Perfect Apostrophes and Freelance Work

When you start working for yourself, it's all too easy to tell yourself that you're not quite ready to do real work. You endlessly re-work your personal site and your portfolio, you read everything you can get your hands on that even mentions your field, and you study endlessly in the hope of one day being good enough.

While all of these are important, and it's always good to have an idea of how much you don't know, it's also important to have the courage to put the skills you acquire into practice. Learning and studying can become a shield that we hide behind instead of doing real work and putting ourselves out there to get real work.

Perfect apostrophes

Merlin Mann once shared the story of his sudden book deal with O'Reilly on an episode of "43 Folders." Merlin decided that he would keep his final drafts in a binder - which required him to research and buy a binder, a three-hole punch, paper to put in it, and more. Binder at the ready, he decided that the binder didn't look real enough without a cover insert, so he designed his own O'Reilly animal-themed cover to put into the binder's front cover.

But something wasn't quite right - the apostrophe he had used in his "O'Reilly" logo didn't match up with the one used on real O'Reilly books. After spending half a day looking at fonts trying to find "the perfect apostrophe," he finally realized that his belief that he needed the perfect set of tools, perfect knowledge of what he needed to do, had wasted three entire days - and he only had a short time in which to write the book.

The moral of the story is obvious. Working to improve yourself is a great goal - it leads to better work and happier clients. But focusing all of your time and energy on improvement is ultimately a waste, because it doesn't give you any real experience. You will never know everything there is to know, because "what you need to know" is always changing, especially in a fast-paced industry like web design. Ultimately, you can probably learn more by taking on client work that is a bit outside your comfort zone than by sitting around reading all day. Don't chase the perfect apostrophe when you could be chasing client work instead.

My apostrophes

I've been guilty of chasing the perfect apostrophe myself. I've been doing web design as a "side job" for years, and I've hesitated to make it my full-time occupation. Even now, I worry that my work isn't good enough for me to look for new clients, and that I should be improving my skills even more. Meanwhile, designers with no concept of usability or architecturally sound coding are cranking out mediocre websites left and right. Anyone who has researched clients for web design knows the incredible number of really terrible sites that businesses and individuals have paid for. To truly practice the principles I hold dear, I should be making those sites - and making them far better than what they are now - instead of telling myself I'm not yet good enough.

How about you? Are there any perfect apostrophes in your life? How are you getting around them to do the best work you possibly can? Leave a comment below!