Dear Readers,

The modern freelancer is now totally mobile with laptops visible in many coffee shops, hotel business centres, trains, buses and on occasion the beer garden. Virtual offices are common with virtual project meetings via the internet being the norm for many freelancers.

This month’s newsletter provides a discussion on what our client’s think, the future trend in self-employment in Europe, an article by a freelancer on the importance of sales training and our freelancer joke at the end.

I wish you every success.

Like any customer-oriented company, we want to learn from our customers. Accordingly, last May we interviewed 38 active customers with valuable feedback being received. Typical suggestions for improvement include better assignment of freelancer categories, better freelancer qualification review and improving the user-friendliness of the search functions.

Among other things, we asked the question as to whether they planned to use the service again in the future with 35 answering yes. The 3 who said they would not use the service again did so as they had no future requirements.

We aim to continually improve the Freelancing.hk service. Your suggestions or comments are therefore very welcome. Simply mail them to us or call directly on +852-9452 9217.

According to a thesis by Christoph Becker of the University of Pforzheim, working in cooperation with the Freelancing.hk, it emerged that the number of self-employed workers continues to steadily rise. In 1992 only about half a million workers were self-employed whereas by 2007, this number doubled to just under one million. Within the group of self-employed the number of freelance freelancers has greatly increased. A good example of the increased demand is the IT industry where according to Becker in February 2007 some 20,000 positions were not able to be filled or were filled after a considerable delay. Freelancers therefore filled the gap. Researchers, such as Michael Horx, looking at future employment patterns, assume that the labour market is continuing to move in the direction of the flexible workforce and thus in the direction of independence freelancers. In the Spiegel interview, he said: 'Presumably, if this trend continues, by the year 2050 30/40 percent of all workers will self-employed.' This trend is also supported by taxation trend. For example, the taxes for self employed have decreased 6% since the early 90’s whereas full time employees have only received a 3% reduction. In Germany, full time employees pay an average of 26% of their income in tax. The self-employed on the other hand are paying an average of 15% on their total income.

Freelancers can present themselves with a short article in the Freelancing.hk-News. Today we present you a provider who is specialised as a business consultant.
___

Sales training with a difference! –I provide analysis services, sales consulting, project management and practical training. These services are individually adapted for the specific needs of the sales and service companies and directly contribute to increased sales success. I leverage my 12 years of sales experience and my 7 years of work as a life coach.

I train in the field and support sale personnel with phone techniques and client visit training activities. My services include a preliminary review including an analysis of previous sales activities.
___

A project manager who has just successfully completed a long project is still totally stressed. He decides that the best thing would be to spend a month alone on a farm away from it all. After two days of relaxation on the farm with long walks by the forest and through the meadows he is starting to get bored so he asks the local farmer whether there is any simple work for him to do.

The farmer invites him to sort potatoes. After an hour, the farmer sees the manager again and notices that the he’s nearly having a nervous breakdown. 'What’s the problem?' Asks the farmer with surprise, 'This is a very light work, the large potatoes go to the left and the small to the right....'

'This is a lot more stressful than my profession,' says the manager, 'In my job I make many choices, but not every second.'