So for the last 4 months I had no contract at all, only vague promises, maybes and “come back in half a years”.

It was awful, and I have been on the brink of bankruptcy.
However, at the same time I am grateful for this.
I’ve gone independent only a year ago, forming my business, and having this crisis so early is a good thing. Drives home a few points, and I have had some necessary lessons very early, which is better than having the same lessons says five years into the business.

What were the most important lessons?

1. Minimize your dependency from your bank. They won’t help you when you need it, and when you hit hard times, an outstanding loan makes it even harder.
   Yes, that means cutting up credit cards too. That will force you not to count on them as a “last resort” financing option.
   N.B.: Here the annual interest rate of credit cards is 40-45%. If yours have a better interest rate, then maybe you shouldn’t get rid of them. Your choice.
2. Don’t depend on one client. If you can, have more than one, even if individually all are smaller clients.That’s something difficult to achieve in my field, I usually work on a project 40 hours a week as a business analyst. Then again, it can be that I have a small sample yet.
3. Even when you are in a really tight spot, don’t roll over for your client. They won’t acknowledge that it was just out of necessity that you worked for so little, or with such bad conditions, and they will expect it.
4. Don’t accept favours from your client. They will bring it up over and over again, trying to use it to bargain for lower prices.
5. When you say no, people are prone to get offended. Tough. Actually, if someone gets offended because you said no, it’s just as well, you wouldn’t want to work with them anyway.
6. People will try to take advantage of you. And sometimes they will go snarky and nasty with you when you don’t let them, sometimes going to such a length as to call you an ungrateful sod. Deal with it. And if you can, stop doing business with them.

Now looking over these lessons I can tell you that they are geared toward a certain, “can’t trust anyone” kind of market, not the?Seth Godin kind. I really like him, but to reach the permission and trust based market, now that is a difficult thing around here.

So far, I came out alive. I can see the end of the tunnel, not quite there but close.
And looking forward to what the rest of the year brings.

It’s been a long time since I have last written here – I don’t really count the last two posts, and even if I did, 2 posts in 3 months is not that much.

Anyway, kind of back, but still not completely – and it’s not lack of time, more like lack of subject. I could not think of anything I could write about. None, nada, zip, nil. Ideas for posts has been swimming in my head when I was relaxing, but then I stood up, and started to work, or think, or plan, and the ideas whoosh – flew away.

Now I try to get the ideas together, and sew a beautiful tapestry of words – I mean, try to type in some meaningful sentences forming a coherent post.

So, as I have written a few times in the summer, for various reasons I have started my own small company, business, which seemed like a good idea – and actually the only way to get some paying job.

Of course, I have always wanted to do it sometimes in the future, so I was content with the way things went, at least until I started to meet the traps, tricks, roadblocks and all the funny things that come with running a business.

Nothing, nothing in my previous experience as an employee has prepared me for this. School? Forget it. Sure, I have had some “Entrepreneurship Course” and we have studied some basic Marketing, and Market Research, and Business Finances, and such, but what I had to realize is that the things I have learned at college has nothing to do with reality. No connection at all. For some weird reasons, the real world works in a totally different way. Plus, all my life I was expected to behave the opposite way I have to behave now. Different mindset, different way of looking at things. But I am learning – and I hope fast enough.

The most important thing I’ve learnt this past 6 months is that I have to say No. No matter that you don’t have another contract, that you probably won’t have any income for the next month if you don’t get this one, you have to say No until the offer is good for you too, not just the other guy. Because next time he will expect you to do it with the same bad conditions, and in the long run you lose more than one month worth of income. And that’s difficult, especially when the other guy is an old co-worker, former boss, or another acquaintance of yours.

Another thing is what you really need is a LOT of discipline. Being your own boss sounds cool. “Hey, I can wake up whenever I want, I can work however I want”, but lets face it, that doesn’t work. On the one hand you still have to do a job on someone else’s terms – deadlines, meetings, deliverables -, on the other hand time has a habit of flying fast, and it is awful to start to work at 4PM with the knowledge that you have to finish something by next morning.

And last, but not the least: financial planning. Bills and taxes have to be paid on time, and there is a good chance that even if you issue the invoice right on time, you won’t get paid by the due date. So you have to plan forward at least two months. Somehow companies have the idea that paying a salary on time is important, but paying an invoice on time is optional, and they are confident that you won’t complain because “you want us to hire you in the future again, right?” – hint: this is the part where saying No can be necessary, but tough.

So that’s my last 6 months in a nutshell – I am on a learning curve, learning things I have never had the chance or the need to learn on the run, and that takes time away from everything. But I am learning – and it worth it.

So, the list so far:

1. Discipline
2. Plan ahead
3. Learn to say No

Now I wonder what other lessons will I learn.

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Long time no see. Yes it has been a quite time, I more or less went “underground” for the last two months, but I was working on that little thing you see on the left.

Right, click on it. So that’s it. Company up and running, and I had to put the website together too.

I want to say a big thank you to Alex Mitchell aka. Zen Elements for the website design, for Karen Swim (Words for Hire) for the text you can find on the site, and to Peeter Paasmae who created the logo.

They were a tremendous help both with the work they have done, and with their encouragement.

Also I want to say a big thank you to all my friends both on- and offline, from every corner of the world, for the kind and encouraging words you gave me.

Now the question is what next? Here, I have drawn you a brief map of the future.

I know. Extremely silly. And this is a business so it should be serious and all. But why start your own thing if you can’t have fun with it?

So, that’s the plan, more or less. Of course, my accountant is not working from this one. Yet.

In the finish. Today I have signed every possible paper the lawyer could find, and with this, I have officially started my company – Palmtree Software Development Ltd.

The name was a tough cookie – honestly, although people told me that picking the name will be the least of my problems, it turned out that finding a name is the hardest step in the whole process. In the end I picked Palmtree, for several reasons:

1. 1. 1. 1. 1. I really, really like palm trees.
            2. Palm trees have a varieties of fruits – a palmtree can yield coconuts, bananas, dates, pineapples (yes, all different kind of palm trees, but palm trees).
            3. Palmtrees can be used to build rafts, huts, the leaves can be turned into clothes, fans.
            4. The palmtree evokes images of relaxation, not rushing and stress
   Of course now comes the harder part of the whole business, but so far I have a few ideas, and a paying contract which always means good things – as far as I remember, the income is the good part of having a business, and the costs are the not so good part.

   Yes, and learning on the run, all the interesting things that a small business owner needs. That is another good thing about this endeavour.

So after stating that I pick up blogging and this time it will be more regular,if not daily, I ended up spending my day at government bureaus, reading even more about small businesses, meeting with the accountant, and so on, instead of blogging.

But it was worth it, and I hope I will say the same a year from now. By the way, whatever people say, don’t believe them, finding an even remotely non-idiotic name – that is not taken yet and no one is sitting on the domain either – for your company is the most difficult and frustrating step in the whole “start your business” procedure. The rest is made up of well defined steps and the lawyer and the accountant will help with that. You have guidelines, rules and laws and all you have to do is to follow those.

So here is a new zig in life, hopefully there won’t be more for a couple of months, and I hope there won’t be any more for a couple months, I just want to go in this lane for a bit longer. In case I want to plan and such.

And I want to say thank you for everyone who helped me in one way or the other, including suffering my “let’s find a company name” harassment the whole week.

And then there is the fact that I can’t write just whenever, I actually need something to write about, something that makes sense,? when I don’t feel like I have something to say I tend not to write – I just go and talk on Plurk.

Then whenever I have an idea, it usually ends up abandoned, mainly because probably it has already been written about by a huge group and then why should I write about it?

Of course, it has been told several times that

1. there is nothing new under the sun
2. this should not keep people from writing
3. this is a very lame excuse anyway

Karen wrote a pretty good post on this issue titled Silent no More. Pretty descriptive and good writing – in case you wondered, that’s why she runs a business based on writing stuff and not me – and you know she is absolutely right, it’s just a shame that even though I agree with her I still am reluctant to write about stuff you can already find on the net. And if you are there read about my other favourite excuses for not writing – what? Yes, I’ve got excuses for that. I think about 5 or 10 of them. You haven’t?

But I will have to write something, because

1. when I started a series of posts, it’s only natural that I started with a topic from the middle, then I set the publish date for the future and if I am not careful it will post itself part 6 following part 3.
2. I have received the monthly bill for the site, and it is common sense to do something with the site if I pay for it anyway. Otherwise it’s just wasting money.

No promises, but I will try my best to push out some posts. Continuing the planned series, writing about OpenSim and whatever comes to mind.

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This is not a huge tragedy, but as it happens the financial crisis caught up with this part of the world, and basically every single project I had in sight was shot down in the last minute. Last minute means on Monday it’s “good to go”, on Tuesday it is “canceled”. Good luck with planning.

So here I am, trying to find something so I can pay my bills – thankfully I had the common sense to have a debt-insurance on every credit card, loan, debt so if everything goes really south, I will have it a bit easier for a short time.

There are two possibilities right now – I can fight claws and teeth to land a job as an employee, or I can fight claws and teeth to land a contract. Honestly, at the moment either solution would make me glad.
The plan to go and work abroad are ditched for now – the situation is at least as bad as here all over Europe, with the added benefit of my saving worth much less abroad than it does at home. Especially since the Forint (HUF) crashed so spectacularly in the last 3 months.

So just you know the whole story. I am at home right now, hunting jobs, talking with people, and hoping for a better future – maybe I should play the lottery, winning would solve my problems for sure.
And, accidentally reading up on marketing, finances, economics, and whatever I can find about small business and freelancing, and having huge lunch and coffee meetings with people in case I have to go totally independent, building some business knowledge in advance.

I planned to have a business in 5 years anyway, but then there were a lot of things in my career that I have reached faster than expected – and yes, I know I have had this idea since December, but fact is the local system is not really favouring small businesses. Quite the contrary.

But as they say: “A tight spot sharpens the mind”. The photo on the top, from au_tiger01 shows the aftermath of the Hurricane Katrina. It shows a rather disastrous event, but also shows that while the market for cars is definitely down for the moment, boats can flourish. So I intend to find a boat – one with a strong engine. And preferably wheels for the time when the water is gone.

I have no doubt that I will have some solution – if all fails, I go and load trucks. That’s a job too -, I just wish life would go in less of a zig-zag.

A rare post, but then, Karen deserves it. We met almost a year ago – somewhere in the middle of February – and when you still keep in touch with someone you know only through the net after a year, that means there is some kind of value.

I would like to say Thank You for all the help she gave me in the past year, the witty and funny tweets, the insightful posts, and that she regularly comes over here to comment on my posts.

All in all, I wish you a happy birthday Karen and many returns of the day. And I wish another year full of great posts and lessons and friends.

For the better or worse, I don’t know, but I really learned a few things.

I quit my job to pursue the goal of getting a new job abroad, with all that comes with it – this plan did not pan out, still at home, and currently jobless.

I learned that even if you do your job, getting paid is not a sure thing, that for some people putting the other into an awkward and precarious situation is not a bad act, and they don’t think it should result in their reputation being harmed – and I was told that warning people about him and the company is not nice. What can I say: Life is tough, get a helmet.

I learned that one thing I should always trust is my gut feeling – I accepted a job where every fiber in my body said no, and the fibers were right, I was wrong.

I learned a lot, now the only question is: will the lessons stick?

I don’t know, but I really hope so.

On the positive side though I met tremendous people, got new friends, and successfully kept the old ones, took part in some really interesting projects, learned a lot about people, and visited London and Lorrain, both a really exciting experience.

So, good bye 2008, and welcome 2009. I started down a rugged, bumpy road, but no worries. Fortune always smile on those who make her smile.