Clients also need to show professionalism

As a freelance journalist, you should always be on the lookout for fresh work. Of course, you should never overburden yourself and enter a situation in which you cannot fulfill clients' deadlines.

But the need to maintain a number of irons in the fire is to ensure you always have work. It allows for multiple streams of income and, in an ideal situation, you are slave to no one. As I say, "I need all of them but I can afford to lose any one them".

Anyway, in my pursuit of fresh clientele, I responded to an ad for copywriters that appeared to promise quite a lucrative gig. The person asked me to provide Skype details and get in contact. This I did. The employer seemed a bit abrupt when I called but I felt that was okay because he was hiring and he was not obliged to impress anyone, least of all me.

He was busy at the time I pinged him so he asked me to call him again the next day, seven hours earlier than the time we were speaking. This was 7am my time. So I got up early, prepared previous work that I could show him and was ready to answer any question.

At the stated time, I logged on to Skype and sent him a message asking him to alert me when he was ready. He replied with an "ok". Now, I didn't know if meant "ok, I'll call when I'm ready" or "ok, I'm ready now".

So, after a few minutes, I sent another message asking if he was free now. He replied "yeah". So, I called him. He answered and I introduced myself as the hopeful from the previous night. He was quite angry and said I should give him warning before I call and that he was not available to talk.

I apologised and said I would call when he was ready. However, at this point, I realised that this was not going to work. Even if the pay was going to be good, the relationship is also important.

He told me he was ready for the interview and then blasted me for calling at an impromptu time. Serious red flag. So I decided against calling again and removed him from my Skype list. There will be other work, at least I hope so.

It is not only freelancers who must fulfill certain qualifications but employers as well. I'm blessed to have had some great employers and clients and I hope to keep it that way.