The best part of a freelancer is that you are your own boss and are not answerable to time slots or working like a nine to five job. The manager is no more there looming over your shoulder. You do not have a specific routine that you need to follow.
It is possible to stay productive and ensure that your clients are happy if you follow ideal freelance project management tips.
1) Scope of work establishment
Make sure to establish clarity on the scope of work so that you do not have to make new changes on and off as per the client’s demands. It is difficult to make way for last minute changes and can be quite frustrating.
2) Creating a project plan
Communication is an important aspect of improving the customer relationships and so you should not be a freelancer who just receives the project details from your client who then conveniently disappears for days together. The execution and strategy plan needs to be discussed with the client and you need to keep them abreast of the new changes. If you are looking for more clients, then you need to have a plan that is convincing to the clients.
3) Setting realistic deadlines
Every client wants the tasks to be completed on schedule but makes sure to say NO if required especially if they set unrealistic deadlines. When making time commitments always give some extra time to yourself so that in case there is some undue delay, you will be able to cover it without much of a problem.
4) Plan workflow
Once the scope of work has been established and client approval with regards to the project plan is received, you need to plan the workload management. Process diagramming is the right way to go ahead.
If you are looking for the scope, you would agree that This is known as scope creep that provides the right information.
5) Visualizing timelines
Timeline is one such internal document that you may want to create especially if you are working on multiple projects and you wish to manage them efficiently.
The concept of work from home has gained popularity over the few months and hence remote employee time tracking has become important.
6) Make a checklist
Checklists have been in place for the longest time and people have underrated its importance. It’s not humanly possible to remember and manage minute details related to projects and hence, checklists come in handy since they enable us to streamline the daily tasks.