Ask yourself why you want to freelance

What

Before you decide to go freelance - it can be helpful to understand the reasons you’re looking to make the move into self-employment, and ask: why is freelancing attractive to me?

Why

The most common reasons for moving into self-employment are generally a desire for more flexibility, a desire to choose the type of projects you work on, a desire for increased income, looking for improvements in mental health at work, and sometimes simply no longer wanting to have a boss.

Freelancing, however, isn’t the only route to these goals. Rather than leaping to freelancing as "the answer", it’s important to look at your goals and objectives - and identify all of the possible ways of reaching them.

Freelancing might be one route, but recognising that freelancing is not the only answer (and sometimes not the answer at all!) is important.

An increasing number of people also are turning to freelancing, not by choice but thorugh circumstance, such as facing redundancy, a poor jobs market or unable to find employment which works for them. In these cases, it's still important to do this exercise, even if you feel you have less choice, to help you identify what you're looking for, regardless of the contract you end up with.

If you decide that freelancing is right for you - this exercise will help you remember the reasons you considered freelancing, which can be helpful to hold on to, when you’re finding self-employment challenging!

How

• Write a list of the current challenges or frustrations with work that are making you explore freelancing - are any of these resolvable whilst staying in employment?

• Write a list of the benefits you think freelancing offers - are any of these possible by changing how you currently work?

• Write a list of the concerns you have about freelancing - does staying within employment help to reduce any of those risks?

• Write a list of what you’re hoping to achieve - and ask if starting your own business is the only way to reach those goals.

(Use our downloadable template, or keep these notes in a journal or notebook - we’ll be using them later in the process.)

Once you’ve captured the frustrations, benefits, concerns and goals - you’ll have a good picture of what you’re looking to move from and move towards - and have a few thoughts on if freelancing is the only route, or if you have a range of other opportunities you can explore.

For example, many people considering freelancing wanted more control over when, how and where they worked from - and since the pandemic, the ability to work remotely has led to fewer people having this as a motivation for self-employment.

You may come to the conclusion that creating your own business is absolutely what you want to do and you’re clear on why - that’s fantastic, and gives us a great foundation to build your business upon.