The freelance industry is growing, and scarcity of work results in a lot of stress. This is especially true for IT freelancers who don’t have any other source of income. Managing work at home can be stressful on its own. Add impatient and stubborn clients to the mixture, and you get a work environment that can lead to a stressful life. Fortunately, there are ways to survive as a modern IT freelancer and fight stress.
Work On Your Communication Skills
As an IT freelancer, you don’t have the commodity of clearing things up with your clients face-to-face. Even if you do manage to find a client willing to video conference with you, the chances are that they won’t be available when you need them.
The primary source of stress is miscommunication. So, you have to work on improving your communication skills and structurize the communication with your clients. While every client will have unique needs, you can learn about their needs by guiding them through a questionnaire of sorts. This will prevent any possible misunderstanding, and you will have the chat history as proof if something goes wrong.
Make The Work-Life Balance That Suits You
Many IT freelancers take too many projects upon themselves, thinking that it is a once in a lifetime opportunity. Well, all that cash coming their way is great, but once the deadlines come closing in and the work is far from being done, stress comes making work impossible to handle.
There is no need to stretch yourself when you are freelancing. You can do it at the beginning of your career to build positive ratings and generate reviews. But once you’ve established yourself as a trustworthy IT freelancer, you should be more picky about your projects.
This will enable you to make a work-life balance that suits your personal needs and preferences.
Find Ways To Blow Off Some Steam
Even if you do everything according to plan, you can end up being exposed to situations that cause stress. While you can think ahead and incorporate strategies to build up your resilience, you should also know how to deal with stress when you can’t handle it anymore. In a common tongue – know how to blow off some steam.
There are plenty of ways to do it. But since you have your personal preferences, we will let you choose an activity that seems right to you. Some of the things people often choose to blow off some steam include exercising, playing video games, hanging out with other people, writing, and others.
Try Your Best to Stay Organized
Scientists keep telling us that we are the creatures of routine. Maybe you should listen to them and see whether it will help you manage your freelance work better. The most common pitfall that awaits you on your freelance road is embracing too much flexibility. If you don’t know when you are eating, working, having fun, sleeping, and socializing, you may start experiencing tension, which you will interpret as stress.
Try bringing in the routine in small steps. Begin with having regular sleep and eating your meals at the same time every day and see where it takes you. If you start feeling better, try doing your work in batches. If the tension disappears, you are on the right track.
Don’t Get Stuck
Finally, to survive as an IT freelancer, you have to continue improving your skills and learning new technologies and best practices. Being stuck in one place, doing the same things over and over, and applying the same skillset to solve different problems will potentially lead to stress.