Signup today, come here me speak in the OC at TEDx Irvine. I have the privilege of sharing the stage with some amazing speakers (More info here). The theme of the day will be “change agents”, the title of my talk will be “transitions”.
When: November 17th, 6 – 9pm
Where: Rancho Las Lomas
Buy your tickets today, hope to see you there!
As a speaker at the Creative Freelancer Conference, I’d like to invite you to join HOW magazine and Ilise Benun of Marketing Mentor in Chicago June 23-24 for this not-to-be-missed conference for creative solopreneurs.
You’ll get two days packed with expert advice on marketing and finances; insight into the fine art of balancing your work and home life; details on developing a viable business plan (this is my topic, To Plan or Not To Plan?); plus ample opportunity to network with other creative freelancers from across the country.
Plus, I’m pleased to have the opportunity to offer you a special “tell-a-friend” $50 discount on the CFC full-conference rate*. Just input CSPKR in the discount code box during the registration process, and HOW will deduct $50 from your total registration.
For complete session descriptions, speaker info and everything else you need to know about the Creative Freelancer Conference, including a quick and easy registration form, visit www.CreativeFreelancerConference.com
Don’t miss this event – register now! And be sure to use discount code CSPKR to get an additional $50 off the registration price*!
* Discount cannot be combined with any other discount offers. Cannot be used in conjunction with The BIG Ticket registration option.
I’ve been invited to speak at the AIGA Y Conference this weekend in San Diego.
As with other times when I’ve spoke I’m always convicted during the note preparation time. It’s then when I have to really think about what I believe and why…and put it in writing *gasp. This weekend I will be doing a two hour ThinkShop on the subject of ‘hiring clients’.
The premise of the talk is that we should market ourselves better so we can be more selective. It’s not about finding clients that are easy but more about finding clients that enable us to do our best work. Some of my key points will be…
It should be an interesting weekend and I look forward to the conversations and hang time with my fellow creatives.
My friend Joven and I launched a little side project today called My4Hats. Our goal is to provide simple reading and actionable tasks for the creative professional. We are calling them “action sheets” basically an 8-10 page PDF that you can download on a certain topic and use to make some incremental changes in your business. Keep it simple and rock!
ps. For fun (and to give ourselves a hard deadline) we hired the crew at IWEARYOURSHIRT.COM to help promote the launch of our first ‘Action Sheet’.
More to come….
While independent workers—self-employed, freelance, part-time, and temporary—comprise 30% of the U.S. workforce, there is limited information about these workers. To help fill that knowledge gap, please complete the Freelancers Union Annual Independent Worker Survey. Survey results inform the public (see previous survey coverage in The Wall Street Journal and USA Today) and policymakers about issues that affect workers like you. Based on data from previous surveys, policymakers have made concrete changes to help support independent workers—from reforming the Unincorporated Business Tax to introducing legislation (S8084/A11520) to help independent contractors collect what they’re owed from nonpaying clients. Needless to say, the more respondents there are, the better the data is, and the greater the chance of helping you as an independent worker. So please take a few minutes to complete the survey here.
PS. I will be doing a webinar for Freelancers Union on March 16th at 5pm PST – Save the date, details to come.
I have to be honest. I’ve had my head in the clouds lately. All my discipline and routines seem to have flown right out the window.
Initially, I felt guilty that I had lost some of my focus. But the truth is, sometimes you walk, sometimes you run, and sometimes you just need to sit still. The other thing I’ve noticed is that when my head is in the clouds, I tend to dream more. I think about how things could be or what if this or that. Sometimes I get so focused on pushing the cart forward that I forget to stop and see if the cart could be improved in some way.
This head in the cloud feeling has resulted in limited blogging for me recently, but it has certainly given me all sorts of ideas.
I have, however, written a couple of posts for the Creative Freelancer Blog. Below are some links. Check it out:
The ol’ client bait and switch…read more
More to come…
I had the exceptional privilege of speaking at the Creative Freelance Conference this weekend (co-hosted by HOW and Marketing Mentor). At this amazing event, I got to speak to my people. Like everyone else in the room, I will return to the trenches and try to figure out better ways to work. In fact I may be using my “no” button tomorrow.
I always walk away from a talk having received more than I gave, and this weekend was no exception. The conference was great. Here are my personal highlights:
1. Conferences are more about the “in-between” for me, about the happy hour conversations or the walks back to the hotel. That social time is what made it really special for me, and I met some really great people at CFC. Mark Duebner may have adopted me into his tribe and I think Steve Gordon Jr has a serious sneaker habit. So many great people.
2. All of the speakers were great. I got nuggets of wisdom from all of them. But I especially loved Dyana Valentine’s perfect pitch talk. More than her content, though, I just really think she’s rad. She prods people to embrace what makes them unique. Her name tag handouts ROCK! Mine read, “Hello I’m really good at calling people out.” Her excitement about teaching people is contagious. And I could not agree more; we are all so unique.
3. Connecting with others in Denver made for a great trip. I had lunch with a client, drinks with my friend RaShelle from inVision, lunch with a friend and even saw a Rockies game before I left.
I hope people got something out of my rant. I love speaking and could see myself doing more of it. Thank you to Ilise and Peleg for inviting me.
This is the longest time I’ve been away from my wife and kids in a while. Don’t worry, guys; Daddy will be home soon.
Thanks to all my friends who came out yesterday to My4Hats. It’s much easier to speak when I can look out and see so many familiar faces, you know who you are.
And thanks to the people who nod in agreement or give me a grin when I make eye contact. It’s great encouragement for me to keep moving through the presentation.
I rarely feel nervous anymore when I speak, at least not how you would think. I’m not nervous about being in front of a crowd or being on stage, I do however feel nervous about having an impact. I worry that the material won’t be good enough or that somehow it won’t fit who is in the room. I feel the weight of being significant always, it never goes away. It’s why I work.
If you haven’t already head over to the Westamerica graphics blog and download the resource sheet that Joven and I put together. Also, feel free to send a thank you email to WAG, they don’t have to offer free learning days like WAGU but they do it because they care. Perhaps they feel the same weight about helping others and being significant?
And thanks to Tim McMahan for posting the above photo on Facebook which I stole for this post.
I look forward to sharing with you some of my rants, raves and ideas. But most of all I hope to be helpful. Thank you for reading and please let me know if you have any specific topics you would like me to cover. Best.
