Working from home as a freelance writer, I spend the majority of my day in relative isolation. I look down at the tasks that I want to complete that day and then I just get down to work, letting my fingers fly across the keyboard as I compose blog posts, product reviews, and feature articles. Because I work in relative isolation, however, it can be a bit of a challenge to get a second opinion on my work or to get another pair of eyes to simply give my articles a glance. Contrast this to a conventional office setting where you can just spin your chair around and ask the guy in the next cubicle for a couple moments of his time.
If I was working out of a regular office and had regular co-workers, I may have been able to avoid some negative feedback that I received recently, because a co-worker may have made a similar comment before the criticism escalated to that point. I’m glad that I did get the feedback, since adversity is good for you, but it may have been better to prevent that situation from arising in the first place.
Going Online for a Faux Office Environment
So, if you work from home as a freelancer, what do you do if you want to seek a second opinion? Getting someone else to quickly proofread your work is usually a good idea, because they may catch grammatical errors that you may have missed. It’s easy to glaze over your own work, especially if you only wrote it a few moments ago. A fresh pair of eyes is of great value.
Thanks largely to the power of the Internet, it’s not too difficult to get some collaboration on your work. I picked up a project a few months ago that was a little outside of my regular realm. It wasn’t fiction, but it was a narrative (“story style”) and I don’t normally do narratives. While I could have focused on my strengths and declined the project, I took it on because I thought it could be fun and interesting. Turning to my Twitter friends, the Dot Com Pho crew, and a couple of other online contacts, I sent out my initial draft to get a little feedback.
Competitors and Collaborators
Even though it may seem like we are in competition with one another, it is also useful to work with other freelancers for mutual benefit. If one of my freelance writer friends asks me to take a look at something they have written, I’ll probably do it with the assumption that they would do the same for me. Aside from the online community, freelancers can also turn to significant others and other people in their lives for some pointers and a response. A second opinion is not only valuable in a medical context.
One of Your Best Proofreaders
If you do not have access to a network of like-minded contacts who can help you with editing, proofreading, and general feedback, perhaps the best second opinion you can get is your own. Go outside and take a break, returning to your work several hours later with a fresh pair of eyes. Smaller projects can be fired right through, but for anything more substantial, you’ll want to spend a little time to make sure it’s just right. Your reputation as a freelancer is on the line.
That’s more or less coopertition, isn’t it? You just have to be careful who you coopertate with. 😉
Excellent post, Michael.
I often turn to other freelances I know online to get a second opinion.
There was a time when I worked from a co-working office. Basically an office setup for freelances to pay a small monthly fee to give them a place to work outside the house. When I was using the co-working space, I would often turn to fellow co-workers who were again, other freelancers.
Do you have any co-working spaces in Vancouver? I’d be surprised if you didn’t.
Jamie
Yup, there are “work spaces” around town that you can rent. It can come in handy for accepting deliveries, for example, since the other people can sign for you.
I don’t know how much they charge, since I never really looked into it.
To give you an idea, I was paying £65 GBP per month (I’m guessing that’s somewhere around $120 CAD). For that, I got access to a desk, a Mac Pro with dual 32inch screens, board rooms and all the equipment I could ever need. Here is the place I was using: http://www.oldbroadcastinghouse.com
Jamie
Presumably, that price includes things like Internet access as well? Fax line? Is there a receptionist?
Internet access is included. I forget whether a fax line was included. There was the option to pay more (around $250 a month) and you could have a dedicated desk rather than others using it when you weren’t in the office. With that option, I believe you could get a phone line and have it put through to the receptionist who would then transfer them to you.
For the lower fee package, you’re essentially getting a space you can use three or four times a week, a better environment for meetings, the connections from others around you, internet and all the development software a Web developer could dream of on the Mac’s.
They even have a Big Brother style diary room for recording video blogs. 🙂
If there isn’t something similar at similar prices in Vancouver, maybe it’s time Chow got his finger out (and wallet) and set something up for the bloggers and freelancers. 🙂
Jamie
Oh, I’m pretty sure there’s something, but it’s never something I really considered. I like my 15-second commute too much.
I second the idea of working on co-working spaces in a manner that lets you get feedback from other writers on your work. From my own experience, the best feedback tends to come frmo other freelancers but not necessarily those who work in the area of expertise that you work in. For example, I often have travel writing friends review my technology writing and vice versa to avoid issues with competition while still trading great advice on the work.
I do think that you can rely on significant others in your life to help give you feedback as well but I would note that these opinions have to be taken with a grain of salt. People who don’t write for the web sometimes try to give helpful feedback that doesn’t end up being applicable because they just don’t really get the point of the format of the writing.
Way to go for looking for ways to improve your writing as you work from home!
There are a few people that I have had proof blog posts before, as I too have done.
One person that I regularly ask is my wife, although she always cringes. She has no interest in the type of posts that I normally write but I think that actually helps.
It truly is amazing though to see how people across the Interweb are usually so willing to help one another.
I’ve had Tammy proofread a couple of my posts, but usually just look them over myself. I can certainly see how it could be beneficial to send stuff to other freelancers and such, but would stick to the recommendation of Kathryn to work out a proofreading agreement with someone in a different niche.
Definitely getting someone else to proofread is an advantage. Not only do they catch typos, but sometimes can offer some creative criticism.