The Work Thread

Good work Taf. I'm probably making assumptions here but now that you've got paid gigs please double your rate on your next engagement before you get compared to the next guy charging £1 less per hour.

Why do designers need free copywriting? Because they're gooseberry fool businesspeople who charge too low to cover their overheads? If they can't write why not pay someone to do it well? I struggle to imagine a scenario where that's not a reasonable request.

Corporate conferences charge hundreds of pounds per head.

That's why at my last pitch I asked what the monthly turnover of the business was when I was told there is no budget yet. They just told me the monthly turnover there and then - £16,000 per month. So surely I can take 5-10% of that if my work is going to drive business by what, at least 10% per month for the following twelve months? My signage is good for 7 years. That's an extra £134,400 in revenue (at least, I can't be bothered figuring out compound % which is considerably more).

Compared to my last engagement where I totally strawberry floated up on a shitty day and quoted literally 20p over my minimum price per unit, I increased my profit on cost to something like 1000% and I charged over half of that upfront - and I often get paid upfront, even when I don't ask for it. I do that by convincing people I am worth even more than whatever the money is, and that just becomes an incidental figure at the bottom of the paperwork. In fact, I rarely have anyone even questioning the price of something anymore (and I still cut my prices occasionally because apparently I hate myself).

Do not compete on price alone. That is a retail or distributor model, that works purely on volume, but it does not work for freelancing.

I just think when you get into freelancing you don't want to spend 5 years sloooowly incrementing your rate when you could just do it tomorrow and still win as many jobs or even more jobs. You'll thank yourself when you're earning £10k more because you asked for it and you spend less time working for dreadful people. Because that's what a low rate generally gets you. I don't claim to always head my own advice that I have heard from many different very successful people (businesses in the £millions) because it's a massive learning experience and we all have shitty days, but it's something I wish I really took to heart earlier.

I'd also drop the term "freelancer" and call yourself a copywriter, as that's probably what you want. Your job isn't to dally around employment status and save people money there, it's to solve their problems and add value - if you do that you're on the way to being a valuable business partner instead of a gun for hire, and there are so, so many cheaper guns. It's really hard to sell yourself early on but I urge anyone employing themselves to cut out the no/low pay as soon as possible, within say, 6 months at an absolute maximum or the prognosis is not good for first of all your health or the business, the former being most important because without it, you cannot succeed in the latter.

You only need at most 3-6 good work samples to win bids - even if those are the only jobs you've ever done. And nobody needs to have heard of those companies either - just that you did a good job and you can do it again.

That's coming from someone with a long history of self-esteem issues trying to make it work.

I have no idea about the industry you're in GG but I've always used people both privately and professionally based mainly on reputation. Having someone that you know will do the job you want done without hassle always works out cheaper.

Changing the subject I want to get people's opinion. I was off last week with flu and although I'mpassed the fever stage I'm still coughing up a lot of stuff and feel totally washed out. I went to the doctors on Monday to make sure I don't have a chest infection and I don't, just a bit of a temperature but they signed me off for the week. Anyway, now that I feel a bit better in myself I'm starting to feel guilty about staying off work, it's a bit of a 'macho' industry and most people I work with will come into work ill and tell you that have had one day off sick in 25 years. Personally, I hate it when people come into work coughing all over the keyboard and being full of snot as we have paid sick leave. I just wondered how people here feel about sickness at work? Would you think that I am taking the piss.

Hime wrote:Changing the subject I want to get people's opinion. I was off last week with flu and although I'mpassed the fever stage I'm still coughing up a lot of stuff and feel totally washed out. I went to the doctors on Monday to make sure I don't have a chest infection and I don't, just a bit of a temperature but they signed me off for the week. Anyway, now that I feel a bit better in myself I'm starting to feel guilty about staying off work, it's a bit of a 'macho' industry and most people I work with will come into work ill and tell you that have had one day off sick in 25 years. Personally, I hate it when people come into work coughing all over the keyboard and being full of snot as we have paid sick leave. I just wondered how people here feel about sickness at work? Would you think that I am taking the piss.

As you are signed off work, I think you have to stay off work unless a doctor signs you back on. My company would not let you through the door if you are signed off as it would invalidate their insurance.

Aside from that, I wouldn’t feel guilty about it. You are obviously not taking the piss and if you are not well then you shouldn’t be at work. strawberry float the macho banana splits that think they are tough going into work and spreading their diseases around. One of the reasons America is currently having its worst flu season in years is because the people there don’t get sick pay and so are forcing themselves into work, only to spread it to everybody else.

We had this discussion not that long ago, actually. GR was overwhelmingly in favour of people staying away from work until they were 100% again. Flush any guilt you might have out of your system, it's nonsensical pride bollocks.

Yeah if you are signed off stay off, people that come in splutting about the place are banana splits and should be shot on the spot, all they are doing is spreading their illness.

Thanks guys.

I'm not sure if having a sick note is the same as being signed off but nothing will happen at work. We have a situation in that we are severely understaffed to the point that one unexpected absence can royally strawberry float things. Obviously it's not my fault but no one wants to leave their pals in the gooseberry fool.

Our sickness policy is quite weird in that it's number of absences father than the duration which in my mind means you absolutely have to be sure you're ready to go back. That said I'm sure no one wants to be known as sick note.

Hime wrote:Thanks guys.

I'm not sure if having a sick note is the same as being signed off but nothing will happen at work. We have a situation in that we are severely understaffed to the point that one unexpected absence can royally strawberry float things. Obviously it's not my fault but no one wants to leave their pals in the gooseberry fool.

Our sickness policy is quite weird in that it's number of absences father than the duration which in my mind means you absolutely have to be sure you're ready to go back. That said I'm sure no one wants to be known as sick note.

A sick note from the doctor means you are signed off.

I am on a similar system to you (the Bradford factor), it is strawberry floating awful, although don’t let Oblomov hear you say that, but it does mean it’s worthwhile having those extra days after being ill to make sure you are fully recovered.

Errkal wrote:Yeah if you are signed off stay off, people that come in splutting about the place are banana splits and should be shot on the spot, all they are doing is spreading their illness.

Moggy wrote:the Bradford factor) it is strawberry floating awful, although don’t let Oblomov hear you say that, but it does mean it’s worthwhile having those extra days after being ill to make sure you are fully recovered.

I have just had a look at the sickness policy for where I am now and it seems they use this.

Not a clue how it works it just look painfully complicated.

Any chance of a simple crash course explination ?

Errkal wrote:

Moggy wrote:the Bradford factor) it is strawberry floating awful, although don’t let Oblomov hear you say that, but it does mean it’s worthwhile having those extra days after being ill to make sure you are fully recovered.

I have just had a look at the sickness policy for where I am now and it seems they use this.

Not a clue how it works it just look painfully complicated.

Any chance of a simple crash course explination ?

It punishes you for more frequent absences, deeming them more disruptive.

e.g. (Might get the numbers/maths wrong - I think factors etc vary by workplace)

B = O^2 * D

(B is your Bradford Score, O is Occurances of abscence in the period, D is total days off in the period, the period normally being the last 12 months)

So if you're off once for 3 days your score is 3 (B = 1^2 * 3)

But if you're off 3 times for 1 day each your score is 27 (B = 3^2 * 3)

If you're of 2 times, 1 for 2 days, and 1 for 1 day your score is 12 (B = 2^2 *3)

Workplaces will have score bands to assess you against.

Moggy wrote:

Hime wrote:Changing the subject I want to get people's opinion. I was off last week with flu and although I'mpassed the fever stage I'm still coughing up a lot of stuff and feel totally washed out. I went to the doctors on Monday to make sure I don't have a chest infection and I don't, just a bit of a temperature but they signed me off for the week. Anyway, now that I feel a bit better in myself I'm starting to feel guilty about staying off work, it's a bit of a 'macho' industry and most people I work with will come into work ill and tell you that have had one day off sick in 25 years. Personally, I hate it when people come into work coughing all over the keyboard and being full of snot as we have paid sick leave. I just wondered how people here feel about sickness at work? Would you think that I am taking the piss.

As you are signed off work, I think you have to stay off work unless a doctor signs you back on. My company would not let you through the door if you are signed off as it would invalidate their insurance.

Aside from that, I wouldn’t feel guilty about it. You are obviously not taking the piss and if you are not well then you shouldn’t be at work. strawberry float the macho banana splits that think they are tough going into work and spreading their diseases around. One of the reasons America is currently having its worst flu season in years is because the people there don’t get sick pay and so are forcing themselves into work, only to spread it to everybody else.

My company gives sick pay (probably because it is a multinational) but that doesn’t stop people coming in spluttering. at a time when working from home is so easy too

Errkal wrote:

Moggy wrote:the Bradford factor) it is strawberry floating awful, although don’t let Oblomov hear you say that, but it does mean it’s worthwhile having those extra days after being ill to make sure you are fully recovered.

I have just had a look at the sickness policy for where I am now and it seems they use this.

Not a clue how it works it just look painfully complicated.

Any chance of a simple crash course explination ?

All I know is that if you're off sick on 3 separate occasions you end up on part B that means your sickness is being monitored and you get given a date that it resets. It's rife for abuse and means you can punished for being off for 3 days while someone who is plays the system gets off without a warning.

You know the thing I hate about this stuff is that I actually enjoy my job and have just been unlucky that the few medical/dental things I've had have resulted in a reasonable amount of time off. I'd much rather be at work than have a pilonidal sinus again but people see it as 6 weeks of dossing about.

Errkal wrote:

Moggy wrote:the Bradford factor) it is strawberry floating awful, although don’t let Oblomov hear you say that, but it does mean it’s worthwhile having those extra days after being ill to make sure you are fully recovered.

I have just had a look at the sickness policy for where I am now and it seems they use this.

Not a clue how it works it just look painfully complicated.

Any chance of a simple crash course explination ?

Instead of adding up how many days you have been off sick, they are looking more at occurrences of sickness and are calculating a score based on that.

So if you are off for 3 days in a row, they will calculate it as one period of sickness for 3 days. The calculation is (1x1)x3 = 3

If you are then off for 1 day a few weeks later, your absence count is 2 and your total days off is 4, the calculation is (2x2)x4 = 16

Then a month later you are off for 2 days, your total absence count is now 3 and your total days off is 6, (3x3)x6 = 54

Etc.

Each workplace will have a different threshold as to when you will start getting into trouble, our office is 200.

I think the system actually encourages people to take extra time off as you are punished more for the occurrence than the actual time off. Which makes it a gooseberry fool system imo.

Our system encourages people to come in whilst sick.

If you have 3 (or more) occurrences of sickness, or 7 days (or more) off total in ANY period of 12 months (i.e. 12th Feb 2017 to 12th Feb 2018), they are on you with warnings and such.

Green Gecko wrote:Good work Taf. I'm probably making assumptions here but now that you've got paid gigs please double your rate on your next engagement before you get compared to the next guy charging £1 less per hour.

Why do designers need free copywriting? Because they're gooseberry fool businesspeople who charge too low to cover their overheads? If they can't write why not pay someone to do it well? I struggle to imagine a scenario where that's not a reasonable request.

Corporate conferences charge hundreds of pounds per head.

That's why at my last pitch I asked what the monthly turnover of the business was when I was told there is no budget yet. They just told me the monthly turnover there and then - £16,000 per month. So surely I can take 5-10% of that if my work is going to drive business by what, at least 10% per month for the following twelve months? My signage is good for 7 years. That's an extra £134,400 in revenue (at least, I can't be bothered figuring out compound % which is considerably more).

Compared to my last engagement where I totally strawberry floated up on a shitty day and quoted literally 20p over my minimum price per unit, I increased my profit on cost to something like 1000% and I charged over half of that upfront - and I often get paid upfront, even when I don't ask for it. I do that by convincing people I am worth even more than whatever the money is, and that just becomes an incidental figure at the bottom of the paperwork. In fact, I rarely have anyone even questioning the price of something anymore (and I still cut my prices occasionally because apparently I hate myself).

Do not compete on price alone. That is a retail or distributor model, that works purely on volume, but it does not work for freelancing.

I just think when you get into freelancing you don't want to spend 5 years sloooowly incrementing your rate when you could just do it tomorrow and still win as many jobs or even more jobs. You'll thank yourself when you're earning £10k more because you asked for it and you spend less time working for dreadful people. Because that's what a low rate generally gets you. I don't claim to always head my own advice that I have heard from many different very successful people (businesses in the £millions) because it's a massive learning experience and we all have shitty days, but it's something I wish I really took to heart earlier.

I'd also drop the term "freelancer" and call yourself a copywriter, as that's probably what you want. Your job isn't to dally around employment status and save people money there, it's to solve their problems and add value - if you do that you're on the way to being a valuable business partner instead of a gun for hire, and there are so, so many cheaper guns. It's really hard to sell yourself early on but I urge anyone employing themselves to cut out the no/low pay as soon as possible, within say, 6 months at an absolute maximum or the prognosis is not good for first of all your health or the business, the former being most important because without it, you cannot succeed in the latter.

You only need at most 3-6 good work samples to win bids - even if those are the only jobs you've ever done. And nobody needs to have heard of those companies either - just that you did a good job and you can do it again.

That's coming from someone with a long history of self-esteem issues trying to make it work.

Wow, thanks GG. This is all fantastic advice, and ties in really well with the situation both myself and my partner find ourselves in. For me I'm almost totally at sea when charging for a job. I did some quick research and came to the conclusion that charging per word is my best bet at the moment as I have no metrics to base a per hour charge off of. I'm going to set my prices around the average of the big proofreading houses (so around £0.01 per word below 30 000) which is, as far as I can see, still cheaper than your average freelancer proofreader, and we'll see where we go from there. I still have no idea how long the job is so I imagine they'll be some wiggle room too.

My partner has been a freelance designer for almost 2 years now (again here if anyone's interested). We recently had a situation where she had completed a large amount of work for the design conference I mentioned above and she was inclined to only charge for two thirds of it. Although large in scale, the conference had a relatively slim budget and the guy who held the strings had become a friend over the course of the thing. I encouraged her to instead seek the whole amount as, strawberry float it, she wasn't doing this gooseberry fool for fun. She was a bit worried she might get a push-back as it was a large amount of money, but it was handed over without comment.

She has also been through the slow incremental style of price management but, and she asked me to put this in, mainly thanks to your advice above she's now seriously reconsidering her pricing structure.

Drumstick wrote:Our system encourages people to come in whilst sick.

If you have 3 (or more) occurrences of sickness, or 7 days (or more) off total in ANY period of 12 months (i.e. 12th Feb 2017 to 12th Feb 2018), they are on you with warnings and such.

strawberry float. This means I will definitely be on a warning?

*edit* I'm not going to worry about it too much, the call centre and dispatch where I work have terrible sickness issues and I've never heard of anyone being sacked.

Hime wrote:

Drumstick wrote:Our system encourages people to come in whilst sick.

If you have 3 (or more) occurrences of sickness, or 7 days (or more) off total in ANY period of 12 months (i.e. 12th Feb 2017 to 12th Feb 2018), they are on you with warnings and such.

strawberry float. This means I will definitely be on a warning?

Er, I don't know. Do we work for the same employer and I just don't know about it?

Drumstick wrote:

Hime wrote:

Drumstick wrote:Our system encourages people to come in whilst sick.

If you have 3 (or more) occurrences of sickness, or 7 days (or more) off total in ANY period of 12 months (i.e. 12th Feb 2017 to 12th Feb 2018), they are on you with warnings and such.

strawberry float. This means I will definitely be on a warning?

Er, I don't know. Do we work for the same employer and I just don't know about it?

No but mine are generally pretty cunty so I've just assumed they use something similar.

Oh gooseberry fool, the proofreading job is 270 000 words. Which is approximately 10 times what I thought it might be. Jeez.

Dat dolla doe