Recording Engineer Advice: Use a Schedule to get the Most Out of Your Days

If you're a freelance audio recording engineer, chances are you do not have a clock to punch everyday. You are your own boss and you're basically free to pick and choose when you want work. This is one of the advantages to working for yourself, but it could also be a disadvantage that could hurt freelance business.

It's easy to put things off and get to them later or tomorrow, but in this type of business where time can be money, if you're not motivated to get work or find clients you could essentially be losing money.

So how do you make sure you don't find yourself in this situation?
 
The best thing you can do to stay motivated and on top of your work is to create a schedule.

I create a schedule at night before bed, this helps me get right up in the morning and get right to work. But creating one at the beginning or end of the week, like on Sunday, for the whole week ahead may work even better.

I found that writing one for a whole week doesn't work for me because some days I would accomplish more or less than what was scheduled for the day, and by time the end of the week comes my schedule would be all fouled up. So instead of fixing the schedule everyday, I just write an all new list at the end of each night.

I also found that knowing that I had a schedule to get to every morning would actually get me up a little earlier. The motivation of crossing some things off my list and putting prospects of making some money on the table makes me feel good and motivated.

Without a schedule I may not even bother heading right to work, I may fart around with some T.V., use the internet to search non-audio recording related topics, basically just waste time until something pops in my head that has to be done. You can easily drain away a half of day watching pointless U-Tube videos.

The point is the benefits of not having to punch the clock everyday are great, but if you don't think of your business like a job than you might-as-well make it a hobby and get a 9-to-5 to pay the bills.