Image Credit: Madhuri Gupta
My blog post on the time management tool ‘The Priority Matrix’ explains that in order to use your time more effectively and make more progress towards your vision and goals you will need to delegate.
There are many reasons to delegate – it will free up your time to do more of what you want in life and business, you will make more and faster progress towards your goals and among many other benefits you will get access to the skills and talents of those who you delegate to.
Whether you are running a full-time business, a hustle on the side or building a brand there is always so much to do and one person cannot do everything.
I outsource as much as I can which frees up my time to write, research, create content and focus on what I need to focus on.
There are many websites offering outsourcing and judging by the expertise available you can outsource just about anything – Administration, Graphic Design, SEO, Web Development, Blog Editing, Podcast Editing etc, the list goes on and on.
My website of choice is Upwork.
Upwork is a user friendly, highly efficient website that makes the process of hiring and working with freelancers from all over the world so quick and simple.
To find suitable freelancers to work with through Upwork you will require the following
- An Upwork account – this takes about 5 minutes to set up
- An e-mail account – this takes 5 minutes to set up on any of the free platforms
- A method of payment – Upwork accepts Visa or Paypal – Paypal takes about 5 mins to set up
- Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) – these are documents outlining the step by step tasks required that your freelancer can easily follow. The more detailed the SOP the more efficient the process will be – I use Google Docs to create SOPs as it is a dream to use and is easily sharable
- An online sharing platform – this allows you to share your files/images/documents with your freelancer. My favourite online sharing platform is DropBox which takes 5 minutes to set up. I also use Google Drive which is very handy and is free with a gmail email account.
All of the above are ABSOLUTELY FREE and are sufficient to get you on the road to hiring your first freelancer!!
When you have all of the above in place, you are ready to hire your first freelancer. Upwork’s hiring process is really simple and goes something like this
- Create your job description on Upwork – the more specific you are when creating your job description, the more streamlined the hiring process will be
- Post your job on Upwork – fabulous freelancers will then apply for it
- Review the applicants – for me this is the most challenging part of the process as there are so many talented people available through Upwork
- Connect with/interview shortlisted applicants – as Upwork has access to globally based freelancers, chances are your preferred applicants won’t live near you and so you will need Zoom or another platform for face to face interviews. Most of the time there is no need to interview as the freelancer’s portfolio speaks for itself, such is the calibre of freelancers available on Upwork.
- Hire your freelancer of choice – share the Standard Operating Procedure with goals, timelines and an agreed price for the job then sit back and relax. Your freelancer will notify you when the job is completed and Upwork will arrange payment. All that is left to do is thank your freelancer for a job well done!!
Upwork is highly efficient – within 10 minutes of setting up my account I posted my first job, in 3 hours I had almost 20 job applicants and within that same day I hired my first freelancer. That was eight years ago and since then I have worked with the most talented, wonderful people from all over the world.
Can fabulous freelancers help free up your precious time?
Can fabulous freelancers bring you and your business to a different level?
Could you make a side income by becoming a fabulous freelancer and sharing your gifts with the world?
Thanks for reading,
Siobhain
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