photo credit: huzzahvintage

It’s the in thing in freelancing today. You have a home office. You work at home. You work from your bedroom. You telecommute.

If you have a day job, and you have to rush to the office before 8 a.m., and you need to run through the crowds downtown in a suit or high heels, chances are you envy those folks who can earn as much as you can (or even more) while in their shorts or nighties at the comfort of their living room.

But the moment you experience telecommuting, then you start shedding the formal workwear. You can now work in your pajamas, and you can still get things done. For all your client cares, you’re probably in your underwear, making those business calls, coding, designing or writing.

You try to tell yourself it’s a good thing you can run your business without having to think of your appearance. Or can you?

Do clothes make the man?

Sometimes, clothes do make the man (or woman). Even if you’re running a business from home, it doesn’t necessarily mean you don’t have to dress up. For some people, dressing up involves pysching oneself for doing work. Even better, dressing up can mean psyching oneself for success.

I mean, have you ever felt sleepy or lazy during your telecommute workday because you’re in your sleepwear? Have you felt shy talking to clients on the phone or via email because you haven’t showered yet?

Working in your pajamas doesn’t necessarily make you less professional. But in some cases, it might make you feel less professional. You’re doing real work, after all. Why not try looking and feeling nice for the job.

You don’t necessarily have to wear a coat and tie at home. But wouldn’t it be nice to start your workday by showering, dressing in smart casuals, and grabbing a quick breakfast (or lunch or dinner, depending on your work schedule) before starting your work routine? It might get you in a more productive mood. It might get you into a more aggressive selling mood. It might help you close deals.

That’s unless you’re Hugh Hefner, which I seriously doubt.

I worked with government for three years before starting a career in IT. My work then mostly involved managing meetings among officials of different agencies. And we technical staff regularly met among ourselves.

What can I say about meetings? Most of the time, they are utterly useless. In most cases, people bickered. People pointed fingers at who should be doing what. People were grandstanding with what they knew, and with what they wanted.

In short, most of the time we did not get to resolve anything. And if we ever did, we ended up too tired to properly record any agreements and resolutions for future action. It’s all talk, and no action.

Most big groups have a designated secretary or secretariat who would prepare meeting agenda, prepare schedules, arrange for the actual meeting, and prepare the record or minutes of the proceedings so nobody would forget what happened.

These days, I’m part of several organizations that hold regular meetings. Most of these still don’t get the essence of a meeting, and still use meetings as an excuse to spend useless time bickering over small things.

My idea of a productive meeting is one that lasts only 30 minutes, and one in which the parties involve actually get to act on something. Meetings should be kept short, simple and straight-to-the-point.

Each party involved should come on time, to avoid wasting the other peoples’ time and to prevent others from dilly-dallying. If you can’t come on time for a meeting, then you might as well re-schedule, or if the delay is really unavoidable (and reasonably short, anyway), then please call or text ahead.

Have an agenda, and stick to it. Meetings should have a purpose, and this should be in the agenda. It’s usually best to have only a few items, to make sure you get to focus on what really needs to be discussed or done.

Summarize the results of a meeting at the end, to make sure everyone understands the important points discussed.

Take notes and send it to everyone ASAP. To make sure no one forgets any agreements, instructions or further things to be discussed, a meeting’s minutes or notes should be sent to everyone involved as soon as possible.

Meetings can be productive, but only if used as a means to an end, rather than the end-all, be-all of an organization. Make each minute count. If you can avoid holding a meeting, and just start doing what needs to be done, then you save precious minutes (or hours) of your life doing things and being more productive.

Joel Spolsky writes about the “exploding offer,” which is essentially an offer from a recruiting manager that comes with a time limit. This is usually intended to pressure job seekers who are not experienced at negotiating to sign up.

Here’s what you’re thinking. You’re thinking, well, that’s a good company, not my first choice, but still a good offer, and I’d hate to lose this opportunity. And you don’t know for sure if your number one choice would even hire you. So you accept the offer at your second-choice company and never go to any other interviews.

And now, you lost out. You’re going to spend several years of your life in some cold dark cubicle with a crazy boss who couldn’t program a twenty out of an ATM, while some recruiter somewhere gets a $1000 bonus because she was better at negotiating than you were.

Sometimes, though, you might find yourself in a tight spot–you might be considered for that first-rate job you really, really want, but not sure if you will get. So you might have to agree to the “exploding” offer. Joel gives a few tips. First, try to schedule interviews as close together as possible, so you can have an easier time deciding. If you do get an offer with a time limit, negotiate for more time. And in the event that you do sign up, do so at the last minute. And be sure you don’t sign anything yet, until you are sure you are committed to doing this.

Campus recruiters count on student’s high ethical standards. Almost all students think, “gosh, I promised I’ll go work for them, and I’m going to keep my promise.” And that’s great, that’s a commendable attitude. Definitely. But unethical recruiters that don’t care about your future and don’t want you to compare different companies are going to take advantage of your ethics so they can get their bonus. And that’s just not fair.

In tough times like these, I think it pays to be practical and street smart when handling interviews.

Len Babauta of Zen Habits has an excellent on Unclutterer on how to create a minimalist workspace. In essence, the best minimalist workspace actually involves using no tools at all, with only yourself and mind as your work “space.” However, since that is not possible for most folks, Len has a few tips on how to maximize space with minimum clutter.

1. Have one inbox.
2. Clear your desktop.
3. Get rid of knick knacks.
4. Clear the walls.
5. Clear your computer desktop.
6. Re-examine your paper needs.
7. Eliminate unnecessary tools.
8. Simplify your filing.
9. Go through each drawer.
10. Use a minimalist desk.
11. Clear the floor.

While most of these tips are most appropriate to folks who actually use desks for work, it can also apply to those of us who don’t. For instance, writers, bloggers or online entrepreneurs might be accustomed to bringing their laptops anywhere they go. So the trick here is to keep a clean, streamlined computer desktop with no clutter. I know I usually fall victim to a cluttered desktop, cluttered task bar and browser windows cluttered with tabs. And these are a few things I’d like to be able to fix so I can be more productive.

[via Unclutterer]

In the creative world, you don’t have to confine yourself to costly enterprise-level applications. Free (or really affordable) opportunities are available. In this article, I discuss my favorite tools to manage my clients and time online, and I invite you to share your favorite tools of the trade too.

These include Google Docs, Google Calendar, Gmail, invoicing software, time tracking software, and even IM clients. If you’re an online professional like me, or if you run a small business based at home or a small office, then these could be very helpful.