Hiring a freelancer ahead of time

[1d78b818]

Hi,

I have submitted a job post now to first get an understanding of project costs, but I only expect the project to start in a month or two. Do I hire the freelancer now and ask him/her to wait until the project is ready to begin? How should I approach this? Best practices?

Thanks ahead.

[emiguelina]

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Jean N wrote:

I have submitted a job post now to first get an understanding of project costs, but I only expect the project to start in a month or two. Do I hire the freelancer now and ask him/her to wait until the project is ready to begin? How should I approach this? Best practices?

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You certainly could try and accomplish, but experience freelancers will not accept the job until there is actually work, 'cause a job without money exchange could hurt freelancer's JSS, (in case if canceled)

If you want to post the job immediately, my advice would be to state that in the job post from the very beginning, take all the time to screen freelancers, don't rush (check carefully freelancer's profile, read previous job's feedback, schedule interviews, video calls if needed), if done properly this can take time.

[petra_r]

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Jean N wrote:

I have submitted a job post now to first get an understanding of project costs, but I only expect the project to start in a month or two. Do I hire the freelancer now and ask him/her to wait until the project is ready to begin? How should I approach this? Best practices?

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Do not hire a freelancer until you are ready to start. It doesn't do freelancers any good to have inactive contracts without any earnings (it can affect their metrics if it goes on too long) and things change in a month or two.

I hope you made it clear in the job post that the job won't happen for weeks or months...

[browersr]

I may recommend you create a small project around getting cost expectations set for your project. Unless your project is very basic, getting a reasonable cost expectation will take some conversations and clarifications. You may want to create a small fixed bid project around that. This will both give you a legit job and also provide you with better cost numbers than you are likely to get off of an initial response to the invitation. Beyond that you would obviously be working with the freelancer who would then take on the main project when it's time. So you also get the chance to better evaluate that person whom you can then invite (or not) later when you are actually ready.