Freelance Business Coaching 101

SEASON 3, EPISODE 1:

Welcome to season three of The Writers’ Co-op: The Business Edit. Each episode of this season involves a coaching session with a freelancer just like you who struggles with issues common to freelancing like imposter syndrome, saying no, finding new clients, and beyond. But before we jump into all of that, we need to define what coaching is. That’s what this first episode is about: Defining the practice, then we'll show you how it works by coaching each other. You’ll get to hear about why Jenni is walking away from journalism as a long-term career plan, and how Wudan grappling with what it might look like to say no more often, even if a project looks interesting. Typically coaching involves us asking a lot of questions. We want to know: Where are you now? Where do you want to go? How are you getting in your own way? Is this block a matter of logistics (i.e.: better planning, raising your rates, finding new clients), or is it working through a mindset issue? We hope this episode gives you a sense for where we’ll take the rest of the season. In the episode, we talk about giving each other homework. Our Patreon members will receive this homework, too! Jenni’s homework was to revisit her business plan (you can do that yourself with this workbook), now that she has new financial goals. Wudan worked through a decision matrix to help her be pickier about how she makes decisions.

This season, we're funded by our Patreon members and revenue from our online courses. Thanks to all who've supported us so far. If you haven't checked out our online courses yet, please do!

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Full Transcript Below:

Wudan Yan- Hello, and welcome to The Writers' Co-op. 

Jenni- We are a business podcast for freelance writers everywhere. 

W- I'm your co-host. I'm Wudan Yan.

J- And I am Jenni Gritters. 

W- Jenni, hello! We are back!

J- We are back. It's season three of The Writers' Co-op.

W- Yes. third season of us producing a podcast during a pandemic.

J- Yeah, I know, we keep saying that. Like for reference, if we move past COVID, and someone is listening to this in the after times.

W- It's also a really important caveat, I think, because there has been so much sitting with it during this pandemic, that it really makes some things unbearable, and also points us towards where we need to shift

J- True, it's really been a painfully clarifying time for a lot of us.

W- Yeah, I empathize with that. So in this first episode of season three, we are going to do two things. The first is to explain to you what coaching is, since it drives the backbone of this entire season, when we interview our guests,

J- Yes, and then we're going to use coaching as a tool for us to basically coach each other so you can see what it looks like. We're gonna offer direction and insights on our own freelance businesses. So basically, you can think of this episode as sort of a mock up of what you're going to see us doing for the rest of the season where we coach other freelancers. 

W- I love this. Let's do it. 

J- Yes. So just start off, why don't we define coaching? Because I think people often conflate coaching with a lot of things, like it gets a really weird reputation for being kind of snake oily, or like maybe a pyramid scheme. So I think it does depend on what industry you've seen the term coaching associated with.

W- Yeah, absolutely. So coaching is defined by the International Coaching Federation as helping another person strive towards their stated goals and objectives through accountability. So helping follow up on tasks, and working with them to respond to challenges. As coaches, we're not mentoring, we're not advising or training anyone on how to build careers exactly like ours.

J- I want to say that like seven times because we're really not expert advice givers. And we don't want you to copy us.

W- Yeah, please, don't, for so many reasons. But also, you know, whatever we say, isn't to be held to some high standard, we use this podcast to share our experiences. And then we've been bringing in a lot of other guests. And that's why we call this podcast a co-op, because we really believe that we're not the people who know all the things. Also, it's completely worth saying that we're both business coaches, which means both Jenni and I assist and guide our clients, by helping them clarify the vision of what they want to do in their freelance careers. Life also comes into play too. But our primary focus is helping you build a business that works just for you.

J- Yep. So if you sign up for coaching, the idea is that we are here as your coaches to assist and guide you on finding clarity and reaching your goals in your business. That's like the most concise synopsis I can give of what we do.

W- Yeah. And the strategy and working towards that is us asking you a lot of questions. Coaching isn't a silver bullet. We can't do the things you need to do for yourself. We can't tell you what to do. Although I will say, I occasionally do this, if someone is suggesting something that will lead them in a bad direction. And again, I just want to emphasize we cannot, we cannot make you make any changes. That's really all up to you.

J- Yeah, recently I had a client who was thanking me for helping her with all this work. And I'm like, you know, I sort of sat here and asked you questions, but the work was all things you did, right? Like, I can't do the work for you. So I like describing coaching kind of like a mirror where I asked people a lot of questions about what they're dealing with. And then I listened really, really closely to the answers and I reflect them back so that the people can hear what they're going through almost from an outside perspective. And I think journalism actually prepared us like, oddly well for this because it's basically interviewing and close listening. And I will say the answers can be super clarifying. You know, I've been coached myself, and it's kind of wild to all of a sudden hear someone spit back to you with clarity what you want. And the process of talking all of this out with someone can also be super useful.

W- Yeah. I'm also getting coached right now for the next few weeks. So I can definitely say that sometimes the questions can be a little uncomfortable.

J- Yeah, totally. Like, the questions are asked to help you be honest with yourself about your motivations and your intentions and why you work the way you do, maybe why you're blocked and getting somewhere so you know, it's really nice to see that stuff clearly. But it can also be painful. But I will say overall, it's a useful process to have that information.

W- Yeah, there is something really powerful. About verbalizing your thought process. Absolutely.

J- Yeah, I think it's a lot like therapy in that way.

W- And coaching. You know, sometimes I say this to clients, it can feel like therapy. But it's really, really important to say that we are not therapists.

J- Yes, that is a very important distinction. Coaching isn't advice giving, and it is not therapy. It's not mentoring, we aren't clinically trained, like during a coaching session, one of the things we might figure out is that you should see a therapist because there are a lot of underlying conditions, mental health struggles, your family history, all these things actually affect how you run a business. But that particular work is outside of our wheelhouse.

W- The other part of coaching is more practical. That's the accountability. So if you tell me that you want to go to a certain place in your business, I'm going to help you figure out practical step-by-step ways to get there. And then I hold you accountable to actually following through and doing those things. So generally speaking, I take a pretty brass tacks approach in helping folks achieve their goals. After running through some of these big picture questions of what drives somebody's approach to work, I focus mostly on the practical steps.

J- Yeah, I think I really like the mindset, sort of big picture stuff. And then Wudan is super, super good at the practicality that you attach to getting where you want to go.

W- Yeah, I agree. And I think those of you who have been in our VIP membership on Patreon, or in our group coaching pods, have probably seen how both of us work together and have our styles complement each other. And we always rotate with our clients. So you get a session with each of us every other month. And it's ultimately I think, a good mix of mindset and practical work.

J- Yeah, definitely. I think after working as an editor for a long time, I find it very fulfilling to turn chaos into order, which is really big picture here what you and I are doing right? We're taking the chaos and confusion around where you want to go and putting it into a set of steps.

W- Yeah, absolutely. I agree. Okay, Jenni, want to show folks how we do it? 

J- Yep, let's do it. 

W- I will start by coaching you. So Jenni, tell us how has the last year freelancing in a pandemic gone for you?

J- You know, the past year has changed everything for me, I think. Having a kid really put into a stark light how hard I was working pre-kid and pre-pandemic. And that pace became completely unsustainable. I think sometimes I look back on like, former pandemic, former parent Jenni. And I was just telling everyone that like, you can make six figures, you should hustle, you can do this. And I'm just like: Girl, no! I can see now that what I was doing, what I was telling people wasn't something that could work for everyone else. And it was not even something that could necessarily work for me, long term. So the hustle is definitely a coping mechanism for me for my anxiety. And learning how to slow down this past year has been super tough. But my energy is a total finite resource. Like I'm chasing a toddler around and there's not enough to go around, I just can't do as much as I used to do. So I've talked about it a little bit on social media. But I've also been dealing with a lot of mental health challenges this year. I was diagnosed with postpartum PTSD following my son's birth. And actually, like, the only way to deal with all of this was to sit still, which I am terrible at, for a period of time. And so I think it was just a really good lesson on how to take care of myself and heal and that has kind of trickled down into my business. But yeah, it's been a tough year.

W- Yeah, all of this really resonates. Especially how clarifying this time can be. Where do you land after all of that? What do your reflections on the past year tell you about where you want to go with your freelance business?

J- I've learned a few things about myself. I think first, like I said, the hustle is a really unsustainable coping mechanism for me. And second, I slowed down enough to actually kind of figure out what kind of work I want to do long term. Like, I think I was moving too quickly to even have a grand vision before this past year. I have to be honest, I've always felt kind of like a square peg in a round hole when it comes to journalism. Like, I don't talk about that lack of a fit very much, because I always felt like I should want to do this work. You know, I should want to go out and report long stories and write investigative features. And you know, people listen to this podcast because they know that we're both journalists. But the reality I've come around to is that I love to write. I really do, you know? But I imagined I'd be writing creative nonfiction and essays when I got into this field. From day one of starting my journalism career, reporting was just a very bad fit for my anxiety. And as I would report I was super aware that it was costing me energy and money and sanity, and yet I kept doing it because I felt like I was supposed to. So all of that is a long way of saying like, I'm basically quitting journalism. So, maybe not quitting, because I think I'm still gonna keep editing and doing some different types of projects that are related to this industry, maybe even occasionally writing feature stories, honestly. But I'm basically no longer gunning towards being a journalist as a long term career plan, which feels really authentic to me. I'm not pitching anything at the moment, except for some personal essays.

W- Yeah, that's big and clarifying and liberating to have that revelation. And we also talked about that in a webinar last season on pivoting out of journalism, I think we develop so many skills to sustain our freelance businesses. So you know, the question becomes, how do we really want them to suit us and our life? And I think choosing our own path forward is really liberating. I keep using that word, but I think it's appropriate. So Jenni, I guess, if we were to go one step further, on a more granular level, what do you think needs to change?

J- This is a good question. You know, it's interesting, because I think this is a big mental shift for me to say: I don't actually need to bang my head against this wall, like I've been doing for years. But in terms of my business, it's actually just a subtle logistical shift. So I've been feeling pretty guilty for like a decade about journalism and the way I was doing it and feeling like a failure for not wanting to do it. And then the anxiety that I would get when I would like land a pitch and just be like, Oh, my God, now I have to report it. And so releasing all of that emotion is like, I mean, there's just so much more brain capacity, it's wild. So on a granular level, I'm going to keep all my content clients, so content marketing clients, the ones I'm blogging for, writing newsletters for, all of that, I'm actually going to try to add a few more of those type of clients into my lineup, because they pay well, and I really like the work. And then I think I will keep doing product reviews, because I love those, they keep me active, like I can test a backpack while I'm out with my kid. But the part that's going to be removed is pitching feature stories. I won't be doing pitching anymore, which is actually a huge time save. I will just be pitching and working on some personal essays, and carving out time in the evenings actually to be working on some of those essays that I've been wanting to write for a long time. And then the other big part of this is that I'm actually going to be ramping up my coaching practice. So I've been loving coaching for the past few months, I just have this really fresh energy for it. When I'm not full of journalism angst, it turns out I have this marvelous capacity to like listen to people, probably because I'm not doing interviews all day. And so I am planning to coach more people, to open up more spots for coaching in this next season. And not just for freelance writers, but anybody who's trying to figure out their career direction. And all of that means I'm investing in a training program to become a certified professional coach. So I could even go into organizations and help them with different types of coaching. And honestly, Wudan, like my long term dream is that when a publication lays off a portion of their staff, I am the post-layoff support. Like I'm the coach that you call in to help work with people to figure out their plan. That would just be like, super, super full circle for me. So we'll put that out there as like a dream scenario. But logistically, I actually think the change is mostly just like shifting time into different buckets in a new way, versus totally overhauling everything.

W- Yeah, it's been good to hear you talk through that. And super cool to ramp up your coaching practice too. Jenni, what roadblocks, if any, are there to get you where you want to go?

J- Yeah, I think first my coaching practice needs to be set up differently. You know, you and I both kind of came into coaching just sort of, I don't know, it just like happened, right? So I need to give my program some structure—have people signed contracts, do intake forms, maybe even designate a few days a week that are like my coaching days, and then I also need to charge a little more. So right now I think I'm not being paid quite enough to make all the logistical work around coaching work for me financially, like I think it's probably still 10% of my income, but taking up 25 percent of my time, I need that to sort of match up. And the scheduling can just be hard with childcare. So for me designating a couple days a week may be a good solution. But I do sometimes get stuck on just feeling like I don't have enough time. I can really only do about two sessions per day. So figuring out how to fit people in is pretty challenging, I think.

W- Yeah, legitimising your coaching business is big. And I agree that it's a lot of energy out, generally.

J- Yeah, I think my other biggest crunch, like I said, it's just time. I still only have about two and a half days of childcare per week, maybe three and a half some weeks. And so I do need to be actually bringing it in like really high paying clients. I need to go back on the client hunt I think, actually because I've gotten a lot of offers recently for, you know, $350 for a blog, and that's just actually too low at the moment, even if I can do it quickly.

W- Yeah, it's also kind of not worth it because why cobbled together so many those small things. And that requires a lot of time and energy too. And I think what we're getting at is, there's just a trade off on money and time. If you have less time, but need to make the same amount of money, you need to charge more. That's how math works.

J- Yeah, exactly. I think I have been operating as if I'm working full time hours mentally, but I haven't been since November. And so I actually need to adjust my projects to match the number of hours that I truly have. So the last thing I would say is just that I think I need to like, let go of some financial pressure. And this is interesting for me, like I'm in a position where I can aim for making a lot less per month than I used to, around $6,000, which is like a lower goal and I really have ever had. It's because my husband has a different job now. And so the problem is that I see that number, and I see it sort of as a failure, because I know there have been months when I've made double that. And so part of the mindset shift for me, I think, is accepting that if I'm refocusing my business and investing in coaching, training and raising the kid, I need that time more than I need that money, if that makes sense.

W- Yeah. And it sounds like you need to give yourself a little bit of permission too. There's this term in ecology called shifting baselines. And it refers to what we perceive as normal in one generation, or point of time, that's different from how another generation will perceive the decline of a species, the warming, weather, etc, when they are adults, and are observing the world. So I think similar to freelancing, we also go through different seasons in our business. And it's a shift, it's a transition, no matter how you cut it. And I think generally speaking, there is the feeling of needing to give permission to move and shift your own baseline, if that makes any sense.

J- Yeah, absolutely. I think I'm like my own biggest competitor with that, right? I love the way you phrased that. It's definitely much more lyrical and less chaotic than how it feels in my own head. It's a great metaphor. And the seasons thing really resonates too with raising a kid because things change all the time in terms of what they need from you and how much capacity I have.

W- Totally! So it sounds like what you actually need to do more moving forward is maybe make a new business plan. You will have new hours, you have some new services, and you have some new income goals or or different income goals, rather. Can you revise your income targets? And if you do that, how does that affect your hourly rates? And you know, for everyone listening, I would say if I were actually coaching Jenni, I'd have her redo those business planning worksheets we put together in season one as homework or as a online course right now.

J- Yeah, honestly, I'm going to take that assignment and do it anyway. So thank you, I will report back. So Wudan, let's switch to you. Why don't you start by telling me how the last year of the pandemic has gone for you and your business?

W- Yeah, I mean, overall, it's just been really mentally draining. And for me, there's been pretty steady work, which I've been lucky to have. And I've also learned how efficient I am in working because when I have a lot going on, in part because I need to be doing these things, I realized that task switching is pretty intense on my brain, whether it's normal brain, or pandemic brain, I think. And I think, you know, during lockdown, or whatever you want to call the last year, I realized that it's pretty draining for me to be constantly switching tasks. I will say, money wise, I think I shared last season that I managed to double my income. So this year, at the end of quarter one, I was able to invoice for over 25k, which is no reflection on how much I'll actually make because I want to take a lot of time off this summer, and later in the year. So I'm front loading my work. And I also didn't work very much in January. That's a good summary, I think. Lots of work in the past year, lots of money, lots of tired.

J- Yeah, even listening to you talk about that. I can just tell it sounds exhausting. And also a pretty big switch from the year before when you were making a lot less and traveling a lot more. Right? It kind of totally changes your equation about how you work and what's possible. So what do you think it is about that setup that isn't working for you? The over busy, lots of money, lots of tired?

W- Yeah, there are a few things that I've learned in the past year. So the first is that quick turnaround news stories don't really work for me. And I realized that after covering the protests last summer, and so I made a sticky note on my computer screen that says I will not be at the whims of the news cycle. And then I stopped taking breaking news assignments for Q3 and Q4. I also want to stop writing about COVID desperately, and I'm trying to take steps to get more into more consistent feature writing work that involves me getting out in the field as much as possible. It's also worth saying that I've been fully vaccinated for a few months. And so field work would be actually feasible and safe for me.

J- So I definitely hear from you that quick turns and news stories are like on the hard no list. So what do you need to do to stop writing about COVID? Because I know it's tough when you see an idea, and you know you could write it up so quickly for a big name publication, it's almost like an automatic reaction to send out that idea. So what would you need to do to stop writing about COVID?

W- Yeah, it's true. And I think a lot of editors also know me as a COVID reporter at this point. So I mean, it's just a matter of saying no, I think. And there are some very few COVID stories I'd want to do. And I need to extract the signal from the noise. So Jenni, you advised me a while back to make this decision matrix, which is really just a fancy term for a spreadsheet where you type or write out all the opportunities that come your way, and what you're going to decide before I go back and tell that client my decision. So that helped me a lot and helped me see a few patterns. The big ones are, I should just follow my gut. And the second one is, my yeses are really provisional. There's nothing that comes my way and I'm like, Oh, my God. Absolutely. No changes required to this schedule or scope. Let's go. There's usually something in there I want to negotiate. So with COVID stories, one thing I am pushing more is, can I have more time? And that's definitely helped, because I like working on my own schedule.

J- Yeah, that makes sense. I love the decision matrix. That was inspired by Aminatou Sow, and she talked about how it helped her take a pause, right? And I think that pause is so important, like, a moment to move past the automatic reaction and ask yourself, do I really want to do this? Or am I just saying yes, because it's automatic, right? The pandemic has made a lot of us so nervous about money that we automatically say yes. So, you know, if you take 24 hours, and then the answer is no, you say no. And like you said, You asked for the conditions you want to make it work if you're gonna say yes. So it sounds like that's been a really good tool and moving forward, the answer to COVID assignments will also be no more often. We'll put that on the, likely no list. So why don't you tell me about though the money side of things. Like a double income is a really big perspective shift. How has that changed things for you and your business?

W- Yeah, absolutely. So one fascinating thing for me is how addicting that has felt to earn money. And I feel like as freelancers there's this hamster wheel. And if we step off the wheel, then we not only stop producing, but we also stop earning money.

J- Yeah, I definitely hear some fear in there.

W- Yeah, it is in part fear. But I'm mostly interested in finding ways to become my own life raft during months off, when I do step off. I think this podcast and everything that we've built with it has been a great buffer because we get to control a lot of things within that.

J- Yeah, agreed. We're kind of our own anchor client. What I would say if I were coaching you, you know, I often ask coaching clients, this question is to sort of imagine a scenario with me, right? So like, tell me what might happen if you just took a month off from work and stepped off the hamster wheel,

W- I mean, probably nothing. I would probably just, you know, because I made so much money last year and last season, in our secret episode, our guest talked about abundance mindset, and that it's typical in times of abundance, to save for the times that are scarce, because nothing is abundant forever, and nothing is scarce forever. So that's kind of the mindset I've adopted, and there is nothing scary financially, that's going to happen if I take a month off. If I didn't work a month, that's, you know, $8,000 to $9,000 off the table, that's fine. But the way that you and I talked about target incomes for a lot of our coaching clients is, you know, this amount of money is nice to have, and maybe 10 or 15k less is also reasonable and won't put us, you know, out on the street, but it is also a lot more sane. Now that I've made six figures last year, the question that I'm grappling with is: I know I can do it; Do I want to do that? And what will it take for me to do that and do more journalism and features? That last question seems a little mutually exclusive. But I just don't know the answer to that yet, I don't think

J- Yeah, it sounds like you're itching for more big projects and less hustle on like COVID and news stuff. Right. And I also hear you saying that it's sort of like, you almost have to choose: six figures, or journalism and traveling? You can't have both. I imagine there's some sort of gray area in there. But I think you're right, that you just can't know, right? But there is some world probably like you said, where you make 80k and you stop yourself actively from going over that right? Like you set a top end. So I would just throw that out there I think is something to think about, like, is there actually a top end financial guardrail for yourself in the form of a number that would protect from burnout? Again, if we're doing homework, I might give down that as her homework and then On a granular level, though, to get more practical on this, Wudan, what do you think needs to change to shift the pace that you've been working out for something slower?

W- Honestly, I think the really big thing is that I need to get a little more comfortable, again with having unpaid time. So our listeners know, I love math, if I want to work no more than 35 hours a week, that's 140 hours a month, 140 hours a month means I shouldn't have more than 90 billable hours. So 50, free, unpaid ish hours. And so 50 divided by four is somewhere in the 12 hours a week of me doing admin, social media planning, pre reporting, that time is actually quite a lot. And so maybe just having fewer billable hours every month, and finding that balance between how much I need to make to pay the bills versus also having time for me to pursue. It's just a math puzzle. It's like an SAT question. I think,

J- Yeah, that was some good mental math. You know, I think that mental shift is tough, though, to say, Okay, I'm actually going to take 50 hours a month and say, these are hours I might not get paid for but that I'm going to use to pursue something that, you know, I'm creatively excited about, or that's adventurous, right? Or, basically, like, the challenge is choosing, you know, something else over the money like that, that is a really tough mental shift.

W- Yeah, frankly, I probably spend 50 hours a month on Twitter as it is, so I can make it work. And you know, this part of me, there's a part of me that acknowledges that, you know, journalism expects you to work really hard, and put in a lot of unpaid hours, without immediate pay. That part has sucked before. And I feel like I've hacked that in some way by pitching places that pay at least $1, a word, working with editors that are prompt with edit and payments, but still, like the pitching process remains crappy, fundamentally so. And it's hard to go from so much paid time to more unpaid time. I mean, generally speaking, my therapist is trying to get me to live in abundance. And I'm reminding myself that I've worked really hard to build my business to a place where I can literally afford to spend some more unpaid time. So all of this is to say, my mindset is a work in progress.

J- Yeah, absolutely. It always is, right? I think that like, if we think that we're gonna reach a point of enlightenment with our freelance business, like good luck, these mindset shifts are always happening and changing. But I do hear from you that you're doing a lot of work around this, which is big step, just to try to almost step back a little bit from what you did last year, right to like, just knock it down, like by like 10 or 20%. But like we said before, COVID really forced us into scarcity. And then journalism forces us into scarcity, like over and over and over again, as we watch people getting laid off, and pubs closing, and so it definitely makes sense that your brain automatically goes there. So it's just doing that work to consider what you've already done to protect yourself, so that your brain can choose something else if you want to. So I mean, tell me, what could you do to support that abundance mindset this month, like to embrace that unpaid time as an okay sort of concept,

W-I think actually doing the math. And I mentioned that I'm working with a coach right now. And one of the questions she had for me was, Oh, my God, do you know a programmer who could, you know, basically, look at my workflow and say, Wudan, you are tapped out on doing this service, whether it's coaching or speaking or something, or if I'm getting too close to that threshold I've set for myself, can a grid on my Excel spreadsheet turn yellow, or then orange, and then red is like danger, you've got to stop. That's kind of the pipe dream that I want, you know, a workflow that visually tells me I've got to cut it out. But you know, as much as putting a sticky on my computer that reminds me of spending more unpaid time it is okay is also fine. I mean, freelancing just feels like I'm doing all the things in a vacuum with no outside validation whatsoever.

J- Totally. And there is validation with getting new assignments, right? I think that's part of why the money feels addicting because it is a metric of success, when we don't often get told that we're doing a good job in this industry. So I love all of that: setting those automatic guardrails and the spreadsheets that turn yellow. If you invent that, please report back because I want to use it too. So again, if we were coaching for reals, I would assign Wudan to write up that sticky note that says, you can choose unpaid time, or you can choose creative projects, right? And I would actually also assign her to keep track of some of those creative projects, like are there any projects that don't have a financial hinge, and to maybe slot those in on the sticky note, right? Like I can choose this because I've prepared myself well, because I've protected myself. And then I think I would also assign her to us that decision tracker. If she were a new client, and we would talk together the next month about why you said yes. And why you said no. And if there were things that you said no to that you ultimately regretted or vice versa. So I love that tracker. And we will actually include that I think, as a resource in this episode.

W- Yeah. I mean, all of this was really helpful for me to verbalize all the things sitting in my head.

J- Yeah, same. I'm thinking that this is why we started this podcast, because we used to kind of have these conversations with each other, even before we came became coaches, you know, so definitely helpful. Yeah, super helpful.

W- Yeah. So again, if Jenni and I were to coach each other regularly, we would follow up with each other on our goals and homework. If I were coaching Jenni for a second session, I would want to check if she's actually done the work to rejigger her coaching program. And she would want to check in about whether or not I've set a top line financial limit too.

J- Yep, I think the magic of coaching is actually very much in the accountability, because you can't get away with putting off some of these uncomfortable or annoying things that you would avoid if you were by yourself. So as you can see from these mock sessions, there's part of this that's helping someone see their ideal direction. You know, so much of freelancing happens in a vacuum, like Wudan said, and having a space to discuss those decisions and then tack on the practicality can just be so, so helpful.

W- For sure. And this is a reminder that Jenni and I offer this dual coaching model where we switch off via The Writers' Co-op. You can find that information on our web page, thewriterscooppod.com, and both Jenni and I also run our own private coaching practices.

J- Yep, we do. So if you think coaching might be right for you, you can give us a shout. And then you can also listen to it for the rest of the season.

W- Yeah, we are going to start out with our guests in about two weeks time. And as a heads up, we also have two online courses for you to take at your own pace now.

J- Yep. So one of them is business basics, like Wudan mentioned, we run through what you need to think about to set up your business, what you value, what your services will be, how to set your rates, and more. So if Wudan had assigned me to break into business plan, she might have actually assigned me to take this particular course. 

W- The second course we have is on navigating and negotiating media contracts, and how to handle unsavory clauses that seem to somehow always exist. 

J- Ugh. That resonates. I'm negotiating a contract right now and getting all sorts of pushback. So yeah, if you want a buddy to help you walk through that, that class is in existence, and we will drop links to both of those courses in the show notes as well.

W- Finally, a reminder that season three episodes will be first released to our Patreon members. So if you're a member, at any level, you will get our episodes two weeks before everyone else, you can sign up anytime at patreon.com/twcpod

J- We just throw a lot of information at you. So I think we're going to drop all of that in the show notes. And you should remember to that our $9 a month members and up are going to get access to some of these good exercises and pieces of homework as well.

W- Yeah, absolutely. Well, all this sounds good. And it's always great chatting, Jenni, I will talk to you soon. 

J- Bye, Wudan. 

W- Bye, Jenni.

J- Season 3 of The Writers' Co-op is made possible by you, our listeners. This season is hosted by me, Jenni Gritters and my co-host, Wudan Yan, and the podcast would not be possible without the help of our producer, Jen Monnier and our editor, Susan Valot.