Tips on Moonlighting for Part-time Freelancers
I used to work in an agency and freelanced at the same time. Now I’m freelancing full-time.
It’s good to be organized. At work, I keep notes, drawings, etc (printed, written) for each project and arranged them nicely. When I go to the office, I can start working on things without much fiddling around.
I also have separate email accounts. I don’t look at my work mail at home. It’s not part of the auto send and receive. This way I can concentrate on my own work.
You’ll need to read outside mails when you are in the office. It’s your day job and your personal clients are most likely to send you mails in the day too. So I either use Webmail or netvibes.com with the pop mail module. You can also forward your mails to a gmail account and pretend it’s personal. Not a good idea to let your boss know you are moonlighting.
If you travel by public transport, use the journey to think of ideas for the project waiting for you at home. When you reach home, you should have some idea what to do.
Eat well and stay awake, avoid coffee unless it’s absolutely necessary. Coffee keeps you awake but kills creativity, at least for me. Have good sleep times and don’t tire yourself out. Get used to sleeping less.
Posting comment, please wait…
Blur Sotong on Nov 29, 06 – 10:02 am
Thanks for the article. It’s good to know how others work sometimes.
I agree that coffee kills creativity,s I just use it when I don’t need to be creative, like doing plain coding.
Joseph Maguire on Dec 03, 06 – 6:32 am
Coffee is good for the mornings, terrible for afternoons in my case. It works wonder for me when I get really excited though and it can burn me out. Say something like a huge ad campaign comes in on a short deadline to make the pitch I turn the music up, I turn the caffeeine on and I fire like a howitzer at the screen. Still just the same as for everyday work I tend to try to cut back on caffeine cept for coffee in the morning or an occasional diet coke. Totally in agreement about the Subway Riding… its where I draw all my ideas up to and from work. But I think its healthy to read too, you know not just design shit. Get your head away from design as much as possible and you’ll be more positive about life… thats my opinion.
I use something similar for emails too, but I tend to be upfront about asking a company before I start if it’s ok to moonlight, and if its ok to show my work that I do at the site online. If it isn’t I know immediately and no concerns will be brought up down the line. I dont think I could work for a place that was too strict about that, I mean how the hell are we supposed to make ourselves more valuable if we cannot show what we do? Right? Not all agency’s are run by assholes :) I hope.
Anyways My best tip is to take time out of your day to do something read something see something different it helps to add to your life and give you balance. Dont get stuck looking at the same magazines and newspapers day in and day out. Buy new ones, or go to a library.. hell go for a walk, take longer walks. turn your cell phone off for a day pretend to lose the thing. dont download an email.. strange things start happening.. you start relaxing. :) I think some sense of balance in ones life adds to our best ideas. and frankly a good sketch is worth 10 times more thana thousand executions… dont kill yourself on the thousand executions do less.. your not a machine stay fresh…
Aen on Dec 03, 06 – 8:07 pm
Couldn’t agree with you more Joseph. I am a keen reader and I don’t always read about design. Life isn’t just about design, it’s the other way round. The more you know about the world, the better you are creatively. The world is a really big place and that’s where our minds should usually be.
I’m nocturnal and coffee absolutely sucks for me at night. Whenever I’m brain dead, coffee makes it worst. I guess when there is too much fatigue for caffeine to take away, it takes away your sanity.
In my country, our public train system is called the MRT (Mass Rapid Transit). Never been in a subway. Hope I get a chance in future.
Anyways, that’s a pretty long comment. Thanks!
Paul on Dec 11, 06 – 12:41 am
Freelancing full-time would not be easy… Wish you all the best!
Great work you done so far!
Aen on Dec 11, 06 – 3:47 pm
Hi Paul, that’s a really small gravatar you have. Yes freelancing full-time isn’t easy, but the freedom and fun makes it all worthwhile.
Nice site too (yours)!