Getting my ISC income back!

One of the main reasons of me taking up my new role was the hope that once things settle down, I will find more freedom to engage in my ISC activities as me being my own boss would give me freedom to adjust my schedule as needed. And not having anyone to look over my shoulder and having my own private office were pluses that would allow me to freelance by managing my time. Also, it was offering me the flexibility to work from home part of the time, so that too would help me further my ISC income.

With that in mind I was searching for a log term ISC/freelancing contract that would earn me a fixed amount every month. Why I was looking for a long term contract was, I had realized that I spent quite a lot of time bidding on projects. These bidding time does not earn any income for you. So I can actually save a quite a lot of time if I had a continuous project to work on.

The other thing is, it is a bit difficult to keep persistently bidding on projects. After a while, if you don't win any projects that becomes a bit demoralizing. Finally, it is difficult to plan your ISC income when you are working on short projects. Some months will be good. Some will be dry. At this point of time, what I wanted was a regular supplementary income.

I had been in a few regular on going projects in the past but they had one major drawback. That was almost all of them required me to be online at certain specific times of the day, all working days. This was a very inconvenient thing as that tend to make my schedules inflexible. So this time around I was looking for an on going assignment which did not require putting in regular hours. Basically a project which allowed me to wok on my own schedule.

Keeping these things in mind I kept applying for jobs on oDesk. The keywords I was looking for were part-time, .NET/.NETCF, Project Management. I found a few and applied to all of them. Got interview requests for a few of them and got interviewed by about 5 clients. Carried on discussions with about 2 of them and settled with one. Of course, as it was the first time that this particular client was out sourcing work it took some time to get things sorted out and he required a lot of hand holding. I sent him sample NDA's that I had singed before and helped him draft a NDA for him to hire me. Gave him the confidence through oDesk as it was his first time on oDesk as well. All of these work on my part helped me land the job.

After landing the job I realized that much of the project management was to be done on myself as the developer in the west was working for a plan that I was not aware of. But I was also given a set of tasks and ended up being a developer myself. But since I was always happy doing coding this was not something that I mind. I am still putting in the same number of hours I promised, whether I am developing or managing this project and I am getting paid what I was promised. So all in all there is nothing much for me to complain about. I get my money as well as the freedom to work my own schedules. And most of the time I get left alone as well.

There is one thing that I realized. If I was to work as a project manager or any kind of management role, the chances are I would be required to make some regular hours for team meetings, status updates, etc. But if I steered towards a more development role, the chances of me being left alone are higher. So I am happy to be working on my developer centric role. So here I am, running my own freelance ISC operation by my side and earning an additional steady income. Well, now my target is to keep this side job going on for a while!

Settling down on the new role

I blogged about a new role I had taken up to set up a software development team for a US client in Sri Lanka. This is a post to review the first month of my operation with the new team in place. For a few months it was just me ding all the work and I was mainly playing a coordinating role. I had the hardware setup in an office, but since the development was happening at yet another remote location, I was playing a more of a hands off role when it came to maintaining source codes, databases, backups, etc.

But when my team was coming on board that required me to setup the infrastructure to support a proper software development team environment. I managed to set that up with the arrival of the team members. Now the office has a proper software development environment that supports team software development. This infrastructure is currently being used by the on site and off site teams. My biggest worry was mainly in setting up this infrastructure. As I am not very good with setting up network infrastructures, I had to adopt a few trial and error methods to get the setup up and running.

Now that the infrastructure is in place, my next target is to get the team up to speed. My performance will greatly depend on the performance of the team. A leaders effectiveness is seen in his followers. A managers effectiveness is seen in his subordinates. In my case the effectiveness and the future of the whole off shore operation is in the hands of the team that I have recruited.

I think these guys have settled down in their role pretty well. They are very receptive to new ideas and the fact that they are relatively fresh, without much experience means that they can be moulded in the manner they want.

I too have seemed to settled down in my new role after these few months. I am no longer 'new' to the work that needs to be done and feel pretty comfortable with the work. My contribution is also a lot more productive. I still seem to run a lot of things by my CEO, but I think even that is gradually decreasing. I feel more and more comfortable to make decisions independently. I am also starting to think more entrepreneurial and make decision as if it is my company. This is a direct feed to my entrepreneurial streak that I have. And it is a good training for a future entrepreneur.