Should Freelancers Know Business Management?

Business management is the management of business operations of particular organization. Business management which is curical for companies, consists of four main components: planning, organizing, leading and controlling.

Most of companies that starts business newly fail sadly because of the wrong bussiness management. In today’s market, there is more competiton then before therefore starting the business journey with an effective plan gives you an opportunity more than your competitors have.

Business Management For Freelancers

Every organization needs a management plan. According to the division of labor in the organization, a certain team undertakes and plans the management, while other groups follow it. But this is not the case for the freelancers, They are running the business alone or leading a small team. In this case, knowing the basics of business management as a freelancer can mean that the freelancer is one step ahead of its competitors.

How to Plan in Business Management?

Planning is a special process used in many areas. For each department, there are different planning styles that help the company achieve effective and efficient production.

Planning enables to set goals for the company, to create strategies to achieve these goals, and to organize an effective work program for the employees of the organization. Predicting possible scenarios that may be encountered in the future and speculating about what actions to take in such cases are also included in the planning.

Various planning styles are available. Time and department-based plans can be created. Operational and strategic plans are department-based plans. While operational plans are for specific areas, strategic plans are holistic plans that apply to the entire company. Short and long-term plans are time-based. While short-term plans are the goals that the company aims to achieve in the near and relatively short term, long-term plans are the goals of the company with high returns in the long run.

Goals are the desired outputs to be achieved. Plans, on the other hand, are the maps drawn by which ways to reach these outputs.

How Important is Organization in Business Management?

The second component to be considered for good business management is the organization. Organization is the compartmentalisation what needs to be done to achieve the goal. There are three steps to getting organized:

1. compartmentalise of work
2. grouping of work
3. Assignment of responsibilities

You may be running the business on your own or you may be getting outside expert support in certain areas. In such cases, compartmentalisation and grouping work gives a clear picture of what work you will be dealing with. Clearly specifying responsibilities and assignments in the getting assistance of outside experts clearly conveys your expectations to the other party.

How Leadership Have Advantage in Business Management?

You can be a stand-alone freelancer, in which case you don’t need to know or apply the leadership criteria. But if you’re outsourcing expert help or have a temporary team, you may need to lead.

According to the study conducted at the University of Iowa, there are 3 types of leadership:

1. Autocratic Leader: The only authority who hardly consults with group members.
2. Democratic Leader: The authorized person who takes decisions in consultation with group members.
3. Laissez-Faire Leader: A leader who allows group members to make decisions.

According to the research, most of the workers prefer the democratic leader. Democratic leadership is also the type of leadership with the highest productivity compared to other leadership types. In group conflicts are quite high in organizations with autocratic and Leissez-Faire type leadership.

According to another study by Ohio University, there are two types of leadership, people-oriented and business-oriented. Productivity and personnel satisfaction are higher in the group with people-oriented leadership.

The Place of Control in Business Management

Control, the last of the business management components, tests whether the target set at the beginning has been achieved.

The control process is a way to understand whether the goal has been achieved, and if not, where it went wrong, it also allows you to get feedback. There is three stages on control process; measuring, comparing and acting. Measurement is the process of deciding and applying which performance will be measured by which method. The benchmark identifies the gap between targeted performance and achieved performance. Taking action requires revising the plan if the target has not been achieved and revising the plan if it has been successful and new targets are to be set.

What Can Be Used as a Job Management Tool for Freelancers?

PeerBie is a business management software. You can realize, manage and edit your projects on this software. Let’s see what can be done with PeerBie!

Planning

If you are a freelancer employee, planning your time correctly can be one of the biggest factors in your success. It can be helpful to use a calendar, but it can be confusing and difficult to jot down different deadlines and meeting times for different projects in one place. With PeerBie, you can create your digital agenda and make project-based planning. You can mark important days and dates on the calendar, set reminders, create and categorize your to-do list in kanban order. In this way, your project management style will be more systematic and you can easily find what you are looking for by typing in the search section instead of turning the pages and make changes.

Controlling

With the “Start Day” and “End Day” features, you can see in which time period you worked, which tasks you completed on which day, you can get reports and analyze them. With performance measurement, you can do your time management better and increase your service quality.

Your communication with your customers reflects your success. Listening to the person or institution you serve and shaping your business accordingly will produce satisfactory results. With PeerBie, you can easily communicate with your customers, share files and organize meetings. Apart from that, you can get feedback from your customers and improve the service you offer by analyzing them. Thus, your customers know that their ideas are valued and their loyalty to your brand increases.

Reports

The most effective way to improve the service you offer is to data and analyze what you have done so far. Thanks to the reports, you can see your mistakes and make improvements. PeerBie provides reports on a daily, weekly, monthly or date range you want. You can analyze your performance with product, performance and task reports.

Storage

You can safely and comfortably share presentations, files, contracts that you can share with your customers on PeerBie. With the PeerBie collection, you can easily store files that may be of use to you. You don’t need to use an extra application for storage space, you can find the tools you need in one place.

“Good management is the art of making problems so interesting and their solutions so constructive that everyone wants to get to work and deal with them.” says Paul Hawken. Management not only plans things out, but also makes problems attractive for solving. Gathers attention by holding a magnifying glass over the problem and responsibility.