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Murphy's Laws of Freelancing By and © 2005 Barnaby Kalan Chances are you've heard of Murphy's Law, which states: If anything can go wrong, it probably will. It was named after Capt. Edward A. Murphy, an engineer working on an Air Force Project designed to see how much sudden deceleration a person can stand in a crash. One day, after finding that a transducer was wired wrong, the test pilot cursed the technician responsible and said, "If there is any way to do it wrong, he'll find it." The contractor's project manager kept a list of "laws" and added this one, which he called Murphy's Law. Actually, what he did was take an old law that had been around for years in a more basic form and give it a name. Shortly afterwards, the Air Force doctor (Dr. John Paul Stapp) who rode a sled on the deceleration track to a stop, pulling 40 Gs, gave a press conference. He said that their good safety record on the project was due to a firm belief in Murphy's Law and the necessity to try and circumvent it. Aerospace manufacturers picked it up and used it widely in their ads during the next few months, and soon it was being quoted in many news and magazine articles. Murphy's Law was born. (source: http://www.murphys-laws.com/murphy/murphy-true.html If you're involved in freelancing or working as an independent consultant, you will undoubtedly recognize the following "Murphy's Laws" as oddly relevant to the work we do. Murphy's Laws of Freelancing 1. The phone doesn't ring until you leave your office. 2. If you want more business, book a vacation. You will receive several large, rush projects the day before you are scheduled to leave. 3. A project that has been put on hold will only become active again when you're swamped with other work. 4. That insignificant little project you turned down six months ago will show up again at this year's industry awards show -- as the Grand Prize Winner. 5. If a client or project doesn't feel right at first, it will feel worse in a few weeks. If you have that queasy feeling in the pit of your stomach right now, stock up on the Alka-Seltzer. Or better yet, politely explain why you are too busy to meet the deadline and decline the job. 6. There are only two rates at which you will get new business: too much and too little. 7. There is never enough time to do things right the first time. But there is always enough time to do them over again. 8. If you give your clients a choice of three concepts, they will invariably choose the one you like the least. 9. A rush project that requires weekend work will generally sit on the client's desk until the following Friday, 5 p.m. 10. Clients will not change strategy and direction on your project – until you've completed the project and billed for your time. And here's a bonus Murphy's Law: Murphy's Law of Client Approvals Senior executives will only find time to review your documents and make changes when: - So much time has passed that you barely remember the project and are up to your eyeballs with other work; - The print production deadline was yesterday; -You're leaving on vacation in two hours. But then, we wouldn't want it any other way, would we? Barnaby Kalan is a freelance copywriter based in Toronto and author of Outsourcing Yourself: How to Turn Your Job Into a Business for Greater Wealth and Security. For details, visit www.outsourcing-yourself.com
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