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Graphic Designer pros and cons.

What are the pros and cons of working as a UX designer for a company versus freelancing full-time?

  • Some idle Sunday evening daydreaming: what are the pros and cons of working as a UX designer for a company (in-house, consultancy, agency, startup) versus freelancing full-time?

  • Answer:

    1. Freelancing You have to worry about getting paid each month. Ideally you get to pick your own clients, but sometimes you'll still end up working on something less than totally entertaining to pay the bills. You'll also spend a lot of your time (think 25-75%) doing business admin, marketing, meeting prospective clients, sorting insurance, professional development, networking, writing up proposals, etc. Some of this is stupidly useful on the UX side though since it gives you a greater insight into how businesses run when you're pitching your UX work. Unless you grow large enough to need to hire folk you spend a lot of your time working alone, or with non-UX folk. You need to spend time networking and socialising to stay in touch. You get to see projects through from start to finish - and touch upon all aspects of the business. This is stupidly powerful information to grok and will help you sell UX better. 2. Working for a company/agency that does UX work You get a salary. Somebody else worries about getting clients and admin stuff. You spend most of the day doing UX work. You don't get to pick the client. Sometimes you'll work on things that bore you. You get to work on a wide variety of projects. You'll get a chance to try your hand at lots of different kinds of UX work in different contexts. You'll probably end up doing some client work in a safe environment, which is a great skill to acquire. You'll often get to skip out of some of the work involved in getting ideas implemented and released. Depending on your outlook you may think this is a good thing or a bad thing (personally I think the  latter ;-) You often don't get to see a project through end-to-end. Sometimes you'll be spending your time doing work under somebody else's direction. You sometimes end up being in the business of selling UX work - rather than being in the business of building great products. 3. Working as a UX person within a product company You get a salary. Somebody else worries about selling products and admin stuff. You spend most of the day doing UX work. You've picked the client (by picking your employer) - but you only have the one. So choose wisely. You generally get to work on few projects in-depth. You'll more often see them through from start to finish. You'll see the results of your good decisions (and bad) and get to try and repeat/fix them. Depending on your outlook this can be very satisfying or terribly dull (I tend to the former ;-) There tend to be not quite enough UX folk for the work involved. You may often be the only UX person around. You may need to work on professional development and staying on top of the field. For some reason in-house UX folk seem to get less respect than agency UX folk by some people. You may need to grow a thick skin.

Adrian Howard at Quora Visit the source

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Other answers

I don't have much to add to Adrian's splendid answer. But here's a few ideas. It's not necessarily the case that you'll always be working alone or with non-UX people in a consulting arrangement... In my experience (10+ yrs in each role) it's been about 50/50. One thing is that, as an outsider, you don't have nearly the opportunity to own long term decisions or influence strategic direction the way you might as a regular employee. That can be frustrating. You do get the opportunity to learn about a much broader range of products and services than you ever could as an employee of a software company (or even an agency, in most cases). And you will often find yourself working on radically different products, platforms, paradigms at the same time, which keeps your work from getting monotonous. If you enjoy the early stages of the design process: getting up to speed on the technical issues involved, understanding the users and their needs, broadening your own knowledge through background research, and generating, refining, and selling a compelling solution strategy, then a consulting arrangement (whether independent or as part of an agency) probably offers the best opportunity to exercise those skills. Yes, employees have a better chance to walk away with a big equity payoff, but they don't get to bill by the hour for the time spent in meetings. Never underestimate the value of that simple principle for protecting your own sanity!

Kevin Mullet

Freelancing is never full-time. I mean it will never be full time UX design stuff. You'll also have to deal with accounting, finding new clients, claiming your money, pay taxes... If what you want is only UX design, you'll certainly do more and with less uncertainty working for a company. The downside: you won't be the boss and won't get that freedom freelancing will give you (like choosing when you want to work).

Alain Mevellec

The key difference these days is that you put all your eggs in the same basket when you are an employee. If you are a freelancer, chances are that you have several clients so directionally your income is more stable.

Pablo Roufogalis

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