Do Freelancers Need Resumes?

March 4th, 2009

 
There was a time the answer was no– freelancers would go from job to job on recommendations and conversations with potential clients, being hired on reputation, mostly.

Nowdays there seems to be a shift. Maybe it’s the new economy, where there are more and more freelancers getting more and more niched, but I have been writing a lot of resumes for freelancers lately. In fact, I wrote a resume for someone with almost 30 years experience in graphic design who was in the process of landing a (freelance) job as an adjunct college professor. The last time she’d had a resume was– well, it might have been never.

Some people might say, “What about LinkedIn? You don’t need a resume if you are a freelancer and you are on LinkedIn, right?” But your LinkedIn profile IS a version of your resume. Or should be, anyway. If it’s not a polished and professional targeted career history, it’s just a business card, a way for people to contact you.

To contact you so they can get your resume.

So if you are a freelancer and you are finding yourself un- or under-employed these days, you might want to start by taking a look at your resume. If you have one, have it professionally polished and updated. And if you don’t have one, no matter how long you’ve been working, you might get to have one written.

Once it’s finished, email it to everyone you know and tell them what type of work you are looking for. Ask them to pass it along. Also, get on LinkedIn and cut and paste it onto your profile. Have a great professional summary written, too. You will not be underemployed for long. Even in this economy, the work is out there. You just need great tools in order to get it.

Photo by Rickydavid.

Related posts:

1. Putting it All Together and Writing the Resume
2. The Worst Resumes on the Planet
3. Rule #3- Your Resume Should Be Easy to Digest
4. Google Yourself
5. Personnel Agencies and Headhunters and Hiring Managers, Oh My!

Filed under: miscellaneous career advice