Ask HN: Do you know of freelance dev work with text-only communication?

I've always wanted this. Full time jobs like this are called async jobs. Isn't gitlabs like this

Contracts are harder because everyone wants a call to form some relationship. I try to push my contracts into a different relationship as time goes along like this because it is so much easier and calls get longer.

My method is to have a separate line item on the invoice for calls and no lineitem for email. The 4 hour calls quickly dryup when someone is being billed.

On upwork you can find a lot of projects without that requirement.

Get good at finding clients without talking to people. Filter out those that want phone support.

In the end you might just want to start a pure online business.

I didn't know the term async job but a quick search shows that it really is a thing, I am kind of fascinated.

And the idea to just bill calls is also a really good one. I will check upwork out, haven't tried it yet.

I know part of the ultimate goal is to not have to circumvent the problem because it's no longer a problem, but I can certainly appreciate needing time to consider questions. I have two ideas for you.

First, you could set expectations that all questions are invited but you will record the conversation (or video call) and reply with an organized response to code questions. You are free to ask whatever questions you want to. This limits questions you must answer on the spot to things like availability, etc. You probably know those answers comfortably. If they balk, just ask them to trust you. Then make sure to deliver. A helpful skill is to always be comfortable to say "I will get back to you about that." If you don't feel free to say that, the anxiety might be from not knowing what it is like when that is said. In that case, try it. It's a normal thing in my opinion.

And from what you are saying, they will notice the difference if they don't take you up on your request. Be proactive so it's their choice if they decline your request.

Second idea, for remote work, is to respond via recorded video. I have clients send me recorded video of their questions and activity on the screen. It works well because it's personal and it's async. When first starting out, people hiring do need to see a face and hear a voice. This is a useful next-best option.

Your situation sounds challenging. Your desire to discuss it is commendable.

Yes, you are right, I am working on removing the problem altogether but unfortunately it takes a lot of time. Having the client record video is a good idea, thanks for the input. If you don't mind me asking: your clients send recorded video because you ask them too? Or because it is easier for them?

It will be worth it, hang in there. I think it's easier for them because they don't get interrupted, they can skip past horrible screen sharing experiences and they don't need to bother with invitations or schedules.

FWIW, I've definitely hired people on Upwork and have never spoken with them in "real time".

Same here

Discord usually works like this for me although occasionally it makes sense to do a voice chat or screen share.

But honestly your question makes me suspicious, because I have had a client bring on a few people into a project (who I was not able to check beforehand) who abused this asynchronous thing.

One was just QA person who just had multiple jobs and would literally have a different and creative reason she did not have time to finish her work every day. It could take a few days for her to get back to you even if she appeared to be idling in the server. Then with the excuses.

Another was an American scammer who claimed experience with just about every technology, and pretended to be working on "wireframes". When we complained too much that he wasn't available to discuss things, he supposedly started showing up in the chat room. But strangely his answers were quite short and sometimes somewhat broken English. I sort of tolerated it for a week or so because I was really busy doing my part. But then we were supposedly having a call to discuss the actual details and amazingly he seemed to have no problem talking about the project for several minutes without ever actually saying anything specific to the project.

So on that call I insisted that we discuss it, and asked him a specific question about the core technology. He could not think of another way to evade the question so he left the call.

Anyway he eventually admitted to hiring some overseas person to "work" on it, and that was the person who was sitting in the chat room. (Although not really saying or doing anything useful).

Having said all of that, I think video calls are usually unnecessary, and text chat should be sufficient 95% of the time.

It is harder to build trust when you don't see and hear the other party. I totally get that and its fair honestly, a lot depends on facial and verbal cues. So I assume someone in my shoes would have to make extra sure to build trust by being responsive and delivering reliably.

It would probably also be beneficial to have some kind of proof that the work I claim to do currently is actually done, maybe invite the other party to the git repos or something. So if they wanted to, they could check on the status any time. I guess that might reduce some uncertainty.

Right I mean you said you can't respond immediately but that doesn't mean you can't be relatively responsive as long as it's within a few hours or a day and you read and reply thoroughly and show evidence that you are making progress.

I normally do give people access to the git and also regularly deploy. Also I pre-authorize X days or a week of work and don't continue until I get paid for the last chunk. That way both parties are seeing real things happen routinely -- software delivery and payment.

Rather than for example having a two month long project with one payment and the website only really does anything useful at the very end.

A freelance dev with limited modes of communication would be quite hard to deliver.

I guess you can try work on sites like Fiverr, where you just deliver results but to take on a project, I think it would be extremely rare to avoid such interactions.

For starters, maybe it is a good idea to list out your portfolio here. It might be also not a bad idea to work in an enterprise that doesn't sell tech products.

I have worked with a lot of developers who I only communicated with over text/email/Jira tickets. It's pretty common in remote/international consulting.

If you find a company that is doing async remote, then you would be fine.

You might tell people that you have a hearing impairment.

Async remote jobs seems to be the key words to find something that fits for me. Thanks for the hint of remote/international consulting, will give it a try to search for this.

In the best case, finding someone from the opposite of the world would force async communication, I never thought of that.

Good one. I think you could probably pull it off. I've seen it done before.

With that said, some clients, psychologically, will need to talk out their problems out loud. They may even tell you that. It's how they need to operate. They may just be too much for you and that shouldn't prevent you from doing well at your business with other clients.

This would tend to be especially true if you can make it clear that you are running a business (sole proprietor) and text-only is your business policy. You could probably even address any issues in a reasonably cool way without talking about your personal health conditions which is kind of a no-no for anybody involved where typical business boundaries are concerned.

So a big part of this might be developing the vocabulary to talk about it at a level that meets the needs of prospective clients and also says, "We can talk about it ALL you want but my boundaries are right here, and I'm also ready to help you out with stuff I'm good at."

Eventually you may also find some related vocabulary for navigating phone calls in a way that makes it clear you are not there to give a half-assed solution over the phone, so you'll need some time. For example, "let me take a look, I will get that on the schedule," "This is new to me, so I'll have to think about that, let me see how the schedule looks," etc.

It may help to think of you as the business, and write about the "you" problems from a third-person perspective. What will you have the business owner do about the issue, if they're your video game character? This can help you focus more on strengths and less about what you can't do for people. It does sound like you have plenty of talent for what the typical small-biz web development client would need.

Getting into a couple of other specifics--if you can, it's a good idea to establish a plan for frequency of communication during a project, and communicate that you have such a plan, up front. "I'll expect to reach out with updates at the next milestone, which is X on date Y. If you have any questions between now and then, my contact information is below." This will also help your clients to be more comfortable not using the phone, since they know their info-needs will be taken care of in any case. You are basically soothing them, so to speak.

It's also a really good idea to practice and develop professional use of your favored media as a way to avoid inadvertently raising the stakes via text communication. This could include using a professional email signature which invites people to reach out (any of these text-based methods). Also, writing emails that do not seem personal in nature and clarifying things to avoid misunderstandings.

Good luck, like I said I've seen it done and if you can develop your practice over time you might even find you get in good with one or two clients, they really love your work, they also like text, and you're set. I think it would be reasonable to look forward to outcomes like that for sure.

That's some good suggestions, thanks!

Being up front with it without giving a reason has not gone good for me so far, but maybe I just need to fabricate a reason that is relatable and somewhat true. Maybe it would be ok for people when I tell them: text-only because I don't want to sink time in long meetings. Maybe its worth a shot.

Letting the client know I will reach out frequently and they can as well would also give them ease of mind and trust. That's good and I guess establishing and deepening trust is the main issue why a lot of people rely on calls/video. In my experience text is often more efficient but not preferred, but that might be because of my own problems.

You're welcome--and, yeah if they are making requests to dig into the issue or asking for your reasons I guess that's different.

I have a friend who says that generally people who ask about the reason behind a blanket policy or platform are not a good match for the small business in question.

This implies that time spent explaining reasons for policy is wasted time, if you look at the first five or so years of your work as building a foundation for your future by selecting clients who are a good match. I thought that was an interesting point.

Trust is a huge one for sure--some people are less trusting, but a lot of those people have had terrible past experiences in business. So it's much less about you and your services, and more about them. And that's not your problem to solve for them. These are very difficult clients to serve in general, and the more you give them what they say they want, the more they feel justified in treating others as if they are untrustworthy.

(It's going to be tricky to integrate these ideas from a position of needing to have more clients, rather than needing to let some go for example, but maybe it helps you select better clients faster, so your asking the question here was a good idea.)