Freelance practice

This branch covers working as an independent writer, divided by the side of the practice each member handles: setting the practice up, finding and keeping clients, the agreement and the price, and running the business, up to handing work to other writers and growing the practice into a company. Building and running a writing team inside an employer is left to leading a writing team and moving back into employment to making a career move.

• Setting up a freelance practice — the crossing itself: deciding whether to freelance at all, what to settle before you leave, the business form, the insurances, what to call the practice, the home office, where to ask, and setting up abroad
• Finding and keeping freelance clients — the client side of a freelance practice: why a client hires a freelance, the niche and the materials, the marketing channels and the website, the approach, the agencies and recruiters, and the fit, the boundaries and the failures of the relationship
• Freelance agreements and pricing — the commercial terms of a freelance engagement: what a rate has to cover and the going rate, undercharging and testing a price, hourly against project and how colleagues bill, the time and resources charged for, held time, the currency, the negotiation, the scope, who the contract is with, the risk clauses, and when the money arrives and how it is collected
• Running a freelance writing business — the business behind the writing: the market and what it competes on, what the practice earns, the routine and the systems, tax and social security, the machines and the documents, data protection in the practice, delegating and subcontracting, growing the practice into a company, and the personal provision