The business of freelancing

There’s no guidebook for freelancing, but it’s important to keep in mind that creatives have engaged in temporary work for centuries. Here are a few tips from Yaara Bou Melhem to make it more relevant in this one.

Disruptions from tech have prompted many industries, including the transport, service and hotel trades, to engage people in short-term contract work in what’s been dubbed the “gig economy”.

Whether you love it or fear it, this trend is growing in our industry, too, with more and more journalists turning to freelancing as a way to survive in the fractured media landscape.

According to folklore, the term “gig” cam from the creative industry. Artists, musicians, actors, comedians, filmmakers and writers would be commissioned for short projects — a one-night performance in a bar, a bespoke painting, a film, a book or two.

If you’re a freelance journalist (and it is possible), you’re not just a journalism. You're a comedian, a filmmaker, a writer, or that thing that’s harder to define: a personality. This diversity only makes our industry stronger and more relevant. It enables it to evolve with the times and exposes it to different ideas and ways of working.

But how do you freelance or work sustainably as an independent? There are no hard and fast rules — it really depends on the individual, their skill set and interests — but here are a few practical tips that may be useful.

SET UP A COMPANY

There are many tax-related reasons to do this and it also has some structural benefits, such as allowing you to pay yourself and others who work with you a salary, as well as take out workers’ compensation insurance and income protection insurance.

PAY YOURSELF SUPER

If you’re not paying yourself a salary, you should at the very least be contributing to super. There’s this thing called compound interest. Look it up — a little bit today will go a long way in retirement.

KEEP SOME DROUGHT MONEY

Okay, so I’m no trust-fund kid and I know it’s a hard ask for most people, but having savings takes the pressure off so you don’t have to accept any old gig that could be soul-destroying or irrelevant to your career path. Three months to cover expenses is usually enough to see you through but six months is even better, especially if you’re transitioning into a different area or taking time out to acquire new skills.

GET A GOOD ACCOUNTANT

A good accountant who specialises in media will save you thousands of dollars in tax and may help you do things like income averaging and claiming items as tax-deductible expenses — everything from home-office costs to haircuts
(if you’re in the land of film and television). Loads of deductions are allowable if you work in the creative industry.

INVEST IN YOURSELF

You could do your 10,000 hours in one area and keep at it forever, but chances are you’ll need other skills to stay relevant and remain interested in what you’re doing. Investing in higher education and short courses, and
finding ways to move laterally across associated industries, will broaden and refine your skill set.

BE PART OF A COMMUNITY

Join a union, become involved with associations of your peers and keep up with what’s going in your industry. The support flows both ways. If you spend a little time laying down some of these structural foundations for working
independently, it will likely become easier to turn your focus to the business of just doing what you do.

The best advice I’ve ever been given as an independent is to simply to do good
work. After all, good work begets more work.

Good luck and have fun while you’re at it, because it’s a privilege to tell stories.

Yaara Bou Melhem is a Walkley Award-winning journalist and filmmaker. She’s currently directing her first feature-length documentary with US-based
Participant Media, is developing a social hybrid VR drama and continues to work in documentary through her company, Illuminate Films. Yaara won
the Walkley Freelance Journalist of the Year Award in 2016 and 2019 for films and reports commissioned by the ABC and Al Jazeera English.

This article was supported by funding from Media Super.