Should I quit my job and go freelance? | Hacker News Reader

Should I quit my job and go freelance?

8 pointsjlc212 comments

I am fed up with the constant bullshit that goes hand in hand with being an employee and am thinking about going freelance. I usually have a job or two on the side, so I am used to dealing with clients.

I am 30 now and have been developing professionally for nearly 10 years. I am experienced in PHP, Python, Javascript and a load of other things. I know I have the skills needed to make this happen. The only thing that holds me back is the fear of being able to pull in a steady stream of clients. Ideally I would like to pair up with someone who has a solid idea but needs a tech guy to make it a reality.

Does anyone here have advice? Should I maintain a full time job while building clients on the side, or quit and put myself into a sink or swim situation? Am I making a poor decision by going freelance?

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Going freelance isn't in itself a poor decision. Quitting a paying job without a steady stream of work already lined up is.

Start trying to build a customer base on the side. Once they're bringing in enough to cover your expenses with a reasonably healthy percentage over that, then consider quitting your regular job.

Freelance work is not steady work, so you have to be sure that you can cover your expenses with regular work before you should be thinking about dropping a regular income for it.

You will need to build up a steady base of regular clients, and build up word of mouth. If you're not a designer, then it becomes really hard for people to discover you in any way other than word of mouth.

tl;dr: Don't quit your day job. Work extra hours until you're earning enough regularly and reliably to cover your expenses, then consider dropping your full-time job.

Same advice I've been hearing from a number of sources. Having two clients plus a fulltime job feels like I'm close to overloaded already, but I guess that's not a bad thing.

what works for some doesn't work for others. I quit my job without stream of work lined up and am not thinking of going back to a regular job.

IMO, It depends on whether you have enough savings or not (6+ months seems a minimum, I had more like 2 years) and whether you have a solid network already, and a few other parameters (your risk aversion for example).

Working a day job + having another salary worth of client work before you can leave seems like a recipe for burnout to me - but again, everyone's different.

Do you have in mind a list of potential clients ?

Basically you can go freelance two ways:

* Use a dedicated service like vWorker, oDesk etc ... You will compete with coders from all over the world, so expect some rough time until you build yourself a reputation. If you go this route I will strongly suggest to keep at least a part time job.

* You already have a list of potential clients and you intend to work for them directly. This is the preferred direction from my experience.

Good advice. I do have a few jobs in progress right now and have been working with a small but established local design firm to pick up more clients.

How much runway do you have? If you have enough savings to survive without bringing a dime in for, say, 3 months, give it a shot. If things don't work out, you can always find another job.

Not quite there yet financially, but close. And I agree, finding another job should be an easy task if freelancing doesn't work out.

3 months is light, I had a client not pay when I was using the 3 month rule and it was a bad situation. 6 is a better rule of thumb. I would not jump with at least 6 in the bank.

Where are you located?

Chicago

I might fit your scenario as to pairing with someone with a solid idea. I'm currently looking to have my idea built. I have zero technical skills (started Codeyear) and I will use my own money to get started. Just finished a fireworks click-through prototype only after learning about it here on HN. Either way, I am interested in paying to have it built or hopefully find someone interested enough to be a partner. Would love to find a competent and trustworthy person to move things forward.

Awesome I'd like to hear more. You can contact me at jlccc81@gmail.com (new email address set up for HN... trying to maintain anonymity for this thread).

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