You also say that it helps to have a working spouse. With two children at home and as the main income earner, that would be nice to have, but we’ve survived on my income so far. There aren’t many job prospects in our area anyway.

Hopefully I’ll get up to 3 days a week billable work some day soon …

Have a happy and prosperous new year

First, love your blog and your tweets.

I’ve kept my research-and-consulting practice for over 10 years now, but it’s almost always scary… Also, the amount of salary I’ve given up is just as frightening.

I would add a couple of other things folks ought to think about to survive as a “freelancing scientist” (just off the top of my head):

– Having a spouse with an ability to make money, be patient, believe in you (or tolerate your career choice), keep the finances, and so much more.

– Branding oneself or one’s business. And, doing it in the right way.

– Having a thick skin. Not worrying what the idiots keep saying. SMILE.

– Believing in something bigger than just thriving/surviving as a consultant. Having a mission. Seeing it as something important that has to be done. This is key, because when the times get tough, you’ll need to re-energize yourself.

– Bringing many multiple talent sets together. Public speaking, writing, analyzing, consulting, marketing, sales, accounting, etc.

– And so much more as well.

Here’s the deal: A consultant must do the following:

3 days a week–billable work.
1 day a week–marketing and sales.
1 day a week–administrative stuff (and there is a lot of it).

A scientist/consultant must also do:
3 days a week–research and writing.

So it’s not easy. SMILE.

One key I think is to be able to figure out what your value-add is. In my field, what is needed are more people who translate complicated research (on learning) into workable (relatively simple) models (often visual models or real-world examples).

But hey, don’t listen to me, I’m still thinking it’s all pretty scary…

Exhilarating too.

you post some interesting thoughts. Here in germany e-learning and especially e-Learning consulting is a small and tough market. Most consultants I know are working as trainers and some as project managers also.