Annie Ridout - The Freelance Mum

4th Estate

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This eBook first published in Great Britain by 4th Estate in 2019

Copyright Annie Ridout 2019

Annie Ridout asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

The information in this book is for general guidance only and is not legal advice. If you need more details on your rights or legal advice about what action to take, please see an advisor or solicitor.

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Source ISBN: 9780008313630

Ebook Edition January 2019 ISBN: 9780008313647

Version: 2018-12-17

For Joni, whose birth prompted me
to change the way I work

Contents

Ive been a freelance mum for the past four years and for me, it works very well. Im the primary caregiver for my children, but I also support myself financially and contribute to the overall household income. I can afford to buy food and clothes for myself and my kids and I can save up for family holidays. The main issue for me when I first went freelance at least initially was money; you dont have that lovely set lump sum appear in your bank, miraculously, at the end of each working month like a PAYE employee does. However, as I discovered, there are ways to secure a reliable income and establish some financial stability when you work freelance as a mum, and Im going to teach you how.

This book will walk you through the necessary steps to setting yourself up as a freelance mum. From deciding on your career path to launching a website, social media, getting your name out there and perfecting your brand. Ive also included a comprehensive guide to the childcare options available to freelance working mums, suggested daily routines for optimum productivity, as well as tips on establishing and maintaining healthy worklife boundaries. Using my own experience, alongside tips and advice from a multitude of other mums who have successfully made a freelance career for themselves, Ill show you that with hard work and determination, any mother can thrive as a freelancer.

Freelancers were worth 119 billion to the UK economy in 2016.

There are 4.8 million self-employed workers in the UK, making up 15.1 per cent of the UK workforce and weve almost all chosen it for the same reason: flexibility. You can decide your own hours and avoid the slog of a daily commute. But the 79 per cent increase in freelancing mums over the past ten years speaks volumes about where women stand in terms of work and family. Many of us are keen to continue developing our careers after having children, but only if we can find work that fits comfortably around family life.

This desire to find flexible work might well be the reason why 54,000 women in the UK are losing their jobs each year while pregnant or on maternity leave. The work culture welcomes back new mothers who will continue working just as they did before they went on maternity leave same hours, some overtime but request part-time work, and youre out. This is when setting up as a freelancer becomes less about flexibility and more about necessity. With no job to return to following maternity leave, women might register as sole traders, or launch their own businesses that they can run alongside parenting. And these so-called mumpreneurs contribute an impressive 7 billion to the UK economy each year.

Its not always a smooth transition from PAYE employee to freelance mum, but once youre up and running, it really does offer flexibility in terms of fitting your career around your family. I lost my full-time, well-paid copywriting job when I left to have a baby, which led to something of a career and identity crash. But I soon realised that my 96 MondayFriday job in east London would have been incompatible with the type of mother I wanted to be. So I flipped my panic into productivity, and when my daughter turned one I launched a digital parenting and lifestyle magazine called The Early Hour.

Three years in, The Early Hour reaches 100,000+ parents a month. Ive learned how to monetise my online platform and build a career for myself around it including writing freelance articles for the Guardian, Red Magazine, Stylist and Metro. Ive appeared on BBC radio and TV, and I spoke at Stylist Live alongside celebrity chef Jasmine Hemsley and the founder of Propercorn, Cassandra Stavrou. The Early Hour has acted as a springboard for me; leading to lucrative consultancy work, well-paid copywriting gigs and being made a partner at womens app, Clementine. This has been my way of sticking two fingers up to the company who employed me as a copywriter but thought Id become useless as soon as I gave birth. It was my way of saying, you can take away my job but you cant take away my power.

Thats not to say its been easy. It hasnt. Ive had to learn everything from scratch: accounting, building a website, SEO (getting my website to the top of Google searches), how to do PR after working out what PR actually is networking, making contacts, social media, how to monetise my website Basically, everything that running a small business entails. And all while looking after my two children, who are now aged four and one. But I quickly discovered that motherhood can give women the incredible tool of productivity; you find ways to squeeze work into tiny pockets of time you didnt even know existed before kids came along.

The thought of leaving behind a salaried job, shared office and daily briefs might feel scary, but if youre keen to spend more time at home than at work, this is probably the path for you. You might have clients or colleagues you collaborate with in some way, but ultimately, you are the boss. You decide your dress code, what hours youll allocate for work and how much time youll spend with your kids or doing yoga, or going for a run. There will be no one checking whether youre back from your lunchbreak on time. If you want to spend all day with your kids then work in the evenings once theyre asleep, thats totally viable.

Ultimately, there is no easy option when it comes to balancing motherhood and a career. Leaving your child at nursery when you go off to work isnt easy. Parenting full-time certainly isnt easy. But freelancing, as a mum, might just be as close as you can get to finding a comfortable, guilt-free, worklife balance.

Youve decided to take the plunge and go freelance. Perhaps youve left behind a salaried job and want to find work to fit around your kids. Maybe your contract ended when you gave birth, as it did for me. Either way, well done for making this decision. It wont be easy but it will be fun, as long as youre working in a field that excites you. So, how to decide on your freelance path?