Do You Know What The Pomodoro Technique Is For Getting Work Done

Weekly Newsletter for The Freelancers: Here is the latest newsletter of the week starting on 4th November 2019.

Getting stuff done is important for freelancers because that is how they make money! Learning what works for you to get more work done is critical. There are several approaches and one of these is The Pomodoro Technique.

Andrew McDermott has written the evergreen article You Should Really Use One of These 4 To-Do List Formats To Be More Productive for the www.workzone.com blog and you can read it here. These are the 4 To-Do List formats:

Kanban Board
The Pomodoro Technique
Don’t Break the Chain
The 1-3-5 List

This quote about priority lists is worth remembering:

“Checking items off a to-do list doesn’t determine progress; focusing on your priorities is what counts.” ― Frank Sonnenberg,

BookSmart: Hundreds of real-world lessons for success and happiness

There is another method that is not covered by Andrew’s article that is included with How to Be Self-Employed: A Freelance Work from Home Guide.

The basis of the To Do-List with the eBook is that you prioritize the items and makes provision for a work-life balance rescheduling system. You can get the eBook from Amazon by clicking on the link below:

Motivate Yourself!

“Things turn out best for the people who make the best of
the way things work out.”

– Art Linkletter

Why Should You Be Motivated To Have A Development Plan As A Freelancer?

“Freelancers realize how quickly the skills needed are evolving and are the most proactive members of the workforce, reskilling much more frequently than traditional employees,”

said Stephane Kasriel, CEO of Upwork and co-chair of the World Economic Forum’s Council on the Future of Gender, Education and Work.

“Because of this, they will play a major role in guiding the future of work — something we all have a responsibility to do.”

Abby Perkins has looked at how to do this in her article 4 Steps to Create a Professional Development Plan as a Freelancer. Abby’s article appears in the www.flexjobs.com blog and you can read about it here.

This is a great quote about personal development from Ralph Waldo Emerson:

“What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us.”

Productivity Tip Of The Week

How Do You Overcome The Demon Of Procrastination?

The demon of procrastination is the enemy of most creative people. It is continually stalking you trying to get you from focusing on getting work done. Therefore, it is important that you understand this enemy and the ways that it can impact on you and your bank account.

Yes, it is your bank account that procrastination is attacking. You do not realize it when you start out freelancing. However, that is where the result of procrastination shows.

I have found that one of the most effective ways of tackling big tasks which often gives rise to procrastination is to break them down into bite size chunks and get a bit done each day.

There are other methods of tackling this problem. Steven Pressfield is an expert on this issue.

Steven Pressfield has written three books on this subject of how to “overcome resistance and getting out of your own way”, which is what he calls it in the introduction to Do The Work.

The other books by Steven are Turning Pro and The War of Art. For creative people, procrastination is a major problem and Steven knows the enemy well and how to overcome it.

Marya Jan has read these three books and condensed their wisdom in her article Overcome Procrastination: Steven Pressfield’s Top 12 Tips. Marya’s article appears in www.writetodone.com as an article and can be read here.

For those who like Steven’s work and want to look inside the books at the index here is the link to start with Amazon eBook bestseller:

Work-Life Balance Tip Of The Week

Freelancers Deserve Holidays Even Though They Don’t Get Paid Time Off!

When you start out as a freelancer you probably did not realize what PTO stood for, but you soon realize what it means. People who are employees that you may go on holidays with do not give PTO (Paid Time Off) on their vacation a second thought.

They don’t have to! However, as a freelancer, it is very much a part of work-life balance and you must think about your holidays and plan for them. This is not to say that you won’t have to answer a few emails while enjoying the sun down by the beach.

Tyra Seldon has thought about how you can enjoy your UTO (Unpaid Time Off) and has given you some tips in her article Freelancing over the holidays – A simple guide to maintaining your sanity. Tyra wrote her article for the Freelancers Union blog. You can read Tyra’s article here.

Gail Gardner has written The Truth About How Freelancers Make Money While Sleeping for www.forbes.com and you can read her article here.

Financial Tip of the Week

Do You See Using An Accountant As An Investment?

Do you remember magic photos and how you can move them around and change your point of view until you see another image? For some people they work instantly, but for others like me, they very rarely work. You can check some out here.

Why I asked this question is that some freelancers view using accountants to help their finances as being a waste of time because they can’t see the value in it.

However, if you are a moonlighting freelancer with a regular 9 to 5 job or a combination thereof with your partner it is worth having an accountant have a look at your financial picture to see whether they can see the opportunities for you to increase your after-tax income.

Having worked as a financial planner that specialized in assisting accountants and their clients, I can assure you that they will be able to see a different picture to you.

I had clients that I referred to accountants and vice versa because it was a change of view that resulted in a better outcome for a client.

For me, I can always see that picture of an accountant being an investment to a freelancer, even if it is not on a regular basis.

Marian Schemberi has written Why every freelance writer needs an accountant on your side for the www.writelifeblog.com which you can read here.

Skills Development and Inspiration

Image Credit Pixabay.com

We are constantly searching for news articles and videos on skills development and inspiration for freelancers as well as developing our own products.

Each week we have decided to bring you the links to what we consider are the top three articles or videos. Here they are for this week:

From the Way We Work TED Series by Matt Mullenweg “Why working from home is good for business”:

From Dr. David Vago TEDX Nashville “Self-Transformation Through Mindfulness“:

This one is worth repeating: From Amy Morin TEDx Ocala “The secret of becoming mentally strong”:

There are now 5,000 skills in 90 categories that the digital economy can offer, according to Upwork’s 2nd. Quarter 2019 Skills Index which you can read here.

Number eleven on the list is Apple UIKit. If you are like me, you will probably want to know more about Apple UIKit. I looked it up on Google and this is a what it is here.

What is interesting about Upwork’s list is that there are new digital skills and they are evolving very quickly. Innovation and technology are very important to countries. In Australia this is particularly important because these skills are applicable to country areas impacted by drought.

Articles now on our website that are relevant to the outcome of new skills training are listed here:

The latest one is here:

https://techlifefuture.com/retirees-freelancing-medical-hospital-ancillary-insurance.html

Amazon News

The weekly AWS news video link to acloud.guru is here. They are the leading trainers globally for Amazon Web Services certification for freelancers.

Amazon Associates Website Case Study

As discussed in previous newsletters we are focussing on the niche website in the future because it is producing better results i.e. sales.

We have changed our strategy to include guest posts and this is one from our cybersecurity website. The guest contributor is Isabella Rossellini with The importance of App security in this modern world (click to follow the link).

We will let you know when another is posted. The goal is to increase traffic and diversify product promotion. There have been approximately 30 Amazon product sales (across all our websites) in the past month due to the keyword research and skills of Mamun, my virtual assistant.