If that client is now providing more than about 20% of your business, stop cheering right now and start panicking.  No, seriously.

There’s an expression for this sort of client – the Gorilla Client.  Sure, that big client seems great, and yes, big projects with lots of work/pay really are. But like having a big, powerful gorilla in your office, it can be a problem that becomes bigger and stronger than you are.  Any problem with that client is now a potential threat to your entire business.  You’ll find yourself structuring your business around the needs of that single client. You’ll find yourself tempted to leave off working for other clients and concentrate on that one[1].   Sure, you want to provide good service.  Good service should be at the heart of your business.  But you do not want to rise and fall at the whim of a single client.

So, why do we accept Gorilla Clients?  It’s mostly laziness and greed, from what I can see.  If you don’t love marketing (and plenty of freelance writers don’t), any excuse to be able to write and not market sounds like a lot of fun.  If you’re getting plenty of work, it’s hard to be motivated to do something you don’t like.

A good way to avoid this is to budget your time carefully.  Since you’re in charge of your work day, make sure you dedicate a certain percentage of that day to marketing no matter how busy you get.   Yeah, I know.  If you’re swamped with work from one client, it’s hard to make yourself go looking for more work.  Suck it up and do it.

Remember that as a freelancer, you can choose how much work you’re willing to accept as well.  How many hours a month are you willing to work?  I go monthly rather than weekly, because there will be plenty of weeks that you’ll be hammer and tongs at a deadline for one particular client.  That’s okay as long as you’ve got more work on deck, and are keeping up on your marketing. What you don’t want to do is let any one client suck up your professional time over a significant period of time.

Hours Per Month	Hours Spent Marketing	Housekeeping	Time for Client Work	Maximum Time Allowed Per Single Client Per Month
120	24	12	84	16.8
140	28	14	98	19.6
160	32	16	112	22.4
200	40	20	140	28

I actually consider myself a client for purposes of time management.  As a writer, there’s a certain amount of non-commercial “sharpening the saw” that’s necessary to stay fit, stay alert and stay skilled in my profession[2].  Now I don’t dedicate anywhere near to 20 hours a month on it, but I do make sure that I leave time to write, to work on projects with no direct result and to make sure that I’m exploring avenues that might be useful in the long run.

This article is meant for the one-man shop.  If you’re finding that you need at least 40 hours a week specifically to spend on client work, chances are good that what you really need is at least a part-time admin assistant or sales person.  If you’re in love with being a one-man shop, raise your rates.  That’ll take care of the problem well enough and you’ll bring your time management back into balance.

[2] This article leaps to mind.  I don’t have a paying client for it at the moment.

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3. Do You Recreate the Office When You’re Self-Employed

Do you have goals in your business?   Of course you do, or you’re not going to stay in business very long.  You need goals.  But more than needing goals, you need to set intelligent goals.  An intelligent goal has three qualities:

1. An intelligent goal is concrete.
2. An intelligent goal is time-based.
3. An intelligent goal has clear steps to lead to completion.

While it’s not quite comme il faut to tell stories about one’s children in a business setting, I can think of no better example than a recent incident with my teenaged son.  His bedroom was appalling.  Legos, model construction projects, his computer, books, stuffed animals, boxes of bulding toys, electronics kits, model trains, school books and school papers all fought for space.  They’d spilled over onto the floor.  At least, I thought his room had a floor, but I was beginning to think it was some sort of rumor.

So, what would any parent do?  A parent says in a Very Serious Tone, “You have a week to get your room clean.”

Now there’s a goal, right?

It’s a goal, sure enough, but it’s not yet an intelligent goal.  It’s time-based, which is a good first step.  He has a week to complete it.  But, that’s not enough.  “Clean” simply isn’t a concrete concept to a thirteen year old boy.  This goal is also missing clear steps that will lead to completion.  In the case of excessive clutter, this can lead very quickly to overwhelmed paralysis.

Because I did not want to sit in that room and supervise every darned step, I sat down with my son and took a blank sheet of paper.  We divided his room into six zones.   I told him he needed to complete a zone a day.  I also defined what “done” would mean¹.  I explained that he would need to take toys that he had not used within a certain timeframe, or was bored with, into basement storage or put into the donations bag to take to a local charity.  He’s now working quite steadily because he understands what needs to be done.  He isn’t really complaining about it because he’s not overwhelmed by a project that seems endless.  Each step has an end to it.  There’s always the satisfaction of the small completion points that lead to the overall large goal of a newly organized room.

These principles can apply to any goal or project.  Sure, we’re not teenagers, but we’re still human.  “Done” feels good to us.  Good goals have many opportunities for that completion satisfaction.  Those small steps will lead to the desired end result.

For 2009, when you’re thinking about where your business is going, take a cue from my kid and make sure that not only do you have the goals, but that they’re intelligent.

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