Getting Laid Off
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- ********
Anyone have advice of starting up there own freelance business????!?!!?
Im on the verge of getting laid off, in less than two months. Company I work for is going out of business.
- bukka0
well you could start by making a website & portfolio...
start talking to friends, tell them you are looking for work.
Go out and find business... easier said then done!
- airey0
what city / country?
- Meeklo0
yeah sorry to hear man.
Listen to bukka, your first step to freelancing is a strong portfolio and business cards, then start networking.
- grunttt0
had you stopped the title of this thread by 3 characters you'd be doing better than 83% of the folks on this site.
Not me though... I'm having sex as I type this.
- With your spare hand?5timuli
- tee-hee!harlequino
- NO. I type with BOTH hands, ya idiot.
I'm using my foot.grunttt - That's not very efficient, why not use the space between your elbows?5timuli
- fap, fap, do not count as sex. lol.akrokdesign
- boobs0
What sort of work do you do? Graphic design, web, Flash?
- akrokdesign0
check this book out, has some good info there. :-)
here's a preview --->
http://books.google.com/books?id…- yeah good stuff thereMeeklo
- +1 bookmarkedalicetheblue
- I expected a lot more from this book. It seems like more of a common sense memorandumPoint5
- most people do not have common sense any more, p5. :-)akrokdesign
- Gucci0
I'm with you, b_wayne. I was laid off a few weeks ago. It sucks, but it'll get better.
- ifeltdave0
damn man, good luck to you. like others said, get a online portfolio up and just start contacting people. and get an accountant, too.
- check out legalzoom.com too!ifeltdave
- accountant if you run it like a studio, yes. if its only you freelance, i don't see why you would needed it.akrokdesign
- how's dave, by the way?Gucci
- mrbee28280
My advice to anyone and everyone in this business is to ALWAYS have your parachute packed. I've been laid off twice in 11 years, quit 3 jobs and got better offers while perfectly happy at other spots. You just never know wtf is going to happen on a given day. Keep your folio and resume up to date. It's good to have PDF with crucial info and a few projects in it.
If you're not a web designer/programmer and you're not in-person, social, conference goer then skip the business cards. They'll end up becoming a paper weight and your information will change as you figure out what you're doing.
Stay fresh, keep up with people and keep your eyes open for the next big opportunity.
- mrbee28280
BTW... if you know it's coming you need to move fast. It takes a week or 2 to get a project started (even with someone you know well and have worked with before) and then unless you're the cat's ass and have your business stuff in order you won't be able to get them to give you a 50% deposit on the work. So you'll have a 2 week effort to get work, probably a few weeks to do it and then a month to weight for payment = 2 month with no income.
- Horp0
More people getting laid off? I had the strange idea that had passed now and what was left was stable... sorry to sound so glib, I'm just interested for the same reasons as anyone else on QBN to get an idea of the situation.
A couple of other people have intimated their work is coming to an end with nothing on the schedule to replace it, so I'm starting to think it was grossly naive to assume the worst was over.
- I think you're right to assume the worst isn't over...babaganush
- AlwaysSunny0
I will echo the comment above by mrbee (Always keep that parachute packed) I had a comfy, stable job for ten years. One day out of the blue, we all get the can. I was totally unprepared, portfolio/resume had not been updated in years, I had not been networking... I was not ready for this and I'm paying for it now. God luck, get out there!
- megE0
you can bid on projects there, but probably won't be extended client relationships, just one time jobs
- penelopes0
get a dog
- wtf?
Leigh - that's an expensive and not a income. unless, the dog is paying the rent. lol.akrokdesign
- wtf?
- flashbender0
resources
http://
www .
freelanc
eswitch
.com/
- scarabin_net0
wake up every morning at the same hour, get dressed for work as usual, then sit down and make finding a job/preparing your book and site a full 8-hour job.
this is your new job
- agree. it's super easy to lose time.vsplus
- Yes. Hours turn to days, days turn to weeks. Get at it and stay at it.AlwaysSunny
- ********0
I have not had work in 3 months. And that is with 7 agencies working with me weekly, using my network outside of my city (Three Jobs That Were Possibles All Shit The Bed), and applying to job boards on a regular basis. I am now making myself a retail resume for a face to face interview at American Apparel on Thursday. Yesterday I went into a new Irish Pub, shook the hand of the owner, and told him I was interested in work. I have seen 3 of my Creative Directors in the last 4 months laid off (All of which I have worked with in the last year), 85 thousand jobs have been lost in NYC alone in the last 6 months, and the work ratio right now is only dedicated to interactive. Since when did Interactive departments become designers?
- http://www.flickr.co…********
- I wouldn't say interactive necessarily became designers, it's more of a functionality and overhead cost driven...Point5
- market right now. That's the only reason I still have a job; I design shitty eblasts all fucking day long right now.Point5
- i'm struggling too. wish you the best.akrokdesign
- No_It's more of agencies wanting to cut a corner and only pay one person as apposed to two.********
- akro_thanks. Best to you also sir.********
- http://www.flickr.co…
- Scotch_Roman0
Some good advice here. Network as much as humanly possible while putting together a bad-ass website. If the name of your studio will be different than your actual name, then you need to register it as a DBA for $7. Once you get a few lucrative projects, I recommend becoming LLC—I'm in the same boat and that's my next move. It will offer legal protection that you'll hopefully never need, but it's totally worth a couple hundred bucks or whatever it costs in your state.
Warm introductions are way better than cold calls, but cold calling a bit here and there can be worthwhile.
- you can also join business networking groups within your cityrodzilla
- ********0
Just do it.
- we need a visual for that. how about an other print. :-)akrokdesign