Many Tennessee court reporters like the freedom of being on their own and working freelance. However difficult economic times have court systems and other clients looking for other solutions and freelancers are having difficulty finding assignments. Freelancers are discovering that joining a court reporting agency gives them much of the flexibility of being on their own with the security of belonging to an organization.

Get Instant Reputation

One problem with being on your own is the challenge of making a name for yourself. While you might get a stable of regular clients, many court reporters depend on a stream of one-time offerings. Standing out from the crowd of other court reporters becomes difficult and word of mouth goes only so far.

Joining an agency immediately gives you that agency's reputation. Many court reporting firms have been in business for years and have a strong reputation with clients ranging from legal firms to corporations and television stations. Even if you have limited experience, you are now a member of a highly regarded organization. You don't have to start at the bottom when you join a court reporting agency.

Steady Stream of Work

When they are on their own, court reporters often experience feast or famine workloads. They might go days or weeks without a single assignment, then suddenly have sixteen-hour workdays as they juggle multiple clients. They are afraid to turn away work and quickly get overloaded. Then, as quickly as it started, the assignments are finished and there is no more work for a while. The rollercoaster ride can get very stressful.

Since agencies work with many court reporters, they can spread the workload out so nobody gets overwhelmed. They deal with far more customers than a single reporter can and this diversification across clients and industries eases the ups and downs of the workload. They typically have many large clients providing steady work for their stable of reporters.

Focus on Reporting

There is a rule of thumb for any form of self-employment -- for every hour you spend doing what you consider to be your job, you will spend at least an hour on ancillary work. These are tasks such as marketing and billing, jobs that need to be done but aren't work you get paid for. Most reporters would rather be on assignment than planning promotional campaigns or dunning a delinquent client.

Agencies handle all the details for court reporters, allowing them a better quality of work. They can choose either to take more assignments and earn more money, or to use the freed up time to focus on important matters like their family lives. The freedom to emphasize the reporting parts of the job removes much of the stress associated with self employment.

Tennessee court reporters are flocking to agencies during these difficult times and finding the arrangement to be the best choice for their careers.