Whether you're a free agent because you're starting a new company or because you're doing piano tuning evenings and weekends, here's a checklist of things you'll need to do to get a return on your investment of time and energy:

Mission: Be sure you have a clear sense (clear enough to tell it to somebody in a sentence or two) of exactly what you're trying to do with your venture, and who you're trying to reach with this product or service. Without that, you won't know where you're going or how to get there.

Plans: Get nitty-gritty specific about all aspects of your proposed business. Finance, production, distribution, marketing, advertising and human resources (even if you're the only employee just now) -- the whole nine yards. BizMove.com calls itself "The Small Business Knowledge Base," and offers a wide range of basic help for the novice entrepreneur. The site has a particularly good step-by-step section on starting a business. The other associations and Web sites listed on Dan Pink's Free Agent Nation Web site and Working Today, an information and advocacy organization for free agents, also have hands-on information about how to plan well and avoid pitfalls.

Starting Up: It's time to move things along, but how? Bob Hill, an email specialist for 20 years for DuPont, recently became a free agent when he launched his organizing service called Bob's Help (as in, "You need Bob's help."). Here's what he has to say about being sure your workspace is as ready as you are: (Even the piano tuner needs a sacred space where his bills and other records live.)

1. Identify your dedicated workspace: Make sure it's your workspace and your workspace only.
2. Keep all your business files separate from your personal ones. Mixing them will soon come to make the whole thing seem overwhelming.
3. Create clear and efficient processes for running the daily mechanics of your business: incoming mail, appointment calendar, invoices, calls, checking supplies, pending files and routines of various sorts. "Without a routine, you'll have no way of knowing that critical things are actually getting done," says Hill, an organizer who helps both new and old entrepreneurs get things straightened out.
4. Finally, set time on your calendar at the beginning of every week to put your working space in some kind of order. "Keep your space and your mind clear, in order to figure out what you really need to do to keep your business running smoothly," Hill reminds his clients.

So where can you get the help you need with your mission, planning and start up?
There are three sources:

1. Personal: This means you yourself have the time and the skills to do it, or your cash-flow situation doesn't allow you to hire help, so you do it yourself. The obvious advantage? In the short run it's cheaper. The disadvantage? You may do a lousy job on the parts that are hard for you and end up costing yourself money in the long run. As management guru Peter Drucker says, in life the trick is to do what you're good at and leave the rest to other people.
2. Purchasing: Pay somebody with real skills to do the parts that are hard for you. Are you a great craftsperson but too self-effacing to do a good job of marketing yourself? Find a pro to do it for you. The extra money you'll make from your publicist's chutzpah will more than come back to you in increased commissions and sales.
3. Partnering: This is a seriously neglected start up tool. It means that instead of paying someone to do the parts that are hard for you, you ask around to see who might be available to barter with you. Or make a more formal arrangement, such as agreeing to write somebody's manuals if he or she helps you out with the design of your Web page. It's cheaper than purchasing and less likely to exhaust you than doing it all yourself -- a win-win most of the time!