Last month, I attended a nationally publicized LaidOffCamp, where I learned a lot of great information and met a lot of inspirational people.

LaidOffCamp was an “unconference” or a “BarCamp“, where the conference sessions are put on and discussed by the event’s participants. This allows a lot of openness, community-building, and networking at all of these events. If you haven’t been to a BarCamp, I highly recommend it! You’ll be sure to take something from the event, feeling positive and productive, and you’ll get to meet folks that have the same interest as you!

I learned a lot of great information at LaidOffCamp and thought it would be beneficial for everyone to know! Below are the notes I took so I could share with YOU. Hope it helps! :)

(If you’re looking for information and resources about to do after being laid off, you can also read my Layoff Survival Guide.)

Interesting Sessions I Attended:

• “Forming a Corporation or LLC”
• “Freelancing Tools”
• “Resume 2.0″
• “Networking 101/Personal Branding”
• “Be a Yes (in this “No” Economy)”

Unfortunately, each session was only about 30-45 minutes, which I felt wasn’t ample time to fully wrap up topics and discussions. Nevertheless, each session provided much shared information and great ideas!

Forming a Corporation or LLC

This session wasn’t necessarily what I was interested in, but seemed more informative for me than the other sessions going on. Thus, I might not fully understand all the terminology nor fully understand the reasoning behind it all. Either way, I just wanted to share in case you’d be interested!

• Keep a separate bank account for your business. This is easier for accounting purposes.
• Open an account with a Credit Union
• Track your expenses. Some services you can use: Mint.com and Outright.com
• Marketing:
  • Create a LOGO – this is your identity
  • Slogans, mascots
  • Business cards (see more below)
  • Promote yourself: go to tradeshows where there’s people of different backgrounds. Social Networking!
  • “Any PR = Good PR”
• Be extremely careful of your reputation: online reputation management.
• Business cards: make it professional. VistaPrint.com offers free business cards, where you just have to pay for shipping.
• Do your homework first before you name your business! Make sure there’s no name conflicts in your county/nationwide. The county clerks will not check if there are conflicts in name. You can check for trademarks with your Secretary of State, the US Patent and Trademark Office, Googling the name. Also make sure that there are no logo conflicts.

Also, here is a Self-Employment Tax Calendar, provided by Outright.com, which I think is an awesome resource!

Freelancing Tools

I was highly interested in this Freelancing session, so I ended up taking a lot of notes for this. The session was headed by Duncan from Workstir, Josh from oDesk, and Travis from Werkadoo. A short session but a lot of great information shared:

• Drafting Contracts

  Tips and advice to make sure you’re legally protected as a freelancer:

  Always get the terms on paper!
  Verbal and written contracts are binding.

  Scope
  This is extremely important! Make sure the scope is laid out. Include the tasks that are necessary to be completed and the hours needed for each. Also have on paper the milestones of the project.

  Change Requests
  Always include a methodology for change requests. (e.g. “If changes occur, the process should be…”) Also, if you need to increase the hours/billing, what is the process for this?

  Payment
  Never wait until the project is done to get paid. Have them pay 1/2 up-front and 1/2 at the end of the job. Give an estimate how of many hours this would take, and ask them to pay half up-front.

  Types of contracts:

  • Timed and materials — the preferred method. This is charging your employer per hour for your services.
  • Fixed price — a flat-rate for your services.

  To receive some help, you can try contacting lawyers directly to see if they’d help you for free until you have enough money.

• Calculating Your Rate

  At the minimum, figure out your standard of living. Keep in consideration these factors:

  • Monthly insurance costs
  • Rent/Living costs
  • Monthly food costs
  • Etc.

  Freshbooks.com
  Also, track your time! Freshbooks provides an invoicing system where you input your hours.

• Filing Taxes as a Freelancer

  1099 Forms
  This is the IRS form to fill out when reporting your freelance/contractor income. If you’ve earned more than $600 from your employer for your freelancing/contractor services, the employer has to file a 1099 form. For more information about this, I found this really helpful site: FreshBooks.com – Get Your Clients to Report Your Freelance Income Using Form 1099 On Time.

  Again, here is Outright.com’s Self-Employment Tax Calendar, a pretty useful and important resource!

  Other Tax/Filing Tips
  - Ask a CPA or accountant if you have any questions about what/how to file your freelance/contractor work
  - Look for volunteer grad students that are studying to be CPA/accountants–they’re available to help with your taxes too

• Finding Clients

  Workstir
  A place where business can find freelancers and contractors with ratings, and where freelance and contractors can find jobs. This is a FREE service.

  Werkadoo
  “A remote working environment built for the people by the people. Join the movement in ditching the cubicle, and werk efficiently by working remotely.”

  oDesk
  “A global service marketplace for small and medium sized business to hire, manage, and pay remote freelancers or teams.”

  Self-Marketing
  Reach out and talk to people. Provide a service.

• Converting from Contractor to Full-Time

  Make it clear from the start that you’re interested in the Full-Time position, but you’d be willing to do contract work. Suggest projects/jobs for them that are opportunities for them–BUILD VALUE.

Resume 2.0

A very unique and memorable ideas, lead by Dale Larson (@dalelarson) and Marcus Ronaldi (@hydra1970). The BLOG and YOUTUBE ideas were the ones that stuck out the most for me.

• Social Bookmarking
• LinkedIn – join groups
• Embed your resume and job descriptions into your Facebook and Twitter Feeds
• ResumeBucket
• Have a Public Resume
  • Take out your address, keep the city name
  • Include the area codes you’re interested working in
  • Include your email address and LinkedIn address
• Using a BLOG as a form of expertise — Think of the blogs you visit regularly. Would you hire that blogger without even seeing their resume?
• YOUTUBE — Create a video to represent yourself, like a cover letter. Include your field of expertise.
• GlobalPitch.com — A visual CV
• In Word Docs for your resume, never put your contact information in the Header of the .doc! It can often very and get lost when people view it on their computers.

Networking 101 / Personal Branding

This session, led by Edith Yeung (@edithsan), was a very engaging session. I actually didn’t take many notes for this session as I was mostly listening, but Edith’s biggest point were these:

• GIVE and OFFER yourself — this is the best way to connect with people because you’re doing something for THEM
• Reword what you want to something THEY want.

Be a “Yes!” in a “No” Economy

This session was led by Adryenn Ashley (@adryenn) from Wow! Is Me: Monetizing Your Passion.

• Find what you’re good at, and make money from that.
• Work on your OWN dream, not someone else’s!
  Get the idea out of your head and take ACTION
• Consider: why should people believe in you? Why should they LIKE you?