Self Employment Trends

I had someone leave a blog comment asking about how I started working for myself, so hopefully this answers all the questions that were posed.

June 13th marked my seventh year of being self employed. I still remember getting laid off on June 12, 2003 vividly. The layoff completely blindsided me and as soon as I got home, I emailed an old college friend who was self-employed about doing some freelance work from home. The next day he sent me information about a client I still work with today. Now I would be lying if I said that I KNEW I would be working for myself this long. I had only planned to do it for a couple months until I found another job. In fact I initially hated working for myself and the freedom it gave me. I had bills including an $800 a month rental that I loved and I longed for the stability of a "real job". Even my parents didn't believe I was really working from home until I showed my Mom a $5,000 check I received from a client. Over the years I often toyed with the idea of getting a "real job", but last year I came to the realization that I probably will never go back to corporate America. I can't say I was thrilled at that idea, but now I'm embracing it and exploring other business ideas.

Most entreprenuers get their start because of some desire to work for themselves. I had no such desire initially, but I guess this is an instance of God's plans being different from our own. I write software and when I got laid off, I reached out to a self-employed person who had a similar skill-set as I did. Luckily for me he was getting ready to leave on vacation and was in need of of someone to babysit his client while he was gone. I watched his client for him and when he came back we discussed me doing more work until I found a "real job". That week he brought me on as a contractor, we signed an initial contract and began a working relationship that only ended last year. The first month I learned how to create an invoice detailing my billable hours and I was in business. As long as I had a computer and access to certain freely available software, I could work from any location. In the beginning I started off as a sole proprietor, later on I created an LLC and just last year, I became an incorporated software consulting business. There were a lot of low points throughout the years but I worked hard in the beginning to satisfy my initial clients and word-of-mouth referrals from past co-workers and clients got me other clients. I'm a consultant and you're only as good as your reputation. Another thing that helped me make it this long was going to see a life coach who specialized in small business owners.

Last year was a difficult time for me careerwise and that caused me to sever the existing relationship with my old college friend who was doing my client billing. I swear I blogged about it, but now I realize that I probably only talked on it via T.witt.er. Suffice it to say, that it was a long time coming, but it was long overdue. In the end I kept the clients I worked for, but since I was no longer billing through his company, I received a rate increase. I am happy to report that this year has seen a complete turnaround. I usually work on one major project at a time or a couple minor ones. Currently the client I have takes up all of my time and it's an open-ended project but the phase I'm working on now is slated to go until April 2011. Probably in January I'll know if I have to look for more projects in 2011 or will it be extended. Since most of my clients have been referrals, that is more than likely how I would go about finding another project when it's time.

Looking towards the future, I want to do less hands on development work, so I'm exploring ways to make that happen. Software isn't really my passion, so I'd like to spend more time working on businesses that are focused on what I'm passionate about. I will keep this software consulting business, but I will probably subcontract work out. Being self-employed has definitely been a bumpy ride, but I do feel that I have grown tremendously as a consultant and business owner over the years. In the beginning I fought against being self-employed but now I realize that I'm following God's plan for me and that is a good feeling.