When to start selling yourself?

[Dow Jones]

All about timing

Ditching a good job 'to embark on an unknown journey to riches' (otherwise known as contracting) can also result in a lot of heartache and crawling back to the permie hole. I have seen this happen a lot of times, but you won't get anyone 'bragging' about it. So long as you know there are 2 sides of the coin.

[SueEllen]

Ok so I know that it may not be the best time to contract however I have taken the plunge and don't want to look back. My question to you people is when is the best time to start speaking to agencies and getting the CV out?

A month before you want one but tell the agents your available in a week.

Most contracts are wanted ASAP but as I am leaving in July it may not be best to start now.

Agents say one thing clients say another.

I've had a contract where I started the next day. I've had a contract where it's taken them 7 weeks to sort things out as it was direct.

[PRC1964]

Most of my contracts have been start immediately type jobs.

The ones that took a couple of weeks to sort out turned out to be for clients who were slightly less incompetent than the start now ones.

[NickFitz]

I had a client who interviewed me on a Monday and wanted me to start the next day - I managed to get them to accept a Wednesday start as I wanted a day to sort out a hotel and tidy up loose ends at home.

When I arrived on the Wednesday morning they didn't actually have a desk or computer for me, and made me sit with a permy so I could "learn how the application worked" from him. It was his first job since leaving uni, he'd never done any web development until starting there a few weeks previously, and after the first hour I knew more about the application than he did.

In the end, it was two weeks before the desk finally turned up

Still, it's all money in the bank

[SueEllen]

Most of my contracts have been start immediately type jobs.

The ones that took a couple of weeks to sort out turned out to be for clients who were slightly less incompetent than the start now ones.

My experience has been the opposite.

The ones who wanted me to start immediately where a f***ing mess. There as the ones who had a time delay where organised but thought they were disorganised - in other words I had a desk, chair and computer to work from.

[SandyDown]

I actually love them jobs when they want you to start yesterday... I once attended an interview, and the first and last question they asked is: when can you start .. said tomorrow and they took me in.... yes such clients are so unorganised, but I am getting paid for it, right?

[thunderlizard]

when can you start?

I don't know why it isn't like that more often. We're supposed to be skilled psople to come and do a task, not staff wanting to join a company. When we hired the builders to do the extension, I don't recall interviewing them for an hour on which brands of plaster they'd got experience with, or quizzing them on the relative drying times of matt versus gloss.

[DiscoStu]

I don't know why it isn't like that more often. We're supposed to be skilled psople to come and do a task, not staff wanting to join a company. When we hired the builders to do the extension, I don't recall interviewing them for an hour on which brands of plaster they'd got experience with, or quizzing them on the relative drying times of matt versus gloss.

Problem is there are probably more cowboy contractors that there are builders...