If you’ve landed on Work for Impact, you’re on the right path to finding freelancers aligned with your values and your company’s mission, congrats!
Now that you’re here, you may even find yourself spoilt for choice, with more purpose-driven talent and good intentions appearing with every click.
To help you navigate the hiring and support your decision, we share here a few ideas on how to take things a step further. It’s time to find those that will truly connect with your project, understand your ethos and match your work quality expectations.
Make time for meaningful in-depth voice conversation
In this highly digital world of ours, real-time voice conversations are becoming a rarity, particularly when it comes to freelance jobs online.
Between navigating time zones, finding an allotment of free time that suits both parties, and choosing a conversation platform you both know how to use, typing an e-mail can seem like the easier option. However, for those looking to make meaningful connections and work with compatible people in-depth voice conversations are vital.
By making time for a chat, you can quickly break past formalities and get to know each other on a more personal level. At this time, it might be a good opportunity to understand their background, beliefs, passions, and purpose-driven life and work that generates a good impact on people and the planet.
Without endless time to pen their most people-pleasing sentences, you’ll know their true colors before you can say the words ‘zoom call’.
Ask the right purpose-driven questions
When recruiting great freelance talent, it’s easy to get distracted by project-specific questions such as: “Could you meet our deadline?”, “Do you have the required skills and can you work within our budget?”. Once you’ve found someone that ticks all those boxes, it might seem like too much to ask that this potential team member also aligns with the brand values and brand purpose.
Work for Impact makes it much easier to find mission-aligned freelancers. But asking the right questions in the first place will take things a step further in finding the people that perfectly fit your business.
Consider writing five meaningful questions you could repeatedly use when hiring freelancers. It may feel like a bombardment when paired with the project-specific questions, but rest assured that the right people will stick around and answer them with genuine enthusiasm and attitude.
The right questions will validate the right talent.
Carefully assess the freelancer’s portfolio
At some point during their career, most freelancers will find themselves working on tasks they don’t love just to make ends meet. Lending to the sad fact that the best freelance jobs don’t always pay the bills. This is the work you aren’t likely to be told about or shown.
On the other hand, the work displayed on their portfolio is likely to be a collection of their best freelance work. It might show the projects that align with their values, give a glimpse of their skills, and reflect who they are and what they love.
If it’s what they are proud of and chooses to share with the world, it speaks volumes of who they are and what mission-driven work means to them.
Spend time carefully sifting through this work.
Give full transparency about your mission and clear expectations.
Transparency is critical to assure you are both aligned. Give full clarity about the company mission, company vision, business goals, and core values. Share the work your company is providing and the positive impact it is making.
Allow them to understand the full scope of work and share your expectations about what work needs to be delivered and how their work will impact the company’s purpose. By doing it, it will be easier for the freelancer to be onboarded and aligned with your essence and culture.
Humanise the experience along the way
After the introductory voice call, it’s easy to slip back to robotic digital communication that’s very matter-of-fact. This makes it hard to form genuine bonds and determine whether you’re dealing with someone purpose-driven and that truly ‘gets’ your vision and values.
Try splicing personal anecdotes into your emails and asking sincere questions that require a response. Keep constant communication and provide clear feedback. You’ll quickly discover if you’re on the same page or reading from two different books entirely.
Research via brands that resonate with your mission
Still can’t find what you’re looking for? It might be time to seek out freelancers based on the brands they’ve worked for in the past. If you’re spotting unethical consumer brands on your hunt for a soulful freelance graphic designer, you might want to proceed with caution.
If environmental organizations are popping up in your search for an anti-whaling videographer or social impact companies are being highlighted when looking for a meaningful copywriter, you’re on the right track.
Just remember, not all freelancers have had the privilege of working solely on projects they feel connected to. Moreover, some freelancers reflected on their mission and values and might be transitioning to fully work with purpose-driven projects. You might need to allow for a few misalignments to be sandwiched between the good stuff and give them the chance to share their vision and explain their work.
Do a scope of freelance talent digital presence
Let’s be real, it’s a bit ethically questionable to snoop through old family photos accidentally left public on the depths of Facebook. Reading tweets and doing a security audit Google search, on the other hand, is very much above board when recruiting in 2021.
With so much of our lives shared on the internet, it’s only natural to check what’s portrayed by those you may be working with. After all, when you hire freelancers, their work becomes a small piece of the puzzle that is your business. It’s important to ensure they will represent your brand in the best possible way.
Time to find the right purpose-driven freelancer.
The Work for Impact talent pool is the best freelance platform to find freelancers with great values and exceptional skills. To find your next remarkable freelancer, simply sign up, post your project on our site and wait for the high-quality applications to start rolling in.
Collaborate with people you will love working with so much you’re tempted to lure them to full-time and deliver great impact together.
Good work on finding the right purpose-driven freelancer that fits your company culture.