It's annual planning season! Where have you come from? Where are you going? In this episode I unpack a successful planning process. Planning gives us a road map to follow. Instead of launching the new year with a few nebulous resolutions, we can have clear goals, strategies and tactics in place that will empower us to make a difference. In planning you define your purpose and bench marks. With a solid destination and purpose — and if we’ve written them down and schedules — we’re far more likely to achieve our goals than if we choose to wing it.

Most clients will pay you — on time. But it happens that some don’t. There are a variety of reasons why some don’t pay. No matter what the reason, non-payment is one of the most frustrating and commonplace problems freelance creatives deal with. When it happens, what’s your response? You need an easy and effective response so that other projects aren’t compromised. In this episode I start out with policies you can implement to reduce the likelihood of non-payment, walk through a 3-part follow up sequence, and wrap up with a litany of 10 common reasons why clients don’t pay.

One inconvenient truth about freelancing is the fact that, no matter how well you get along with your clients, no matter how effective your work is, or how smoothly a project is going, clients will leave you. Even long-term client relationships come to an end. I lay out 12 reasons why clients leave, and most of them have absolutely nothing to do with the quality of your relationship or the effectiveness of your work. And, I share a 4-point approach to working with your clients to keep them returning to you.

Every freelance creative needs a vision — a reason to look beyond their current circumstances. Our work has to be about more than simply making a client happy or earning a living. Vision keeps us moving forward toward a better future, helps us make good decisions, and set meaningful goals. Without vision, we will falter and even given up. In this episode I explore the important of vision and share how to craft a vision statement you can hang your hat on.

Whether you serve clients by offering creative services and creative results are your clients, or you create a product that you sell to customers, you won't accomplish anything without addressing four aspects of success. I describe these as mission, mindset, mechanics, and marketing. These all work in unity to support and grow your freelance business.

What's the end result of our creative efforts? What responsibility do we as creative professionals have toward the end user? What responsibility do we have to uphold the public good? What do you do when your ethics and your client’s ethics clash? Creative work involves more than proper function, ease of use and visual appeal. There's a bigger horizon we can't lost sight of, both in the work we create and in how we serve our clients.