How Can A Freelancer Find Stability?

How many people have shied away from freelancing for the very sake of lack of stability? A dime a dozen. Careers are plagued by their unique issues, and that of freelancing is a lack of stability. Versatile freelancers know it. Budding freelancers know it. Aspiring freelancers aren’t left out as well.

In spite of this obvious problem, quite a number of people have been able to pull through in the freelance world, and do even much better than their counterparts in ‘stable’ careers. This can only be a pointer to something exciting: that freelancing can also be a stable career path in spite of all the odds.

There are a couple of tips to help a freelancer attain stability, some of which include:

1. Consistency

In any sector/parlance, the consistent person can never be pushed aside. Where talent becomes pale, consistency comes to the rescue. If as a freelancer, you choose to believe that you have ‘freedom to work whenever you want to work and stay off work whenever you want to’, the rest of your freelance career is a history: especially if you are a beginning freelancer.
You shouldn’t wake up on a Monday morning when you’ve got a job to deliver and instead, choose to visit a neighbor who just had a baby- simply because you can. Not to say that you cannot take time off, but you still have to train your mind to see your job as a REAL JOB. so what is freelancing to you? You would have to come up with a definition which is registered in your mind.
The key to enjoying the privileges of a stable career is greatly hinged on your view of that career- do you actually see freelancing as a job or not? If to you, it isn’t a job, then you wouldn’t be consistent- and of course, it would be difficult to enjoy the potential stability in freelancing.

2. Review Your Progress

One of the key aspects of stable career paths are reviews- monthly, quarterly, yearly reviews. In most organizations, there are always these kinds of reviews taking place and no matter how much you grumble, if you work there, you’ve got no choice but to be involved in these reviews. Freelancers have a lesson to take away from this; how often do you track your own progress? While working for yourself might mean that you don’t have to be scored by anyone, scoring yourself weekly, monthly or quarterly will help you know how far you’ve gone, where you ought to make adjustments and sit up. Being stable takes a while, but a review of progress also helps in shaking things up and making that process faster!

3. Take a step back

Take a step back to learn from those ahead of you and learning from them is not a mark of weakness or lack of capability on your part; just wisdom. There’s a reason for which they are in front of you, not behind you. Look for much more stable freelancers and get insight from them. The very problem that’s giving you sleepless nights is likely to have plagued them, and surmounting it has definitely given them an edge over you in that area, and if only you would take a step back to learn from them, adjusting to different challenges might not be such a daunting course.

4. Invest in your areas of strength

Sometimes, we find it easier to rush into action without actually strategizing. Being strategic would save us a lot of stress, you know. If you go into freelancing with the aim of doing what every Tom, Dick, and Harry do, you would probably get frustrated in no time- especially if Tom, Dick, Harry and his twin sister Harriet, got there before you. Everyone who has made a name in freelancing provides succinct services better than the average Joe, the issue to figure out would then be what can you do better than the average Joe? Find it, and then do it repeatedly, and you’d see that discipline does pay well.

5. Are you in demand?

Looking for a shortcut to stability? Two words: supply and demand. If you would be stable, then you have to be engaged in something that is in high demand- and you would agree with me that it makes a lot of sense. If your niche isn’t in demand, then you might get only trickles of jobs here and there, without you really being in high demand, but this isn’t what you want to aim for. What to do? Craft out an area of expertise that’s high in demand and watch yourself become stable and unshakeable in the freelance business!
While the road to stability might be topsy-turvy, not giving up is key to getting you to that desired destination, and making you a proudly stable freelancer.