When it comes to web design about 80% of the people with full time jobs in the industry freelance on the side.  I totally made that number up, but I don’t think it’s off base.  Go into any agency and ask a designer, writer or programmer and they will tell you they created a site for a friend or wrote a press release for a former coworker.  I’m not talking big time contracts, just side work that you do in your free time.

Another thing you will find is that freelancers keep pretty quiet about this work. I know I did. Employers have two primary concerns when it comes to employees doing side work. The first is that it’s taking work away from them. The second concern is that it’s effecting the work the employee is doing during the day.  Two very valid reasons.

I worked for a small web development company when I was starting out and I wasn’t allowed to do any side work. This made sense to me since we were a tiny little three man operation I would be taking away projects that the company would take on. Those $3000 web sites that a larger agency wouldn’t touch with a ten foot pole were decent projects and we could make some good looking sites that could go in our portfolio.  My boss at the time realized the constraints of not being able to do side work and had the decency to offer me a good commission on any work I brought in to the company as compensation.

I’ve been discouraged lately to learn about friends who aren’t allowed to do side work that has no bearing on their day job. People who are webmasters or work in a marketing department where taking up a side gig in a non competing industry would have no impact on their company.  This seems short sighted to me. What better way to keep an employee happy then to let them use their skills to make more money to supplement their income. That kept me at my last job far longer than I would have otherwise. Shutting the door on freelancing says to an employee that you don’t trust them.

So what about job performance? If someone is doing side work they might be thinking about (or actually doing) it during the day when you are paying them to do your work.  When I was working full time (man that feels like ages ago) I knew where my bread was buttered. I learned that clients could make your life hell. I learned that making it work on your own was a lot harder than working for someone else. I had a heck of a lot more respect for the company I was with when I was working on a side project that was spinning out of control last spring than I ever had before.

So if it gave me new found respect for my employer why did I leave? I had to know if I could do it. I had worked for seven years to get to that point and so far so good.