PROS OF FREELANCE

• Freelance can be an attractive proposition to an employer, as they are not tied to keeping you on. When you’ve just left college, you haven’t established yourself in the industry, so it can be seen as less risky to an employer to take you on to do some freelance work and see how you go.
• Often freelancing can be a foot in the door to a permanent job, a sort of ‘try before you buy’ for the employer. You get to suss them out too!
• Freelance can be a fantastic way to work for a number of very different clients.

• You will be able work with lots of different designers and have exposure to many different design styles.
• Not sure whether you’d like to work in a design agency, advertising agency or even in-house? Freelancing gives you the opportunity to try a bit of everything out.
• You get to choose when you want to work.
• You’re not tied to any employer.
• There’s less chance of getting involved in office politics. You’re not going to be there for long, so why do you care? You can just go in, do your work and leave.
• If you don’t like the job, it’s easy to move somewhere else.
• There’s the chance to earn more money per day freelancing than in a permanent role.
• You may be able to work from home.
• You’re your own boss. There’s a definite feeling of autonomy and independence.
• You get to meet lots of people and build up your contacts in the industry. Once you start building a reputation for yourself, you may find that you don’t have to seek out work so much, but that you get called back by the same places when they are busy time and time again.
• It’s easier to take longer periods off to go on holiday to pursue other creative projects. This can be great if you’re also a budding animator, photographer, illustrator…
• You can negotiate your own rate. Once you start gathering experience, you can up your rate accordingly.
• You can sometimes charge for overtime – depending on the employer. You must pre-negotiate this before you start.

CONS OF FREELANCE

• You are often called in because an agency is really busy, such as in a pitch situation. This can be pretty intense.
• You don’t get any real downtime or ‘quiet days’ like you would in a permanent role, as if you’re not working, you are costing the company money, so they won’t keep you on.
• It can be hard to plan holidays and other stuff, as you never know when you’ll be working.
• You could be called in to work all weekend and lots of late nights, especially in a pitch situation.
• As you’re often moving around from agency to agency, you often don’t get to bond with co-workers and you always have to get to know new people and suss out how they work. You can consequently always feel like the ‘new kid at school’.
• You may not have such a large say as a freelancer. You can always have a creative opinion, but if someone in the agency doesn’t agree, you often have to go along with what they say, as you are in effect ‘the hired help’. If you become too disagreeable, they can just get rid of you. This can be frustrating, as you often just have to follow other people’s ideas, against your better judgement.
• You can sometimes have less creative input, as you are seeing someone’s idea through.
• You often start a project and you may not get to see it all the way through, so it can be harder to build up your folio.