????自由職業對很多人來說意味著有望按自己的方式來完成工作。但除了這一份獨立自主，隨之而來的還有一系列抉擇要做。最難的是如何給你的時間定價。

????無論你是獨立顧問，還是按小時、按天、按星期或按項目收費的自由職業者，你都是用時間來賺錢的人。因此，珍視自己的時間價值，這是你與客戶協商的核心。

????“如果你不珍惜自己的時間，別人也不會珍惜，”艾奧瓦州得梅因的一位自由職業作家本?格蘭說?！氨仨毚_保你坐在桌前工作的每個小時都是賺錢的，以彌補你由于推廣或繳稅而不在桌前工作的時間?！?/p>

????全球外包網站Elance最近發布的報告指出，市場對自由職業者的需求正在不斷增長。Elance為獨立工作者和公司提供了一個服務平臺。2012年第三季度，新發布的工作職位增加了41%，自由職業者的收入增加了42%。尤其值得注意的是，銷售和營銷項目呈現增長，其中社交媒體營銷、策略和潛在客戶開發均較上年增長了一倍以上。

????但在算自由職業者的經濟賬之前，首先要明白一點，獨立顧問必須要在收費工作和不收費工作之間取得平衡。人們的本能總是要盡可能多地將每段可利用的時間用于收費工作，但現實是，很多工作并不能帶來收入，不管是是營銷、人際交往、寫提案、開發票，還是其他案頭工作。成功的顧問總是孜孜以求效率，注重時間管理。

????第一步：設定目標收入。按小時、按天或按星期，你需要賺多少錢才能滿足開支需要，才能賺到你期望的收入？搞清楚必須要賺多少錢，你就可以更容易地判斷并回絕那些報價過低的工作，同時確保一個項目能給你帶來期望的小時費率。例如，本文采訪的顧問和自由職業者將目標設在每小時收費50-300美元。

????第二步，必須能準確估算一個項目需要多長時間才能完成。即便按小時計費，你也需要提供給客戶一個項目總的費用估算。

????“任何提案最有壓力的部分就是最后一頁，列出我所做的所有工作要收多少錢，”紐約州斯卡斯代爾的營銷顧問特雷西?拉扎勒斯說?！拔业姆绞绞墙o客戶提供一個報價，為他們創造價值，他們就會給我一個讓我滿意的費用?！?/p>

????每個項目拉扎勒斯都會撰寫詳細的提案，列明每一個步驟以及客戶將獲得什么。比如，她可能會列明她將撰寫5個新產品銷售創意，或者提交的文件最多將經過兩輪修改。這樣，她就可以避免節外生枝或額外工作，導致工作時間（和成本）上升。

????“我確保自己不被盤剝的方式就是在提案中明確我的主要工作內容，這樣就沒有太多可以隨意闡釋的空間，”她說。“如果不夠詳細，結果會是報價不當，有些錢可能沒有加進去，或者你忘了還有一個步驟……”

????For many, being self-employed offers a promise of doing fulfilling work on your own terms. But along with that independence comes a dizzying array of decisions. One of the toughest of these is how to price your time.

????Whether you are an independent consultant or freelancer who charges by the hour, day, week, or project, you are trading time for money. So the question of how you value that time is central to how you negotiate with clients.

????"If you don't value your time, no one else is going to," says Ben Gran, a freelance writer based in Des Moines, Iowa. "You have to make sure every hour you spend in the chair working is profitable, to make up for all the hours you're not in the chair working because you're marketing yourself or doing your taxes."

????Demand for freelancers is growing, according to a recent report by Elance, a website that connects independent workers with companies. New job posts grew by 41% and freelancer earnings climbed 42% in the third quarter of 2012, compared with the previous year's quarter. Most notably, sales and marketing projects were on the rise, with social media marketing, strategy, and lead generation all more than doubling from the previous year.

????But before you dive into the freelance economy, understand that independent consultants must balance the need to pack billable work into every available hour with the reality that many activities won't bring in revenue, whether that's marketing, networking, writing proposals, invoicing or other paperwork. Successful consultants maintain an unrelenting focus on efficiency and time management.

????The first step: know your target income. What dollar amount do you need to bring in each hour, day, or week to cover your expenses and make the kind of income you desire? Having a clear understanding of what you must earn makes it easier to turn away work that pays less than you need -- or to ensure a given project delivers your hourly rate. Consultants and freelancers interviewed for this article set targets from $50 to $300 per hour, for example.

????Next, you must be able to accurately predict how long a given project will take you to complete. Even if you're being paid hourly, you need to give a client an estimate of the overall cost of a project.

????"The most stressful part of any proposal is the final page, which is how much I charge for all this work," says Tracy Lazarus, a marketing consultant based in Scarsdale, N.Y. "I've found a way to provide a price to clients that provides them with a value while providing me with a fee that I'm happy with."

????For each project, Lazarus writes a detailed proposal that spells out every step and what her clients should expect to receive. She might specify that she'll write five new product concepts, for instance, or that a given document will undergo up to two rounds of revisions. That saves her from unexpected changes or additional work that would add time -- and cost -- on her end of things.

????"How I make sure I'm not exploited is I'm very specific on the key activities in the scope of the proposal so it doesn't have a lot of leeway for interpretation," she says. "If you don't detail it enough, what happens is you don't price it out appropriately and you leave money behind, or you forget a step…."