
| Basically, you're most likely being taken advantage of
| and will never be properly rewarded for what you're
| doing, IME.
| itsoktocry wrote:
| Do you enjoy the work and feel fairly compensated? If so,
| carry on. Who cares what others are doing?
| gumballindie wrote:
| > Working for yourself at your own pace is. > As an industry
| we're surprisingly very behind in normalizing this.
|
| We are trying this but have you seen the constant media siege
| bombarding us with "studies" show remote work is bad for you?
| In the uk there are now articles saying that even hybrid is
| bad. We want to be more independent but we are not always
| allowed to. Tech is meant to be the easiest path to
| independence yet somehow its not. Wondering why.
| slau wrote:
| I haven't seen the studies you mention, but I wouldn't be
| entirely surprised if in a few years some of these studies
| are revealed to have had some bias due to being funded by
| commercial landlords.
| Aurornis wrote:
| Remote work is different from pace of work.
|
| Going remote shouldn't change the pace of worn. For some
| people, going remote causes their productivity to collapse
| (distractions, loneliness, feeling disconnected, less
| oversight) but those people should be managed individually.
|
| But being remote or in office shouldn't determine your pace
| of work.
| gumballindie wrote:
| It does change the pace of work, because suddenly there are
| fewer distractions so you can focus on doing actual work.
|
| As opposed to wasting time chatting or in useless meeting.
| That means you dont have to rush getting the actual work
| done.
|
| So yeah, it's a better, slower, calmer, well thought out,
| pace.
|
| It's you, the code, and the environment that makes you
| happy. Thats why working less results in more output,
| paradoxically.
| sjducb wrote:
| I'd love to know how you did this.
| pxue wrote:
| Reach out to me on twitter. Links in profile
| DeltaCoast wrote:
| Can I ask how you find contracts? Are there that many contract
| roles posted in public or is it due to your network?
| freitzkriesler2 wrote:
| Upwork. Solely up work.
| delfinom wrote:
| Wow, I tried upwork but it generally always seems to be
| entities in significantly cheaper countries underbidding
| everything.
|
| How did you get started to snap up your first jobs on it?
| frankreyes wrote:
| No idea on the specifics, but the theory goes like this :
| clients have been burned many times over cheap solutions.
| Cheaper is usually more expensive on the long run. For
| this to break the circle you need reputation of
| reliability.
| freitzkriesler2 wrote:
| I didn't nor do I use Upwork. I'm just saying what the
| reality is.
| bdcravens wrote:
| If you're in the US, restricting yourself to jobs where
| they are limiting to the US results lessens that problem
| (doesn't eliminate it - I suspect there's a ton of
| fronting accounts)
| jokethrowaway wrote:
| Upwork can work for very niche things as a extra channel.
| I've seen it work for people selling packages of "I'll fork
| bitcoin for you for 2k". For normal contracts it's
| terrible.
|
| I started on freelancer websites when I was 15 and it was
| nice to bag 20$ per hour plus extra if I happened to be
| faster.
|
| But the more experienced you get the more you can charge
| and use your network instead of cheap jobs on Upwork.
| ransom1538 wrote:
| If you are cool with $12 USD an hour: it is the place to
| be.
| bdcravens wrote:
| You can do "decent" rates in the US if you only look at
| gigs that are only looking at US contractors.
| pxue wrote:
| 100k:
|
| - network
|
| 200k:
|
| - high signaled / luke warm outbound on dev communities (YC
| work at a startup job board is one)
|
| - referrals
|
| 300k++:
|
| - dedicated outbound tech sale person
| mylons wrote:
| you hired a sales person? can you elaborate on that?
| pxue wrote:
| Yeah.
|
| I have a dedicated outbound sales person who pings their
| network for referrals every few weeks. Their job is to
| weed out noise + educate + convert hourly to project
| based billing
|
| Went into a lot of detail on Reddit a couple years back
| here
|
| https://www.reddit.com/r/Entrepreneur/comments/ommiww/com
| men...
| tuukkah wrote:
| > _convert hourly to project based billing_
|
| I can see how that helps in increasing revenue, but it
| also makes the work less agile, requires longer
| negotiations and adds risks. So it's probably not for
| everyone.
|
| Some others have found a way to bill similar amounts but
| on short projects billed by the day/week. That sounds
| preferable to me, but you need to have a skill that
| produces value in such short projects.
| pxue wrote:
| I do it mostly for legal purposes.
| pxue wrote:
| Hit nested reply limit. Reach out to me on twitter I'll
| give you deets. Links in my bio
| tuukkah wrote:
| Are you saying project-based billing has fewer legal
| risks - could you expand on that?
| itsoktocry wrote:
| > _but you need to have a skill that produces value in
| such short projects._
|
| I assume you're a software developer? There's your skill.
|
| I think you're overthinking this. How is it less agile?
| You have a project, a price and a timeline. Everything
| between then and the end is on your schedule.
|
| The only "unintuitive" skill you need to hone is
| assessing value and pricing based on that. But there is
| endless analysis and analogies out there to help.
| satvikpendem wrote:
| Based on what I've seen other people do, it's basically
| someone who does the lead prospecting and qualification
| for you. They can be paid commission or flat, but are
| usually paid both.
| arrowsmith wrote:
| Do you work for a lot of different clients at once? How do
| things work day-to-day?
| mooreds wrote:
| I feel this! I have run my own one man contracting shop for
| about half of my career, in two different stints.
|
| I loved:
|
| * the flexibility
|
| * getting paid for every hour I worked (I billed by the hour)
|
| * the freedom to choose clients
|
| * having more than one made me feel more stable
|
| * how close it kept me to the business problem space
|
| * the ability to take time off
|
| * the distance: I could roll my eyes and say "at least I'm
| getting paid for this BS" when there was political BS
|
| However, after time I joined a team because:
|
| * PTO is quite nice
|
| * Insurance (in America) is better in general for employees
|
| * it was great to be part of a team
|
| * the ability to specialize in a way that is difficult as a
| contractor (I can be further away from direct revenue
| generation or product creation)
|
| Highly recommend everyone tries this out as you'll have a much
| greater appreciation for all the components of a business when
| you are doing them yourself (or are responsible for them).
| elwell wrote:
| > getting paid for every hour I worked (I billed by the hour)
|
| As someone who is (overly?) honest/careful; this could be a
| con. Also, if you're able to, bill by the day.
| tuukkah wrote:
| Billing by the day is not the best for everyone: billing by
| the hour can give you the flexibility to work incomplete
| days or switch between clients during the day.
| 93po wrote:
| I think maybe the premise is having minimums per day so
| you can't be called on a weekend and only bill half an
| hour for it
| tuukkah wrote:
| It would suck if I was called in on a weekend (without
| having agreed to be on call). It would suck even more if
| I was called in for a whole day just because I'd demanded
| that to be my minimum. Instead, weekend hours could be
| priced 16 times higher. There could be a quantity
| discount so that a full day would be somewhat less
| expensive.
| itsoktocry wrote:
| > _It would suck even more if I was called in for a whole
| day just because I 'd demanded that to be my minimum_
|
| This isn't really how it works though. If you find
| "getting called in" (what does this mean?) to be
| terrible, you should be charging more for that service.
| You should be in control.
|
| The whole point is to generate enough surplus value that
| your client signs the cheque, no questions asked, and is
| happy to do it. You shouldn't squabbling over hours.
| arrowsmith wrote:
| You make $500k/year from freelance contracts as a solo
| developer?
|
| What kind of companies and tech stack do you work with?
| chiefalchemist wrote:
| It's not clear if that's revenue or profit. Due to that
| intentional ambiguity I had to presume the latter.
| arrowsmith wrote:
| Maybe, but how big can the expenses have been?
|
| I've worked as a freelance solo dev (sadly for far less
| than $500k/year) and the difference between my revenue and
| profit was close to zero. Expenses included accountancy
| costs and the occasional new laptop or whatever bit of
| hardware I could justifiably call a business expense, but
| it was a tiny fraction of my revenue.
| makk wrote:
| That assumes your time costs zero.
|
| But if you assume as I do that your time is the most
| valuable thing you have, then there's no way to generate
| profits when all you sell is your time.
|
| You can generate cash, sure. But profits as in selling
| something for more than it cost you, never. You can never
| get that time back, and it's worth more than anything.
|
| I would guess many will disagree with this perspective.
| [deleted]
| arrowsmith wrote:
| Maybe, but that's completely irrelevant to the original
| question of whether the quoted $500k was OP's gross cash
| revenue or net financial income.
| [deleted]
| Aurornis wrote:
| > Working for yourself at your own pace is.
|
| > As an industry we're surprisingly very behind in normalizing
| this.
|
| This is great for people whose own pace is reasonable and
| matched to their compensation. If you're paying someone 50th
| percentile compensation and demanding a 90th percentile work
| pace and output from them, you're just going to have endless
| turnover as you burn people out.
|
| Conversely, if you're paying 90th percentile compensation and
| you have an employee moving at half the speed of their peers,
| eventually you'll get fed up and replace them with someone
| better matched to the position.
|
| But this all breaks down when you get into the weirder ends of
| the market. Self-pacing works great for you because you can put
| in the work to deliver $500K/year of value and companies
| appreciate it. It doesn't work for many people whose idea of a
| workday is to put in 1-2 hours of focus and then browse the
| internet all day, which is a larger portion of the developer
| population than I would have guessed before becoming a manager.
| Other people can't help but wander through tasks, get
| distracted by rewrites or new frameworks, needlessly refactor
| working code, or otherwise do a lot of activity without
| producing a lot of work. Both of these fault modes benefit
| greatly from the pacing and structure of management.
|
| There's no one size fits all approach. I think solo dev
| contracting is a great option for some people, but the type of
| person who can self-manage, sell themselves, network, and
| retain self-discipline isn't all that common.
|
| I think this is a great example of how different people thrive
| in different environments.
| jokethrowaway wrote:
| How do you know that people are lazy by nature and not
| because their job sucks?
|
| Of course they have zero incentive to get anything done, they
| get paid regardless of how well the project gets done.
|
| Maybe if they had the guts to leave a paycheck for browsing
| Reddit and started their own business they would have success
| too.
|
| When I work on my projects I have way more stamina than when
| I'm doing client work. I kind of have to resist the urge to
| kill myself all the time instead of doing that boring job and
| I keep reminding me I'll be able to build a villa with the
| money.
|
| I don't think it's laziness or lack of accountability, I
| think it's the 20 years of indoctrination in the school
| system - which are just factories churning out employees
| afraid of stepping out of line.
| subroutine wrote:
| > How do you know that people are lazy by nature and not
| because their job sucks?
|
| The two aren't mutually exclusive. I personally wouldn't
| say humans are lazy, but simply: people avoid doing things
| they find unenjoyable, but if they must do something
| unenjoyable they'll find ways to minimize their time spent
| doing it.
|
| > Of course they have zero incentive to get anything done,
| they get paid regardless of how well the project gets done.
|
| This makes it sound like freelancers get more work done,
| not because it's more enjoyable, but because they must to
| get paid.
|
| > Maybe if they had the guts to leave a paycheck for
| browsing Reddit and started their own business they would
| have success too.
|
| For some people, getting paid to browse reddit is one
| definition of success.
|
| > When I work on my projects I have way more stamina than
| when I'm doing client work. I kind of have to resist the
| urge to kill myself all the time instead of doing that
| boring job and I keep reminding me I'll be able to build a
| villa with the money.
|
| Huh... After reading this I need to rethink what you are
| even arguing. I assumed it was that freelancers put in more
| hours because the nature of their work is more fulfilling.
| But you're really just saying, yeah humans are lazy to the
| point of wanting death over client work, but at least with
| freelance I can frontload the actual number of miserable
| hours worked, instead of spreading them over 30 years.
| greybox wrote:
| As someone who takes pride in their work and who tries to
| always work the hours I'm paid for (and often regrettably
| more, but trying to cut back on that ...) It can be
| surprising to find out that a lot of people, really are,
| very lazy.
|
| If you've been lucky enough not to encounter them in your
| day to day, then that's really good, because when you have
| to work with one of them, boy does it suck.
|
| That being said, I've only encountered this a few times in
| over 10 years working as a software developer. Most people
| really do want to do a good job. Even if some of them get
| distracted easily and need more structure.
| MisterBastahrd wrote:
| > Other people can't help but wander through tasks, get
| distracted by rewrites or new frameworks, needlessly refactor
| working code, or otherwise do a lot of activity without
| producing a lot of work. Both of these fault modes benefit
| greatly from the pacing and structure of management.
|
| These are all problems that stem from management, not
| employees.
| jart wrote:
| > If you're paying someone 50th percentile compensation and
| demanding a 90th percentile work pace and output from them,
| you're just going to have endless turnover as you burn people
| out.
|
| Only if they're a 50th percentile person.
| tuukkah wrote:
| Burnout does _not_ work like that.
| tomjakubowski wrote:
| I don't think burnout would have been any easier on me if
| I'd been taking home a 90th percentile salary instead of
| a ~mean one.
|
| Burnout is also not only a function of workload. Other
| factors can contribute too.
| codeTired wrote:
| Would you mind sharing how to get started? I am full stack dev.
| I can pivot my current job into a contract but I'm scared of
| getting more clients.
| ekanes wrote:
| Work on getting the contracts first. Then when you're ready,
| pivot. Then there's nothing to fear. If you can't / don't get
| contracts, nothing changed.
| mig4ng wrote:
| Regarding this topic, I know many people (myself included at the
| moment) that do not want the burden of freelance, starting their
| own business, etc. For these people, there are other
| alternatives.
|
| For me, I have been working 4 days work weeks for multiple years
| now, and love it. The experiment went so good that the rest of
| the engineers in the time have Friday's afternoon off now.
|
| You can do this, even if your company never had this type of
| working schedule or even if your team still works 5 days a week.
| You will not be left out nor called lazy. In my case I actually
| deliver more, and higher quality, since I started because
| previously I was developing physical pain in my hands/arms
| (because of work and sedentary life). I have started the process
| of working 4 days a week in 2 companies, a big (unicorn) one that
| is part of NYSE, and a small one of less than 20 employees. This
| works on all scales (not guaranteed it works with all companies).
|
| Shameless plug: If you want help on this, I actually have in my
| bucket list to write a medium/short guide or handbook on how to
| do this. With examples, email templates and how to approach your
| employer.
|
| If you are interested, fill this:
| https://forms.gle/8VkGnE6Rpq86BGQa6
|
| *You'll only hear from me regarding this book.* I won't add you
| to any list, nor send you anything else not related to this.
| mkl95 wrote:
| > have started the process of working 4 days a week in 2
| companies, a big (unicorn) one that is part of NYSE, and a
| small one of less than 20 employees. This works on all scales
| (not guaranteed it works with all companies).
|
| Don't take it as whataboutism, but many companies love adding
| clauses to engineers contracts that forbid them from working
| for other companies or starting their own business. In some
| cases they will also claim intellectual rights on all your
| creative output "while you are working for them". In my case
| even contributing to some Github repo could get me in trouble
| if my employer thinks a competitor is benefiting from it.
|
| On the other hand, as someone who suffers from similar physical
| pain, a 4 day week would boost my quality of life
| significantly. So it's something I am looking forward to at my
| next job.
| mig4ng wrote:
| > Don't take it as whataboutism, but many companies love
| adding clauses to engineers contracts that forbid them from
| working for other companies or starting their own business.
|
| That is true, and I actually have a friend that renegotiated
| that with their employer and removed that clause from his
| contract because he wanted to do consulting work outside his
| working hours. Sometimes it is as easy as asking, sometimes
| it is not possible.
|
| > On the other hand, as someone who suffers from similar
| physical pain, a 4 day week would boost my quality of life
| significantly. So it's something I am looking forward to at
| my next job.
|
| It is a major change in terms of life quality, even more if
| you use the extra free time to explore hobbies that add
| physical activity to your life. I tried climbing/bouldering
| and loved. Now I also go to the gym for lifting.
|
| Also you don't need to wait for moving to a next job to
| negotiate 4 days work week. Just a reminder :)
| progmetaldev wrote:
| I realize that this comes off as a very American way of
| thinking, and apologize if you are not, but things are
| starting to move towards employee rights in regards to
| striking down non-compete agreements or anything where your
| livelihood would be affected by signing an agreement. Of
| course the biggest changes are starting in more "progressive"
| states, such as New York and California, but the movement is
| spreading. You might see trouble if you are so specialized
| that whatever you work on, it would touch your day to day
| tasks, but moving towards another path of development could
| provide you with more creative output in a manner that your
| business couldn't touch. Your business may decide to fire
| you, but you should be free from legal obligations if you
| aren't directly releasing the same type of code that you
| write for the business.
| atum47 wrote:
| Back when I was a 3d artist I was making good money as a
| freelancer. I would also work with a archviz studio as an
| "employee". Time went by and I leaned towards the "secure" job
| with the studio (instead of opening my own), cause from time to
| time I would have a hard time with my clients as a freelancer
| (sometimes they did not pay, sometimes they would ask for changes
| that would be a entire new work...). Making a long story short:
| the studio went bankrupt and let me go without any compensation
| whatsoever. Maybe I've should kept a few clients and not rely
| entirely on the studio.
|
| Don't know if my experience adds to the discussion, but I thought
| about sharing it.
| mattgreenrocks wrote:
| Warning: bit of a rant ahead.
|
| I'm currently on the path to a principal-level role at my
| company. I really don't know what I think about it. The jump from
| lead to principal is a big one in terms of workload and stress,
| and I've been told the pay difference isn't huge.
|
| Older I get, the less I care to ascend the ladder. Even at this
| point I'm doing it out of a sense of amassing status in case I
| need it, rather than being motivated by it. And I feel that lack
| of intrinsic motivation.
|
| I'm mid-career, and mostly just tired of selling so much time and
| energy to someone else's enterprise, especially because I watch
| myself trade away time that should be spent taking care of myself
| for a stupid title upgrade.
|
| I think I am a late bloomer bootstrapper.
| [deleted]
| MattGaiser wrote:
| In general, interest in career advancement is collapsing.
|
| https://www.wsj.com/articles/your-coworkers-are-less-ambitio...
| manicennui wrote:
| Unfortunately promotion is the best way to get more money at
| most companies without leaving.
| [deleted]
| ToucanLoucan wrote:
| I have no interest at all in being some high ranking manager
| or director in any company. I want to clock in, do my work,
| and clock out so I can go do what I actually want to do.
|
| Don't get me wrong, I love my job and find my work
| interesting. I'm incredibly lucky to be where I'm at. But I'm
| also completely fine just doing my thing and being done for
| the day.
| plugin-baby wrote:
| Good luck with the new role! I'm surprised you've shared this
| rant non-anonymously, I hope it doesn't have negative effect on
| your progress.
| mattgreenrocks wrote:
| Everything that's supposed to happen will happen. If this
| mini-rant damages my prospects, then I wouldn't last long at
| this level anyway.
|
| Nice name, btw. Classic song, still!
| Nextgrid wrote:
| In some countries it doesn't make sense to transition to higher
| positions because the taxation will eat up a large chunk of the
| salary increase, so you end up with _significant_ increases in
| workload /responsibility but only a _slight_ increase in net
| pay.
| ipaddr wrote:
| That status can act like an anchor and prevent things in the
| future. Once you have that on your resume you outclass yourself
| for smaller title roles where you might be happier.
|
| A principle helps other and finds ways to add value. You get to
| deal with the enterprise issues. If you like sticking your nose
| in everywhere, going to meetings and want to move away from
| programming this is the role.
|
| It's a role with little power or accountability. Part of your
| role is justifying your value. The successful ones I have seen
| have been able to listen, take in everything and convey that
| message in language a vp understands.
|
| By default I say don't take it you sound happy at your current
| level. You are better off going the management route or product
| manager path if you are looking at status, power and higher
| pay.
| allthecybers wrote:
| I wrestle with this frequently as I am on the cusp of Senior to
| Principal promotion. Principal means more money but diverting
| from my preferred sweet-spot of tactical and strategic
| technical leadership.
|
| The optimal answer for me is to stay at Senior level and enjoy
| my work to an extent. But I am forgoing the related
| compensation increase and career progression.
|
| Then my thoughts turn to working for myself or with other
| friends/associates I trust and potentially seeing more of a
| reward for the effort I put in every day.
| erhaetherth wrote:
| You don't _have_ to rise the ranks. I 'm still debating if I
| should go for a 'senior' role. I've been programming for over
| 20 years. I _was_ a "senior" in my last job but now I'm just a
| regular SWE. I get paid well enough and I get enough respect.
| Do I need more stress/responsibility? Probably not. Mostly I
| just don't want more pointless meetings.
| manicennui wrote:
| Having never worked at a FAANG company, I'm not sure exactly
| what the principal role commonly entails. That being said, I've
| recently been promoted from lead to principal, which is one of
| the highest titles for software engineers on our tech track.
| There are basically a few people who are higher in the entire
| company, which is a medium-sized public company.
|
| The best thing about this company is the work life balance; I
| never put in a lot of hours. The worst thing is the skill level
| of most of our software engineers. The thing I hate about this
| new role is that I'm less connected to the day-to-day work and
| just getting shit done. I'm in even more meetings now and the
| expectation is that I'll somehow help to level up the semi-
| competent people we hire, and make sure projects go smoothly
| even though everything is built on a foundation of shit.
|
| Fortunately I am paid extremely well. Pay is literally the only
| reason I accepted the promotion. Sadly, the company probably
| gets less value out of me now even though we all convince
| ourselves that this layer of principals and managers is making
| everyone below us more productive.
| asimpleusecase wrote:
| Question: a friend is a great designer and has coding chops. He
| just got a project with a large company fixing their e-commerce
| site. The deeper he digs the more farcical the whole thing has
| become. Nothing works, no one seems able to do anything and the
| past "agency" appears to be someone who hires developers in a
| developing market but has no real idea what they are doing. My
| friend has fixed huge amounts of broken stuff and delivered on
| time and under budget stuff they just could not get done. But big
| boss will not give him the big project for coming year because
| "he is just one guy" . Any suggestions on how to address this?
| Big boss is looking for security more than performance. But my
| friend can't afford to hire 10 people to be an "agency". Any
| suggestions on how to crack this?
| setr wrote:
| Assuming it can be done by a solo dev, then pull on 10 guys out
| of body shops in India/Pakistan, seek the cheapest possible
| credentials that they can be called developers, call yourself
| project lead/architect.
|
| Bill as a fixed price project with milestones -- you want the
| work assignments to be ambiguous. Plan/budget by your own
| workload, consider using offshore resources as a bonus (keeping
| in mind you intentionally pulled them on as just bodies).
| j7ake wrote:
| I think the quantity to look for is the fraction of time you
| spend working on your own projects.
|
| You want it to be about 40 hours a week.
|
| Too little means you're probably spending too much time on client
| or admin work.
|
| Too much could mean you're in a hyper competitive field and
| you're struggling to keep up, eg academics.
| raziel2701 wrote:
| This is very refreshing to see. Not everything needs to grow grow
| grow fast fast fast. I think she has a very sustainable way of
| operating and living and it makes me very happy and I find it
| inspiring.
|
| I hope more people follow suit,I kinda am saying that to myself
| :)
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