Not too long ago, working from home seemed like an impossible task, but now freelancers are here to prove that opinion wrong. More and more people are starting freelance careers every day and there are currently around 1.1 billion freelancers working around the world.
If you know all the tips for hiring freelancers you will have the right talent, but will you also know how to manage your freelancers? In case you struggle with the idea of hiring people from different sides of the world, there are many tools that were designed specifically for managing freelancers.
Here are some of the best ones.
Slack
One of the biggest issues managers have when it comes to freelancers is how to communicate with them. But that doesn’t have to be a problem if you use the right communication tool. And for over 600,000 organizations worldwide, that tool is Slack.
You have probably already heard of this messaging app, but if you haven’t, it’s a very simple yet flexible app that allows for smooth communication.
Here are some of the features Slack offers:
- One-on-one communication
- Creating teams and deciding who can join them
- Creating channels that allow you to collect conversations about multiple topics
- Starting ad-hoc channels that allow you to communicate with people that you don’t want to include in your permanent business channels
- Integration with a plethora of third-party tools
The ability to integrate with other tools is one of the reasons why so many teams opt for Slack instead of another communication tool. If you’re using Jira as your project management tool, you can enable Jira Slack integration and enjoy the features that come with combining them. For example, you will be able to set up automatic reminders for Jira issues, send notifications to different channels, customize Slack notifications with over 20 Jira fields, and much more. With your communication and project management tools integrated, you will always stay in the loop.
Interactive Database
An interactive database is a data editing software you and your freelancers can use to edit your data without any hassle and keep all of your information up to date.
One of the biggest benefits of using an interactive database is that it provides you with simple and effortless creative resource management because it allows you to do the following:
Create Onboarding Flows
The way a freelancer enters your organization is detrimental in deciding how long they will stick around and if they will be a good fit for the company. Your database will allow you to create a customizable user-friendly onboarding workflow to match your business’s needs.
Stay Organized
Using a CRM, your database will ensure all freelancer information is always up to date, making it easy for you to categorize all of your contractors and find resources when you need them.
Find the Perfect Freelancers for Each Position
Search for talent for every new position you have and share the recommendations you have with your other departments to find the perfect fit.
Always See Who Is Available
Track your contractors to see who is available whenever you have a new project and get updates about availability straight to your dashboard.
Zoom
It would be almost impossible to achieve your goals without video calls and online conferences. In the past, companies mostly used Skype for video calls, but as technology advanced, better video conferencing tools appeared on the market, one of which is Zoom.
Zoom is a video conferencing tool that is used by remote teams and freelancers all over the world because it has a lot of amazing features that make video conferencing a breeze. This cloud-based service allows you to schedule meetings and collaborate with your team effortlessly.
It’s a very intuitive tool that is simple to learn but still comes with a plethora of features that are more than enough to provide you with everything you need for a perfect virtual meeting.
By using Zoom, you can have one-on-one conversations as well as group calls with your team. People who are attending the meeting can join via computer, tablet, or mobile phone so no matter what technology they’re using, the call can be organized.
You can also record your conversations and view these recordings later to ensure you didn’t miss any important points. Another great feature that Zoom comes with is a whiteboard, which makes it easy to provide visual explanations to freelancers.
Payoneer
Payoneer is a tool that enables you to send payments to your freelancers, no matter where in the world they’re located. You can set it up for one-time payments as well as automated payments. It comes with reporting features that make record-keeping easy and those features include freelancer information, payment history, and account history, just to name a few.
To make payments on Payoneer, you can use bank transfers, credit cards, international checks, and online wallets. And as an added bonus, this software supports payment in various currencies so your freelancers can get their salaries in their national currency if that’s what they prefer.
TimeCamp
Efficient employee monitoring and billing can be a real struggle. But thanks to the fast development of the SaaS market, companies hiring both in-office employees and freelancers can now do it automatically, saving time on administrative processes.
TimeCamp tracks time automatically in the background and fills timesheets with time entries and (if the module is on) computer activities. Freelancers can easily report the time spent on their assignments and send the invoices based on the logged hours straight to their customers. On the other side, employers can access their records and stay up to date with the performance of their contractors.
Key TimeCamp features:
- Automatic time and activity tracking,
- Daily and weekly timesheets,
- Wide range of built-in and custom reports,
- Billable/non-billable hours,
- Attendance management,
- Invoicing,
- Custom management roles and Guest features,
- High availability: web timer, desktop app, mobile app, a browser extension for Chrome and Edge
- 30+ direct integrations with tools like Trello, Asana, Jira, Salesforce, Zendesk, Azure DevOps, Monday, Clickup, and many more (most of the integrations allow you to track time directly from the tool you use or import the project structure to TimeCamp from them).
Besides automatic time tracking, TimeCamp offers many other features to make the freelance workforce a lot easier. It provides teams and individuals with a wide range of preset and custom reports, offers budgeting and billable/non-billable hours, and a comprehensive project tree structure.
Plus, there’s a free plan available for unlimited users, with an unlimited number of projects and tasks. You can easily upgrade it to the higher version (prices start at $6 per user per month) and access the features included in the pricing plans.
Final Thoughts
Freelancing wouldn’t be possible without technological advancement and all of the amazing tools that allow business owners to manage workers from different sides of the world. If you’re struggling with managing your team of freelancers, give these tools a try and you won’t regret it.
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