With unemployment projected to be as worse as Great depression or even worse, How do you currently feel? Nervous? Scared? Curious?
With the unprecedented increase in unemployment, will be taking risks to be a new norm?
Well let's be honest, many of us are worried about losing jobs in the coming months, or thinking what after Jobkeeper and Jobseeker payments end in September 2020.
The workforce trends have always been shifting even before COVID-19 struck in the recent past, But probably not many noticed as it was not a sudden pandemic shift like now, but many jobs have been automated and the shift of skills has been happening constantly.
The New era of the workforce - Future is just preponed.
According to Herald Sun, in 2017, One-third of the workforce were freelancers in Australia and that number was expected to rise exponentially by 2020.
Forbes stated Post COVID-19 will see a massive increase in the freelance market.
So, What will change? How do you prepare for it? How do you handle the situation?
Start freelancing.
For the first-time freelancers, I'm sure, it has been one hell of research in the past 2 months on the best ways to freelance. Let me break this down and help you to prepare for better freelancing.
5 must do’s to be established as a freelancer:
1. Stick to your best
Specialize in a niche and work with teams to deliver your skills. Find freelance gigs, where you can truly add value and work with fellow freelancers in teams.
2. Trust the process
While you are working full time in your company, the majority of the standards and processes are set by your employer and you just had to follow them. When you are by yourself now, it will be challenging to coordinate with the client and other fellow freelancers to be on the same page. Make sure processes are set well to follow standardization and best practices.
3. Always hustle
Don't shy-out. Be out there and network with people, attend events, and make new connections. Let people know who you are, what you contributed in your industry and how you can help. Register into Meetups, Slack communities, Facebook groups, and other online communities where you can network both online and offline.
4. Work in referrals
Always refer to other skilled professionals when you can't deliver something. Referrals will be a great way to get more gigs from your fellow freelancers too.
5. Get digitally equipped.
It's very important to keep your work on the cloud as much as you can, so it's easy to collaborate. There are heaps of free tools to start with for everything today to perform your work online or wherever you are remote. Some of the tools we love are Miro - Online whiteboard, Zoom- for video meetings, Figma for quick prototyping, GSuite or Dropbox for file storage, Slack for team messaging, Notion - as a daily planner, Trello - for project or campaign planning to name a few.
Change from here is inevitable. Prepare yourself to freelance and build your career as a flexible worker. It would be great to hear thoughts from others who have embraced and embracing flexible work lifestyle.