If, like me, you’re an independent consultant or freelancer I can highly recommend the podcast The Freelancer’s Show, which is about the business of consulting and freelancing in the IT / software development industry.

More than 300 episodes in it covers a wide range of subjects that are vital if you want to run a successful and sustainable software consulting business. Some of the questions the show tries to answer or at least help the listeners with are:

• How do I position myself?
• How do I approach pricing?
• How do I get noticed by potential clients?
• How do I market my services?
• How do I negotiate with clients?
• How can I deal with difficult clients?

I can particularly recommend episodes 295 (“Erik Dietrich on the Future of Labor”) and 296 (“Negotiating with Clients”), some of the key takeaways of which are:

• Position yourself as a consultant who creates comprehensive solutions instead of just a pair of hands that merely code a solution someone else devised.
• Take end-to-end responsibility for your work and your results.
• Don’t commoditise yourself.
• Don’t negotiate or compete on price.