想拥有一个自由时间的职业

So you're a freelancer. Maybe you do some side work, maybe it's a full-time gig for you. Maybe you're the entrepreneur behind a small startup, still functioning like a freelancer.

所以你是一个自由职业者。 也许您需要做一些辅助工作，也许这对您来说是一个全职工作。 也许您是一家小型创业公司背后的企业家，仍然像自由职业者一样运作。

In these and many other cases (I'm looking at you, workaholics who don't stop when you get home), people often have trouble managing time.

在这些以及其他许多情况下(我在看着你，回到家后不会停下来的工作狂)，人们常常很难安排时间。

This article looks at some of the main time management challenges freelancers (and others) have to face, and considers some practical solutions.

本文探讨了自由职业者(和其他人)必须面对的一些主要的时间管理挑战，并考虑了一些实用的解决方案。

确切地说，什么是“工作”？ (What, Exactly, is "Work"?)

It's important to understand the difference between work and leisure.

了解工作与休闲之间的区别很重要。

You sit at your desk flipping through Twitter; or skimming articles as you research a topic; or maybe note-taking; or contributing to an open-source project; or helping a colleague with a problem.

您坐在办公桌前浏览Twitter； 或在研究主题时浏览文章； 或做笔记； 或为开源项目做出贡献； 或帮助有问题的同事。

These activities can look like leisure activities—not only to outsiders, but even to yourself. Of course, in some cases they are! But often, they help to further your skills or career goals, and aren't simply for entertainment.

这些活动可能看起来像休闲活动，不仅对局外人，甚至对您自己。 当然，在某些情况下是！ 但通常，它们有助于提高您的技能或职业目标，而不仅仅是娱乐。

重新定义您的工作理念 (Redefine Your Concept of Work)

If your activities help to boost your online presence or portfolio, or enhance your ability to make money or generate leads, then they're related to work. They are work. So treat them like work.

如果您的活动有助于提高您的在线形象或投资组合，或者增强您赚钱或产生潜在客户的能力，那么它们与工作有关。 他们是工作。 所以对待他们就像工作。

保持纪律 (Maintaining a Discipline)

Of course, you still have to prioritize. Do these activities have a higher priority than other work? Than leisure activities? Than family time? You need to work out a realistic balance between all these.

当然，您仍然必须确定优先级。 这些活动是否比其他工作具有更高的优先级？ 比休闲活动？ 比家人的时间？ 您需要在所有这些之间找到现实的平衡。

It's a difficult balance, as a freelancer or other working professional, because these "grey area" activities creep into your life. With social networking applications, news and email on our mobile devices, we can literally be working anywhere, at any time, in one way or another.

对于自由职业者或其他工作专业人员而言，这是一个艰难的平衡，因为这些“灰色地带”活动席卷您的生活。 借助社交网络应用程序，移动设备上的新闻和电子邮件，我们实际上可以在任何地方，任何时间以一种或另一种方式工作。

Setting clear boundaries of what is work, and then stopping work when it's time to do so—for however long you intended—is very important. Give yourself a mental break before returning your nose to the proverbial grindstone.

设定清楚什么是工作界限，然后在需要时停止工作(无论您打算长时间)，这非常重要。 在让自己的鼻子回到众所周知的磨石之前，先给自己一个精神上的休息。

难以捉摸的工作与生活的平衡 (The Elusive Work-life Balance)

This leads into a topic that many of us know and love—the elusive "work-life balance". In the United States, a 2014 Gallup Poll says that the average work-week is 47 hours. That, unfortunately, is not including the random, off-the-clock work done at home. And it definitely isn't the norm for freelancers or entrepreneurs, who may work many more hours than that! So how do you balance these things?

这导致了我们许多人都知道和喜欢的话题—一种难以捉摸的“工作与生活的平衡”。 在美国， 2014年盖洛普民意测验显示，平均每周工作时间为47小时。 不幸的是，这还不包括在家中进行的随机，不定时的工作。 对于自由职业者或企业家来说，这绝对不是规范，因为他们的工作时间可能更多！ 那么如何平衡这些事情呢？

不要混淆休闲工作 (Don't Confuse Work for Leisure)

Firstly, define what your work involves. Be clear about this, so that you don't fall into the trap of working when you're supposed to be relaxing with the family etc. (Are you sure you're relaxing with that phone in your hand?)

首先，定义您的工作涉及的内容。 请对此进行清楚说明，以免在与家人等一起放松时不会陷入工作的陷阱。( 确定要用手拿手机放松吗？)

安排它 (Schedule It)

Secondly, plan ahead. If you want to have a bowling night, movie outing or date, schedule it. It makes it more real to you, and the time really seems blocked off, preventing you from filling it with other stuff.

其次，提前计划。 如果您想打保龄球，看电影或约会，请安排时间。 它对您来说更加真实，而且时间似乎确实被挡住了，从而使您无法用其他东西填充它。

说不 (Saying No)

Thirdly, learn to say no. This is an age-old adage, but it's a good one to remember. And it applies, most of all, to yourself.

第三，学会说不。 这是一句古老的格言，但值得记住。 最重要的是，它适用于您自己。

Freelancers and entrepreneurs are often constantly busy—either because it's in their nature to be, or because it's in the nature of self-employment.

自由职业者和企业家经常忙于工作—要么是因为其本性，要么是因为它是自雇。

Say no. Set aside time to manage the other areas of your life, and don't put any more tasks on this day's list. Say no to yourself, and to others, and begin filling another day.

说不。 留出时间来管理生活中的其他方面，不要再将任何其他任务放在今天的清单上。 对自己和他人说不，然后再开始另一天。

任务管理系统 (Task Management Systems)

It's crucial that freelancers and entrepreneurs manage tasks effectively. Yet many of us don't, or at least don't do so effectively.

自由职业者和企业家必须有效地管理任务，这一点至关重要。 然而，我们中的许多人没有，或者至少没有有效地这样做。

When tackling the exciting—but daunting—adventure of working for yourself, or starting your own business, you may find yourself with much less free time than you previously had. It can help to manage all of the various things on your plate—both work-related and not—using a task-based rather than time-based approach.

解决自己工作或开始自己的事业这一令人兴奋但艰巨的冒险时，您可能会发现自己的空闲时间比以前少了很多。 它可以使用基于任务的方法而不是基于时间的方法来帮助管理与工作相关的所有事情，而不是与工作相关的事情。

I recommend that you use a task management system to organize your schedule. Examples of these include Todoist, Wunderlist, OmniFocus, Trello, Asana. I currently use a combination of Todoist and Trello.

我建议您使用任务管理系统来组织计划。 这些示例包括Todoist ， Wunderlist ， OmniFocus ， Trello和Asana 。 我目前使用Todoist和Trello的组合 。

If apps aren't your thing, at least use a pen and paper system to organize yourself. Either way, take some time to assess the options and choose one or more that work for you. And once you've make your decision, try to stick with it, at least for a while.

如果不是您想要的应用程序，请至少使用笔和纸系统来组织自己。 无论哪种方式，都需要花费一些时间来评估选项，然后选择一个或多个适合您的选项。 一旦做出决定，就至少坚持一段时间。

Of course, once you've chosen a system, you can adapt it to your way of working. Decide when you'd like to organize yourself—be it first thing in the morning, or last thing before bed—and start doing it.

当然，一旦选择了系统，就可以使其适应您的工作方式。 确定何时要整理自己的时间(早上是第一件事，还是睡前是最后一件事)，然后开始做。

To get the most value out of a task management system, create tasks for everything, including work, online activities, family things, chores, and overhead for your business.

为了从任务管理系统中获得最大价值，请为所有任务创建任务，包括工作，在线活动，家庭事务，家务和业务开销。

Also, limit your tasks in a day. At some point, draw a cutoff and stop adding more things to your plate. You can only do so many things in a day!

另外，每天限制您的任务。 在某个时候，画出一个界限，并停止向盘子里添加更多东西 。 一天只能做很多事情！

非计费时间问题 (The Non-billable Time Problem)

Let's talk about the implications of non-billable time, what it is, and the different methods you'll need to consider to deal with it.

让我们谈谈非计费时间的含义，它是什么以及需要考虑的不同方法。

For most freelancers, non-billable time can really be classed in two ways: as business overhead, and as an illusion.

对于大多数自由职业者来说，非计费时间实际上可以用两种方式分类：业务开销和幻觉。

业务开销 (Business Overhead)

"Business overhead" can include a lot of things: admin tasks; checking on your services (hosting platform, social media accounts, any number of things); dealing with your accountant or attorney; marketing for your own business; networking; and much more.

“业务开销”可以包括很多内容：管理任务； 检查您的服务(托管平台，社交媒体帐户，任何数量的东西)； 与您的会计师或律师打交道； 为自己的业务进行营销； 联网; 以及更多。

Get a realistic picture of how much of your working week you spend on this sort of overhead task. Time-track yourself if you must. Then make a note of it. The most important thing to remember about this type of non-billable time is that you should account for it when doing estimates or quotes, or when figuring up an hourly rate.

真实地了解您在这种日常管理工作上花费了多少工作时间。 如果需要，请对自己进行时间跟踪。 然后记下它。 对于这种类型的非计费时间，要记住的最重要的事情是，在进行估算或报价或计算小时费率时应考虑到这一点。

合并非计费时间的示例 (An example of incorporating non-billable time)

You deduce that you spend approximately 20% of your time on non-billable business overhead. You have a job in your queue that you are about to quote, estimating that it will take 100 hours, at around $50/hour. So you're quoting the project at about $5000.

您推论出您花费了大约20％的时间用于非计费业务开销。 您的队列中有一份要报价的工作，估计它将需要100个小时，每小时约为50美元。 因此，您对该项目的报价约为5000美元。

What you may be forgetting, though—as a business—is that you have to account for that overhead somewhere. So you should either add time to estimates, or raise your hourly rate to cover that extra 20% of time required to run the business.

但是，作为一家企业 ，您可能会忘记的是，您必须在某处考虑该开销。 因此，您应该增加估算时间，或者提高小时费率，以覆盖开展业务所需的额外20％的时间。

虚假的非计费时间 (Illusory Non-billable Time)

Secondly, and perhaps just as important, is the amount of illusory non-billable time you spend on client projects. "Illusory? What does that mean?"

其次，也许同样重要的是，您花在客户项目上的虚幻的非计费时间。 “虚幻？这是什么意思？”

It means that this kind of non-billable time is only not billable in our imaginations. Many freelancers and entrepreneurs are simply short-changing themselves.

这意味着这种不可计费的时间仅在我们的想象中是不可计费的 。 许多自由职业者和企业家只是在改变自己。

Are you doing research for a client project? Add the time to the total, or account for it when you estimate.

您是否正在为客户项目进行研究？ 将时间添加到总计中，或在估算时考虑。

Are you having meetings with the client? Does that involve travel time? What about quoting and estimating time? You need to account for all of that.

您正在与客户开会吗？ 这涉及旅行时间吗？ 引用和估算时间呢？ 您需要考虑所有这些。

There is no such thing as non-billable time spent on a client project; there's only time you are choosing not to be paid for.

没有在客户项目上花费大量时间的事情； 您只有一次选择不付款 。

Tracking your time spent on projects is a good idea, even on non-hourly projects. The more time you track, the better you'll be able to estimate in the future. When building, say, a simple WordPress site for a client, with 5–10 pages and no special features, you'll already know from the last three similar projects roughly the amount of time it will take—including any project overhead that you may not have included previously.

跟踪您在项目上花费的时间是一个好主意，即使在非每小时的项目中也是如此。 您跟踪的时间越长，将来估算的效果就越好。 举例来说，为客户构建一个简单的WordPress网站(具有5-10页且没有特殊功能)时，您将从最近的三个类似项目中大致了解所需的时间- 包括可能需要的任何项目开销以前没有包括在内。

您比想像的时间更多 (You Have More Time Than You Think)

You don't have an infinite supply of time, but you probably have more than you think.

您没有无限的时间供应，但是您可能拥有比您想象的更多的时间。

Using the methods I've covered—defining what "work" is to you, creating a work-life balance, organizing your life, working with task management, and using careful time tracking to eliminate non-billable time—you can create more free time, and/or get more income out of the time you have.

使用我所介绍的方法(定义对您来说“工作”是什么，建立工作与生活的平衡，组织生活，与任务管理一起工作以及使用仔细的时间跟踪来消除不必要的时间)，您可以创建更多的免费工作时间，和/或从您的时间中获得更多收入。

You have to eat, sleep, and get things done, though. So the last piece of advice here is simple. Remember that there are only so many hours in a day. Don't overload yourself. If a task can't be done today, put it on tomorrow's list. If a project won't fit in your schedule, don't take it on.

不过，您必须吃饭，睡觉并做好工作。 因此，这里的最后一条建议很简单。 请记住，一天只有几个小时。 不要让自己超负荷。 如果今天不能完成任务，请将其放在明天的清单上。 如果项目不适合您的时间表，请不要继续进行。

Anxiety, stress, lack of sleep, under-performance on jobs and damaged relationships won't help your freelancing career!

焦虑，压力，睡眠不足，工作表现不佳和人际关系受损将无助您的自由职业！

Be mindful how much you allow on your plate at once. Don't overload it, but also don't stop looking for ways to do things more efficiently and thus maximize the value of your time! Good luck!

请注意您一次允许在盘子上放多少。 不要超载，也不要停止寻找更有效地做事的方式，从而最大程度地利用您的时间！ 祝好运！

How have you dealt with the challenges mentioned here? How easy do you find it to manage your time, balance work and non-work, and to avoid too much non-billable time?

您如何应对这里提到的挑战？ 您如何轻松地管理自己的时间，平衡工作与非工作时间并避免过多的非计费时间呢？

翻译自: https://www.sitepoint.com/how-to-manage-time-as-a-freelancer/

想拥有一个自由时间的职业