One of the hardest yet most rewarding personal development steps you can ever take is to discover what you are good at, and where you have areas that can use development. Accepting our own limitations can help make all of us better people.
When it comes to web design and development, it’s a demanding industry—even more so if you’re freelancing. However, although the freelance life may seem hard at times, successful freelancers never look back.
Successful freelancers often start by evaluating their own skills and personality, especially their ability to work solo. Once you have a clear understanding of your areas of weakness and what you need to improve upon, you have solid goals to work toward.
Although you may feel that you have all the technical competencies to manage the freelance role, you’ll soon find that there is far more to being successful as a freelancer than the ability to write great code or design the coolest layouts.
The skills required for being a great freelancer can be broken down to four distinct areas.
Technical, Business, Organizational, & Interpersonal.
Technical Skills
For a developer, possessing technical skills means that you’re technically competent in your language or languages of choice: PHP, Ruby on Rails, Microsoft .NET, and the like. As a designer, you’d consider the strength of your skills in design software, color theory, typography, and overall design knowledge.
As a designer or developer, you need to feel confident in your own technical ability, as this is what you’re going to be relying upon. You can’t just lean over to a coworker’s desk and ask about anything you’re not sure of! Consider your areas of weakness, and research what’s involved in strengthening these areas—you’ll probably find that they’re easier to fill out than you thought.
Business Skills
It’s vitally important to have, or at least be aware of, the fundamentals of business before you consider running your own. If you plan to succeed, you’ll need a solid understanding of cash flow, marketing, time management, customer service, and other areas. Many of these elements can be outsourced, as we’ll see in Chapter 2, but you’ll still need a working knowledge of all of them.
Organizational Skills
Your ability to be well organized, or at the very least to keep on top of those dreary administrative duties, will be paramount to your success. Start by reading personal productivity books and blogs, and research the different techniques of organization.
Don’t go overboard though; you could end up being hampered by trying too many productivity methods and not doing enough actual work! You’ll soon find a method you feel happy with, which can be defined in this context as feeling that you have the smooth running of your business under control.
Interpersonal Skills
You may think that the freelance life would suit the shy or socially inept recluse, beavering away alone. Unfortunately, however, an aversion to social contact could limit your opportunities more than you think.
Productive interaction with clients and prospective clients, not to mention your suppliers, will become a crucial part of your success, so embrace human contact and be personable.
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