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Plenty of successful freelancers make good money just by themselves (or maybe 1-2 junior people). Great point. The underappreciated thing is how much stress b

by Radim 9y ago

Plenty of successful freelancers make good money just by themselves (or maybe 1-2 junior people). Great point. The underappreciated thing is how much stress bringing a few other people to your freelancing brings. Suddenly, you realize that all these things that are obvious to you (when you "flow" working alone) need explanations and coordination and planning and checking and ... You may find yourself at a substantially reduced income (because you have to pay these extra people), but without the increased productivity / revenue to show for it. There's like this uncanny valley between freelancing and having a stable team / process structure (aka company). For me, building a proper consulting company around machine learning / Python services took the better part of 4 years. Along with considerable stress & hair pulling. Sometimes I long for the solo freelancing days...

mgkimsal 9y ago
> There's like this uncanny valley between freelancing and having a stable team / process structure (aka company) Perfect one-liner. I've found myself at the edge, and sometimes going in to that valley, for years. Finding the combination of people and process to get through that is more work than most people imagine, and a whole lot of risk. You get to the point where you can hire/contract one other person? That person better tick a lot of boxes, or you better be able to ramp up to X people quickly. Having a whole lot of effort in to one person, then to have them leave, loses you a whole lot of time/money/effort. Getting to a team of 4-5, which I've seen folks do, reduces that risk a lot, but figuring out how to get there and remain stable ... haven't done it myself, and have seen others try and fail (and some succeed, to be sure).
pjungwir 9y ago
If you freelance, there are three ways to earn more: work more, charge more, or hire. A few years ago I made a spreadsheet to model charging more vs hiring some people. The problem with hiring is that you have to spend a lot of time on unbillable work, and also suddenly you have to sell enough projects to keep 3-4 people busy. The risks are higher and you might need to hire 3 others just to break even. I decided that I would focus on just charging more. :-) But I've also started a small partnership with two other excellent developers, and that has been working very well. I don't have to manage anyone, but I have help when I need it. And as a firm we avoid some of the "market for lemons" freelancer stigma, so we can charge more. Also with 3 of us the chasm to eventually hiring others is maybe easier to leap. I think this is a great way to go!

by Radim 9y ago

mgkimsal 9y ago

> There's like this uncanny valley between freelancing and having a stable team / process structure (aka company) Perfect one-liner. I've found myself at the edge, and sometimes going in to that valley, for years. Finding the combination of people and process to get through that is more work than most people imagine, and a whole lot of risk. You get to the point where you can hire/contract one other person? That person better tick a lot of boxes, or you better be able to ramp up to X people quickly. Having a whole lot of effort in to one person, then to have them leave, loses you a whole lot of time/money/effort. Getting to a team of 4-5, which I've seen folks do, reduces that risk a lot, but figuring out how to get there and remain stable ... haven't done it myself, and have seen others try and fail (and some succeed, to be sure).

pjungwir 9y ago

If you freelance, there are three ways to earn more: work more, charge more, or hire. A few years ago I made a spreadsheet to model charging more vs hiring some people. The problem with hiring is that you have to spend a lot of time on unbillable work, and also suddenly you have to sell enough projects to keep 3-4 people busy. The risks are higher and you might need to hire 3 others just to break even. I decided that I would focus on just charging more. :-) But I've also started a small partnership with two other excellent developers, and that has been working very well. I don't have to manage anyone, but I have help when I need it. And as a firm we avoid some of the "market for lemons" freelancer stigma, so we can charge more. Also with 3 of us the chasm to eventually hiring others is maybe easier to leap. I think this is a great way to go!