Oh, that dirty “r” word.
Yep, you know the one. You’ve heard enough about it, read enough about it, thought enough about it. Maybe even lost sleep about it.
Recession.
Are you shuddering yet?
People seem to come out of the woodwork with advice on how to stay afloat during a recession. And while I would love to put a pillow over my head and tune it all out for a while, there does seem to be some advice worth adhering to, good times or bad.
Jeffrey Zeldman, founder and executive creative director of Happy Cog and the co-founder of An Event Apart, posted “Recession Tips for Web Designers” on the collective blog, 24 Ways (touted as “the advent calendar for web geeks”).
Zeldman offers encouraging insight and palatable strategies for getting gigs, staying patient, following-up, and all that jazz. He highlights four essential tactics for conquering the economic drought: “do good work, charge a fair price, lower your overhead, and be sure you are communicating with your client.”
But I think Zeldman’s most valuable observation is that there’s really no magic formula for recession-proofing your career or business. No golden ticket.
Rather, he points out, “The qualities that help you land a web design project are the same in good times or bad. Have a story to tell about the kind of services you offer, and the business benefits they provide.”
I like the inherent dose of optimism in Zeldman’s statement, i.e. good work will prevail regardless of the economy or job market. It may take a bit more of a creative approach, a few extra phone calls or emails, or an hour less sleep, but the bottom line is that consistently creating great work will get you somewhere, someday.