When I started freelancing, I thought it was be a lonely, elite experience. The reality is there is a lot of networking, give and take and team experiences out there. It’s a blast. I reflecting on this and wanted to acknowledge and thank the people who have helped me get here in one way or another. Hopefully I have given back and have helped you along the way.

So here we go, most are in Ottawa (my town) but some aren’t. Thanks y’all! In no particular order:

Brad Miller : First joint venture and hackathon partner. We killed it.

Reid Van Melle and Shawn Hyam : Solid dudes who have given me great business and startup feedback over the years.

Luc Levesque : Very solid advice from a very experienced dude. Wanting to help out the little guy.

Travis Persaud : A freelance writer and long time friend. Always happy to be a shoulder to cry on.

Chis Advansun : High level visionary. Has fed me interesting potential clients.

Chris Wise : Showed me how getting ahead in freelancing is not about competition, but working together. He brought me on to a contract.

Luca Pette : Killer subcontractor. If I didn’t have him, I couldn’t have gone on my extended trip to France. Met him in person 6 months after Skyping with him daily.

James Puderer : Embedded guy (awesome) who has also fed me work.

Piotr Sarnaki : My most recent sub. High quality work and quite responsive.

Richard Garand and Shane Holloway : My weekly mastermind group. Invaluable feedback and keeps my energy level high. One of their leads became my very FIRST paying customer for a product I’m building.

Darrell O’Donnell : Guy I worked with before I left government. Now he feeds me work, I work on his teams, and I make him look good!

Trevor Williams : Sales genius. Showed me ways to not to be afraid to sell.

Jason Annable : Startup entrepreneur and real estate investor who inspires me with his tenacity.

Geoff Longman : Solid senior developer who I enjoy to hang with.

Scott Annan : Visionary who fights for the Ottawa entrepreneur. Called me once “the smartest guy in town working for boring clients”. Something like that. HAHA

Richard L : When I was frustrated in my previous work situation, he sat down with me and gave it to me straight. He provides great advise from time to time.

Chris Barrett : Told me his story of a soul destroying job. Left to do volunteer work full-time and follow his dream. Helped inspire me to leave my own soul destroying job.

Sorry if I forgot anyone. Seriously

I often have very good results with outsourcing various things. However, in my experience, graphic design is really tough to outsource. Still, I thought I’d try my luck with a logo design on Elance. The proposals came pouring in. My jaw dropped when I saw this one. Copied verbatim:

hiii i think i am very well worsed in logo and graphic designing.. i am going to complete my diploma degree in animation.. i even very well know coreldraw and indesign apart from photoshop and illustrator.. i have’nt worked for any companies or any website.. i have ZERO experience.. SO YOU CAN JUST BELIEVE IN ME AND GIVE YOUR JOB TO ME. as i have’nt worked anywhere, i have many new and fresh ideas..!!! i dont want to place my order on the front. so i dint use another connects balance.. my policy is every one should get a job..

$28.49 for the logo. I hope he finds someone to hire him. It just won’t be from me.

So I’m trying to learn the programming language R and there aren’t a TON of resources geared for non-statistitions to learn the langugage. So I thought: “I don’t have a TON of time, so why not hire a tutor?”. Well I found a brilliant guy at a good price on Odesk. We work through problems I’d like to solve, and he explains how it all works.

Problem 1: Last year, I hit a ton of rocks when sailing around our river. Fortunately, it only hit my swing keel resulting in no damage. Everyone said the water in the river was at historical lows then. This year, our city had NO rain for all of July so I was afraid the river would be even lower, resulting in MORE rocks being hit. I wanted to know how afraid I should be this year.

The water levels are posted online every few days along with historical information. I wanted to see how low it was this year compared to all previous.

Here’s the result:

The curve shows how many times in the past fifty years that depth occurs in the same month as right now.

The number represents the height in meters (pretty sure relative to sea level).

So what does this tell us?

1. From month to month, the water level doesn’t deviate much, only 15 cm. So when someone says the water is “low”, it’s not too low.
2. The situation isn’t bad right now at all. We’re currently at the top end of what’s normal for August.

So, I’ll still try to avoid the rocks, but the water level wasn’t ever the real problem anyway.

Source data and thank you to: Ottawa River Regulation Planning Board

Interested in the code? Check it out here:

I give a 5 minute talk at (Rulu)[http://www.rulu.eu] in June. I had a blast and received some great feedback. Check it out!

I’ve tried to develop (or start) 5 products over the past two years. Not one has made me a penny of income. When reading hacker news, micropreneur academy forums and talking with friends who “are making it,” I get frustrated and anxious: “Why not me? How come every business I try and develop fails?” Then I get all sad and mopey of a few days.

I wanted to write up this blog for anyone else who can relate, and keep it as a reference for myself when I have yet another product that has failed.

Here are some things that help me whenever I fail and I feel sucky:

The greats say failure is very important

Lots of people think failure is key to success. Check out what these business/thought leaders have said:

Would you like me to give you a formula for success? It’s quite simple, really. Double your rate of failure. You are thinking of failure as the enemy of success. But it isn’t at all. You can be discouraged by failure or you can learn from it. So go ahead and make mistakes. Make all you can. Because remember that’s where you’ll find success.” – Thomas Watson (CEO of IBM for 30 years)

When defeat comes, accept it as a signal that your plans are not sound, rebuild those plans, and set sail once more toward your coveted goal. – Napoleon Hill (Business Guru)

“I have not failed. I have just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” – Thomas Edison

“If you are not failing, you are not growing.” – H. Stanley Judd

“Success is a poor teacher. We learn the most about ourselves when we fail, so don’t be afraid of failing. Failing is part of the process of success. You cannot have success without failure.” – Rich Dad (From Robert Kiyosaki’s book)

Other great ones here

Find people that support you

I’ve found when things aren’t working out, having people who care about me and how well I do really makes a big difference.

I’ve developed a strong group of people around me who want to know where I’m at, and how they can help:

• My wife
• Parents
• The group of men I meet for breakfast on Friday
• A lifecoach I meet with every two weeks
• Some close, trusted friends
• Other local entrepreneurs who I have on an ongoing Skype chat

Who do you have looking out for you who can keep you focused and support your efforts?

Avoid emotional attachment to your business

When I started developing products, I was quite blind to the reality of how one builds a business. When it was time to throw in the towel (for perfectly valid reasons) I couldn’t let it go. That was unhealthy.

Since I’ve now followed the Lean Startup methodology, I’m far less emotionally engaged in my business since I’m developing customers before I code anything. This means, if I don’t have anyone interested in the product after a few hours of interviews, maybe it’s a bad idea.

If your identity is tied to your business, why is that?

Take care of your body

A few years ago, I would start work at 8:30am and would need a nap by 10:30am. I had some pretty serious sensitivities to some foods. I even found that if I ate certain foods, it would affect how I thought. For example, if I ate too much sugar, I would become lethargic and unhappy. Once I figured out how certain food affected me, I now avoid altogether and feel a lot better.

More recently, I started “couch to 5k” (C25k) just to be a better steward of the body I have. Into the second month I actually found I had more energy and a greater desire to work hard, create things and the ability to take negative things in stride.

Be grateful for what you DO have

Sure, my desire to create a product that nets me $10k/month isn’t something I have yet. Should I then be unhappy about life? Let’s regain perspective:

• I have a fantastic wife.
• A beautiful daughter
• Great parents, brother and inlaws
• A job where I get to create great products for clients
• I work from home (or from France as I am doing right now)
• I pull in a great hourly wage
• I have a roof over my head and food on the table (and we can eat out from time to time).
• God is good!

So really, is life all that bad? No, life is great actually.

Evaluate what your failures have taught you

If I look at each failure I can tangibly say that I’ve learn quite a bit about building a business from each one. With every lesson learned, one can leap frog to making better and better decisions, giving way for a greater chance of success. For example from my previous business attempts:

MyMapNow : Build something quickly that is useful for people to see if people will actually use the thing! What’s your business model?

Reservely : Figure out if you’re actually solving a real problem by talking to customers before you build the product, otherwise you might build something no one cares about. (Story here)

NeedSomeCleaning : Good luck trying to get house cleaning people to go on the record and use anything other than cash only. Avoid building something for someone that requires a TON of educating the customer WHY they need your product. Find people that are searching for it already. (Story here)

KidJaunt : Even if people have a yearning for a product, you need to monetize it in the early stage. (Story here)

The chances are good that is I continue learning and trying stuff, I’ll find something that works!

Find stuff outside of the technology world that you love

I love sailing, there’s no business involved, and it’s social. Find something that you can retreat to that helps you recharge.

What works for you?

I’m always looking for other ways to stay positive in the face of failure. What have you found that works?

I’m always interested in imporving my workflow. Email is my central incoming ideas database while Omnifocus helps me figure out what I should be doing next.

While I have been a happy GMail user for over 8 years, I reached out on Twitter for a good OS X app to manage my email.

My conditions

• Support an archiving workflow (i.e. Send the email and archive the conversation) type mentality.
• Incredible search features that mimics GMail’s intuitive search ability (automatically detects if you’re trying to type in an email and auto-completes it)
• Good keyboard shortcuts

How does Sparrow compare with GMail’s web interface

This may not look very interesting to you, but I try for “Zero Inbox” daily. It keeps my mind clear:

Overall, I’m happy with the switch. This is evidenced by the fact I have not had to return to the GMail interface at all (except for using GTalk).

Keyboard shortcuts : Work pretty well! Sparrow tried to support GMail’s keyboard shortcuts as much as they could. I think I’m not used to a native app having VIM shortcuts so I naturally reach for the mouse.

Archiving workflow : Pretty good! They recently added a “Send & Archive” button when composing a message which really helps me get down to “Inbox Zero” quite fast. One complaint is that I can’t archive in the “Starred” label view. No idea why. I usually use the stars as “reply to later” so it’s something I am missing.

Search : Sparrow has to download all your mail before it can do a full search. If you have lots of email (I have 100k even with spam and old mailing lists deleted), it could take awhile to sync up. Once it does, it is really fast. It also detects if you’re trying to type in an email address or free text. Very slick

Will I make the switch?

Sparrow did a great job working through the use cases of what a GMail user will need in a native app. I will be sticking with Sparrow for awhile I think.

Update 1 : Based on feedback from this Reddit thread, this article would have been better named: “My workflow in Sparrow as a former GMail web user”

Update 2 : Link to the Sparrow app: sparrowmailapp.com

I have found in at least 3 of my web product attempts, paying a trusted outsourcer to do the work has allowed me to fail faster (a good thing according to lean methodology) than if I had to do the routine tasks (for maybe an hour a day) plus do the high level work (2 hours a day). That one hour is actually 33% more effort I could put towards customer discovery, or on my freelancing work.

I was always conflicted about hiring outsourcers do to my work and paying them somewhere between $2 and $5 per hour. I have often asked myself questions like:

• Was I exploiting them?
• Was I being fair by giving them the work I didn’t have time for?

I decided to approach two of the outsourcers who I have good relationships with to get their overall feeling about their work.

My main issue is how little I pay them. How do they feel about making one third the hourly wage of a worker in Ontario?

$10 is equivalent to 8 hours of work for a regular job in the Philippines. I make that in 3 hours of work on Odesk.

$2.60 an hour is 33% better than what I would get paid for a job in the city, and so [this work] is better for living :)

What about the work being often very repetitive?

Actually I’m not frustrated because I know there are more people who don’t know how to do it and I’m happy to help them. Not only that, I need to work to get some extra money. Sometimes I learn a lot from a repetitive job.

I think most work are repetitive even offline. Sometimes though, I want a variety of tasks and to learn something new.

Surely some people are jerks and treat outsourcers like nameless, faceless resources right?

[Most clients] are very professional, supportive and most importantly know how to appreciate not just my work, but me as a person. I had a problem with this before at my offline job, I worked over time without pay and yet they didn’t appreciate it. For me, sometimes appreciating person’s work/effort is a better “pay” than actual money given. Though, I would be lying if I said I don’t need money :) So yes I feel so much like a real person and not just a faceless resource. Frequent communication with my employers help a lot too.

Most of them treated me well but I have had bad experience on 2 other clients.

Conclusion

Everything needs to be looked at in context. In the case of my two outsourcers, they have better working conditions, feel they are making a difference, and making more money their other local alternatives. So why not? What has your experience been?