Goodbye Contractor Chronicles: What's next for 2024... What do you think?

Get a heads up about new year changes — From detailed design insights to empowering career advice

Hello 👋

How are you? Have you done all your shopping? It’s so great to have you here by the way!

What was that? Oh…I was just saying hello to the 100+ people that signed up to my newsletter in the last week.

But also I wanted to say a personal hello again to the OGs who have been around since March 2021. 

Over the last couple of years my writing consistency has risen and fallen like the tides. But since posting my “Steal my portfolio: How I structure my portfolio preview including FREE Figma Template!” article last week, a new drive and love for writing has been reignited. 

So though I won’t be appearing again in your inbox until the new year, I wanted to give you a heads up of my plans for this newsletter in 2024, and I can’t wait to hear what you think about it! 

Share more about what I do and how I do it

When writing for others it can become incredibly hard to be specific. Writing posts about finding your next role or creating that killer portfolio, for me, can mean I tip into writing in a way that is vague, and not that helpful due to its lack of actionable advice. It’s usually from an attempt to write for everyone. Which we all know is impossible. And to that I say no more. Next year I plan to provide more resources, tools and frameworks that you can try straight away. No more fluffiness.

Ditching the contractor chronicles as a name

Who I was in 2021 when I started this newsletter, is no longer who I am today. When I first opened up Substack and typed my first post, I was a timid designer looking to step into my first contract role after years of working in agencies, employed by someone else who had to worry about how to pay the staff.

Today, I’m a fully fledged contractor, who networks easily, finds their own projects, pays their own salary and hires their own freelancers. I would have never imaged that I’d have the confidence, skill or ambition to work for myself. As someone who is their own worst critic, reaching the stage where I can publicly and proudly announce my achievements is a huge step personally and professionally for me.

And in that, this is what I want to share with you. With 10 years worth of experience, of taking risks in my design work and career. Going from a shy, under confident designer I feel that I’m at a stage where I can provide meaningful, useful, and actionable advice to those who are starting or in the middle of their design career. 

So if that doesn’t align with the kind of newsletter you’d want to subscribe to, that’s cool, feel free to unsubscribe. I’m hopeful you’ll stick around, but if not, I’m sure our paths will cross again another time.

I’ll reveal the new name and updated about section in the new year. 

Embracing my inner recruiter

“…This is so brilliant, thanks so much! You should be a recruiter haha…”

More recently than ever, I’ve been told that I should be a recruiter. Over the last year I’ve helped connect promising designers with those who are hiring for junior roles. I’ve helped my freelance peers bag a design project with clients I’ve also been working with. 

And you know what? I absolutely love doing that. When I get a message from someone telling me that they got an interview, or they have wrapped up a previous client project, I’m over the moon. I get an absolute buzz from that, for both sides. I love when a client tells me that they enjoyed working with someone I recommended.

So in future posts, you’ll start to see a section at the bottom of my weekly emails featuring a few jobs I’ve found and curated. Over this year I’ve built up a growing junior designer and freelancer network, and I want help those designers pair up with clients, companies and more people I know.

I won’t keep you reading any longer, and let you get back to your mince pies and terrible Christmas films. But I just wanted to say huge thank you to everyone who reads and opens my emails. It’s kind of you to let me drop into your inbox and share what I’m so excited to write, teach and talk about that week.

I would love to learn more about you, the person reading this right now, what questions are you desperate to ask but don’t have a designer to ask? What stage of career are you in? Are you even in design at all and just thinking about it? Who ever you are, don’t be too shy to say hello!

Until next year 👋 
Liz 🍔

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