Back of the (Excel) envelope...

[alexpgp]

One of the first things done this morning was to review the past four years of billings. I was interested in seeing if there were any seasonal trends, and although a more mathematical approach might find some not-obvious correlations, my eyeball inspection of the data showed nothing striking.

Bright Spot 1: Nothing will likely ever beat April of 2009 for a lousy billing month. I could probably go work part-time at McDonald's for a couple of weeks and earn more than I did that month.

Bright Spot 2: Last year was an improvement over 2009, during which only 4 months qualified as "outstanding," "excellent," or "good." In 2010, seven months fell into those categories, almost back up to the 2007 level of 8 such months.

Bright Spot 3: If I list the twelve worst billing months over the period from 2007-2010 (using the Excel SMALL() function), the tenth through twelfth worst months are actually not that bad (they all fall into the "fair" category, which is immediately below "good") and the difference between the tenth-worst and twelfth-worst month is less than $150.

Cheers...

Comments

[silpol.livejournal.com]

sounds like you've been reading books on freelance financing right before that :)

[alexpgp.livejournal.com]

No. Yesterday's exercise was an attempt to confirm or deny an uneasy feeling that overall, my freelancing efforts are resulting in an ever-smaller return.

That uneasy feeling was doubtless the result of some recent disappointments, because when I cast the data in terms of my informal grading system, there is a definite dip from 2008 to 2009, with something of a recovery in 2010.

Cheers...