Communicating well, working carefully and assertively defending your rights are the three things that make up the basic logic of the deal. Everyone wants to take on a few private jobs to create more income in addition to their full-time job. But once we lose the blessing of the company, there will always be many problems for a person to take up a job. We don’t have professional legal to help us deal with legal issues and draft contracts, nor do we have sales to handle pre-sales and post-sales relationships, nor do we have team members to discuss the work together, we just go it alone to solve all the problems, I alone am legal, sales, finance, or execution. The work task itself may not be easy, but also may be owed money, customers play missing, customers are not professional and other issues.

In today’s article, I will share what we need to pay attention to when taking private jobs, based on my experience as a party A and party B. Let’s cut to the chase and get right to it.

You have to set the payoff from the beginning
Almost everyone has tried to be taken advantage of when they were young. About four or five years ago, I just started to do my own project is also embarrassed to mention the money directly, always thinking that the other party directly to give me a price, the best other party directly have a payment standard, I according to this standard to come on the line. At that time, the A-party, more friends of friends, with this relationship, I am more in the way of bad feelings to ask.

I met a party at that time, he was not quite sure of the workload, and not sure how much value I could create, and hoped that I would work for a while before discussing the remuneration. I worked for nothing for three or four months, and then quit the project because I was busy with my main business. Of course I had a problem, I didn’t mention it (I insulted myself like crazy).

It was only after I ended the project that I told him that I needed to calculate the return on my labor for that time. The other person confronted me and said: Do you know that I can totally not pay you now? I am paying you because I am giving you face.

I was depressed for a long time, why could he be so shameless? How could he say such a thing? Is my labor worthless? Because of my withdrawal, the whole project stopped for a while, so I was not useless, but why could he say that my labor was meaningless and that I paid because of the ridiculous “face”? Then I realized something whole, that the way you price yourself affects the way others price you.

You are weak, but as long as you ask for a high price, others will assume that you are competent and can come and help them solve their problems. If you don’t mention money, others will think you’re worthless and may even think they provided the opportunity for you to work on yourself. At that time, I didn’t put a price on my labor, so in their eyes, they offered me the opportunity to work on myself (although none of them had written “100,000 plus”, no one could edit videos, and no one had an award-winning work), and they wouldn’t think that I was capable and that I was here to solve problems. (bitter laugh)

Be sure to price your labor. You can price it according to the cost of time, or the difficulty of the project, or even the connections that need to be made, but in short, always determine the pay before any work begins.

Don’t listen to any “try before you talk about payment”, the customer who says such things may not want to not pay at first, but when he finds himself not to spend a penny things have been done, whether the latter can pay depends on the other party’s moral level. People are not reliable, only black and white contracts and bank deposits are reliable, never challenge the moral level of people.

After this project, I was suddenly enlightened about the “money” thing. Being brave enough to talk about money is respecting your own work and asking others to respect theirs. In the workplace, directly expressing your ambition to earn more money is also expressing to your boss that you can shoulder more responsibilities and solve more problems. If your boss is unwilling to invest in your future or avoids discussing your future when the company is going well and your work performance is shining, then you can also make your next move as early as possible.

How to finalize the fee
As I mentioned earlier, the finalized fee can be in accordance with the cost of time, project difficulty, priorities, and even the need to use contacts. If you can’t get it, you can set a price that you do not aggravate, anyway, a few more losses, more wrong work, you will know what you can hold how big the project, you can do more in what areas, these are life experience.

When we talk about remuneration, we also need to ask these questions with the client.

Is the fee pre-tax or post-tax? What are the tax points?
In what way is the payment made? Direct transfer of bank cards, Alipay, WeChat? Do I need to invoice?
When will the payment be made? At the end of the project? Or will I be billed for my part of the work? What day of the month?
If the order is large, you can ask for an advance payment of 30 to 40% before the cooperation starts. In reality such negotiations are difficult to succeed, and it is difficult to intimidate corporate clients in their personal capacity. Even the private company is not very useful, see how many small and medium-sized companies are dragged to death by upstream customers every year, you know how vulnerable downstream. Although not expectation, but can make more requests in can make requests, it is not allowed to become it?

In order to protect their rights and interests, we can also prepare their own cooperation agreement, before the start of cooperation with the customer with a signature, to avoid them from reneging on their debts. I also previously prepared an agreement because the customer reneged, but then never used, may also be relatively lucky. Later, the customers I worked with were all regular companies, and instead they would take the initiative to ask me to sign various agreements before cooperation.

Many people may think that in order to cooperate with big companies and give glory to the resume, they can take less money and just break even. In fact, big companies are not short of money – they would rather you get more money, do a good job, and save them the trouble, than to have a partner who gets less money and is average. So you don’t have to think “I’ll make less money because I’m working with a big company”, just take as much as you can.

In my experience, foreign companies have a complex and extremely slow payment process, but almost (let’s say 99%) don’t default on their payments. I had a payment of more than 30,000 that was delayed for a year, and when I thought the client was going to renege, it suddenly arrived because the client’s client paid (laughs). As for small and medium-sized businesses, it’s hard to say whether the people you’re working with will still be with the company after eight months of delays, and who else will be able to help you settle the bill (laughs). Don’t be embarrassed when chasing the money, just ask the other party: Boss, can you settle the bill?

Attitude is far more important than ability
In addition to taking jobs on my own, I will occasionally be party A. During the past four or five years, I have also experienced the mood of party A many times. For me, it is not the most difficult to deal with a big temper and poor ability of party B. The most troublesome is that party B quit the job. Although party B is to make money, but this is a private job, not his work to survive, the contract is only he is responsible for himself, unlike in the company, he does not want to do, leaving the company, there are other teams in the company can take over the work, will not slow down the progress of the project. So when I was a party A, the most annoying thing I heard was — I don’t want to do this job, and I don’t want the money. Every time a party B says this, I will have a black eye and immediately pull this person into the “never work together again” list, and will also decide whether or not to reprimand him according to the distance of love.

Many people who are new to private work feel that private work is not a full-time job, so they do not need to work as hard as they do in the workplace. This behavior is particularly unprofessional, unless you are too talented, great fame, customers have to run after you, or bad reputation, willing to work with you will be less and less.

In fact, the bullying arrogance, business will not last. Once they find the ability to pass (do not need to be talented, the difference between 80 points and 100 points for the layman) and a good attitude of the new party B, they will immediately choose him.

Out to do the B party, always remember that the attitude is far more important than the ability, because the difference between high and low ability a dozen points will not directly affect the project results. Of course, before the start of the project, because the time, place and values are not appropriate to refuse is very normal, after the cooperation reached, you can only do.

Cooperation is not just about having fun. After the cooperation starts, we pay for the labor, the client pays for the money, and both sides pay for the time and energy. Halfway through the project, suddenly said not to do, the customer has to temporarily go to find a back-up, may also have to spend a lot of money, the customer is to find you to save trouble, not to find themselves an extra trouble. To the customer tossed out so many things, even if you live well, affordable prices, the next time will not find you.

If you really find it difficult to do the task yourself, you can communicate directly and ask the client if they want to change, and ask them to pay themselves a certain amount of money according to the existing work product. You feel that the client is not good, you can also be completely fighting back and point out directly what kind of assistance you need. The solution is to solve the problem directly, not to run away, since the cooperation has been finalized, absolutely can not leave the showdown, even if the temporary end of cooperation, but also to mutual agreement.

Although I swore in the previous article that I would never work with people who quit, I tried to work with a few authors who temporarily quit when I first joined the industry a few years ago (because the task was urgent and the money was not much, so I couldn’t find authors with good service and good attitude), but the subsequent cooperation still broke my heart, either the first draft was so bad that my revisions were almost like rewriting, or the other party had a very bad attitude and didn’t reply to messages or refused to revise because they didn’t have time. The attitude of the other party was so bad that they didn’t reply to the message or refused to revise the manuscript because they didn’t have time. I still remember looking at the sporadic revisions, I was so helpless that I wanted to ask, “Why can’t you take half an hour of sleep to revise? But I didn’t ask, and it was a lot of work to continue the conversation, so I just revised it and didn’t cooperate in the future.

And I found that those who have left the showdown, in the subsequent cooperation will do worse and worse. (This is my own feeling, not supported by research data.) It’s like — I handed over a turd and you can eat it, so what’s wrong with me continuing to hand over turds next time?

As you can imagine, most of the talented writers have their own insistence, are more noble, and do not communicate well. I have met several authors who write particularly good novels and articles, because these works are their expression, and no clients restrict them, but once they face business work, their tempers can stink. One author saw the client’s request and told me “this is disgusting”. I asked him to confirm whether he wanted to take it or not, but he took the job anyway, but refused to change the manuscript after writing it, and finally I changed it. Because I had too much trouble in the process of cooperation, I would choose carefully whether to cooperate or not.

As I mentioned before, I will decide whether to reprimand him or not according to the proximity of the relationship. The word “reprimand” is a bit condescending, but… that’s generally the case. If I still want to work with this person (maybe he is not good-tempered, but really good), I will explain my feelings directly to the other party, and make it clear to him that he should never leave the project after it starts, which is very unprofessional.

How to take private jobs?
Prepare a portfolio
A portfolio has two main pieces of information: who I am and what I have done. This portfolio will quickly show the client that you have the ability and experience to help him solve his problems.

I will always update my portfolio with a list of what projects I have done and what I have accomplished, both in full-time work and privately. This project information is not as complete as a resume, I will only let people see my work. When a new client comes along, I send him the appropriate work according to his needs. I’m telling them: I’m a professional who takes jobs, I’ve served many clients like you, don’t worry, they can all be solved.

With your portfolio, the next time your friend needs similar service, he may refer you directly, so you will have a potential client immediately. You can say that a portfolio is a door knocker.

There are many authors who do not introduce themselves or prepare a portfolio when they first approach the A-side. The quality of their work may be good, but once they communicate, they will find that they are not in a state to work with people for a long time. If the project is more important, or if time is limited, I would give preference to authors who have worked with people for a long time, who have more experience, who can understand what the client wants, and who have a better service attitude. They won’t want to look for their own creative freedom and dignity in the client’s manuscript.

Speaking of which, there is another small story, I previously found a well-known film public author to write a film analysis, although the pre-communicated customer needs, but the finished draft is still very different, I asked him to change the draft, he said, he thinks the appointment is free creation, A is not allowed to interfere with his free will. I was silent and asked the referrer for a chat afterwards, and found that he had not taken on a custom business script before, so he did not know how to adapt.

Expand your clientele
Let everyone around you know that you are taking on private work and that you have very specific skills, such as writing, programming, design, editing, voiceover, selling merchandise, or even having contacts. In short, let everyone who knows you, and let everyone who is new to you, know that you have a wealth of experience. Sometimes when I see a potential client, I will just say “I can handle this job for you”. In short, let people know that you have the ability first.

After that is to serve each customer, you can not make everyone satisfied, but even if you do not do well, attitude well. You do a good job of the first order, the second order, the back of the customer will come one after another, one after another. I have a lot of projects are referred to me by customers because I do a good job and attitude. We are always waiting for the nobleman, in fact, we are their own nobleman, to do things carefully, never lack of money to earn.

In my understanding, good communication, serious work, resolutely defend their rights and interests, these three points constitute the basic logic of the transaction. Not to mess with things and not afraid of things, encounter unreliable party A party B, or have to carry out the gas field, the gas out, we are out to work, no one is more noble than anyone else.

If you have any new questions, welcome to ask in the comments section, I will reply one by one. Good luck with your “job”!