Self-Employed People Almost Always Underprice their Services
Thursday, September 12, 2013 at 1pmBy John Friedman
I help people improve their overall financial health, wherever that task might lead, and, since a lot of my clients are self-employed people, I help a lot of them improve their self-employed financial health, i.e., I provide business consulting services to them.
This can range from helping them decide whether to vesselize their business (most have heard somewhere along the way that they really ought to put their business into a C corp or an S corp or an LLC) to helping them increase the odds of having happy customers who come back for more, and it can range from providing a little bit of rusty-ol’ recovered-lawyer non-lawyering (father/mother, it’s been 15 years since my last lawyering . . . and helping someone write a contract isn’t per se lawyering, right?) to helping them figure out how to solve day-to-day business problems, either internal to the business or having to do with a less-than-satisfactory interaction with a customer or client.
Like I said: where-so-ever the task might lead . . .
And, of course, I also help them with pricing. I especially provide this sort of help to people who provide services in areas in which there is no preordained, one-way-and-only-one-way conventional approach to charging customers. And as to those areas in which there is a deeply embedded, conventional approach to charging customers? Why, then, there is either nothing much to talk about on that front (e.g., the client says, no, you just can’t do that in this business, and no poking or prodding from me will change the client’s opinion on that front), or there is a great deal to talk about because that conventional approach to charging customers is often old, in the way, and ripe for disruption! And disrupting is one of the funner parts of business.
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99%-plus of the advice I provide to people is very much custom-tailored to the person receiving the advice — and then only after I have heard quite a bit from that person, and only after I’ve done my best to understand what is, and what is not, important to that person. After all, financial lives and financial personalities are far too diverse for most one-size-fits-all approaches!
But there is one piece of standard advice that I dole out in a parlor-trick, say-no-more, I-can-guess-what-card-you-have-in-your-hand sort of fashion when prompted by only the barest of hints about what a person’s financial life or financial personality is all about.
I can do this with little or no risk because, at least eight out of every ten times I give the advice, the person — often very much a stranger — upon hearing the advice says, Yea, that is so true. You are so right. How could you possibly know that about me?
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So what’s the barest of hints that I need to hear before I playback the tape/provide the canned advice/do my robo-advisor routine?
I need only hear that the person in front of me recently went out on his/her own into the ever so loverly world of self-employment.
And then the advice I automaton’ally give is this:
You should charge more.
Admittedly, maybe two out of ten times the person I say this to looks at me like I’m crazy, as if to say, Me? Not charge enough? Me? I am great at what I do — not that many can do it at all, and no one does it better — and I charge a pretty penny for it. You’re wrong, Friedman, just plain ol’ wrong — nuts, even
And when I hear someone say those sorts of things, I know that I am, in fact, wrong. And I can see it in their every posture and manner.
But the other eight out of ten times the person hearing this cookie-cuttered, you-should-charge-more advice looks at me somewhat sheepishly, with a posture evoking something short of fully-empowered, and says, often semi-begrudgingly, Yup, Friedman, you be right. Though I am powerful in the providing of the service, t’is true that I am much less so in the pricing of the service.
These 80%ers do not yet have their confidence. They do not yet have their business legs (at least not of the self-employed kind). They do not yet have their giddy-up at the pricing level of things. This is common — 80% common in the world in which I walk, anyway — and therefore, by definition, nothing to be ashamed about or to kick oneself over (I’ll have more to say about self-abuse below . . . ).
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But being common doesn’t make it good. These lackings can self-perpetuate for a good long while — forever, even — if allowed to fester and ferment, which means reduced Money-In, which, all things being equal (which they never are . . . ), means diminished financial health, so anyone suffering from these lackings can benefit from being someone helping them just snap out of it.
And so the friendly financial health advisor, moi, rides in to the rescue.
You need to increase your prices by a third, I say to them. Maybe even 40 or 50 percent.
And then I follow that up with one of the all time great MBA-isms, worthy of a two-fer block indent plus font color-change:
Because if someone hasn’t told you in the past twelve months that your prices are too damn high, then they’re too damn low.
So if you’re self-employed — newly or otherwise — ask yourself if someone during the past twelve months (or ever since you started out on your own, whichever is a shorter period of time — remember: I am a recovering lawyer, and lawyers love ’em some whichever is less/more‘s) has, upon hearing your price, immediately told you to take a flying leap off a bridge, or to do something untoward and generally physically impossible to yourself, or some other words to that effect, and, if the answer is no, then you really should raise your prices.
Try it. You really might like it.
Improved financial health awaits you.
Top 10 Things to Know When Helping a Loved One Deal with a Big Medical Issue
Tuesday, September 10, 2013 at 10amBy John Friedman
Most of us, at one time or another, will help a loved one deal with a serious medical issue — help guide our loved one through a big, gnarly medical journey involving hospitals, doctors, nurses, big medical machinery, constant beeping sounds, tubes everywhere, constant blood draws, yucky bed pans, clean white walls . . . the whole nine yards.
It is a journey like no other, and it can be one surprise after another for first-timers.
Today’s Top 10 List can help you know what to expect when embarking on that sort of medical journey, and provides some tips about how to be the best guide you can be for your loved one as s/he embarks on this big-deal, wish-this-wasn’t-happening-to-me journey.
(There is also a longer, more fancifully-languaged version of this piece here)
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Top 10 Ways to Help Loved Ones Go Through a Medical Journey
1. Make Sure that You Have All the Information, and that Everyone Who Needs It Does Too.
The Internet has had a barely noticeable impact on the medical world, so there is no big database in the sky serving as a repository for the information everyone serving your loved one needs. You need to be that database. Make sure that you get copies (paper-based or scans or whatever) of everything you possibly can (lab results, medication lists, etc.), and then make sure that the folks who need that info to best serve your loved one have it too.
2. Prepare Yourself for the Busy Doc.
It is a sad but near universal truth that doctors are on the clock, and have a limited amount of time to give to you. Set your expectations accordingly, and seek out those who know almost as much as the docs but who are less time-constrained, such as nurses and physician’s assistants.
3. Have a List of Questions When Speaking with a Busy Doc.
As a corollary to number 2, when meeting with a doctor always have a list of questions you want answered.
4. Always Finish a Doc Conversation with a Blunderbuss Question.
Save time at the end of every conversation you have with a doctor for this question uh-one-and-uh-two: Are there any questions I would have been smart to have asked, but didn’t? What are they and what are the answers?
5. Prepare Yourself for Imperfection.
The medical services industry is quite imperfect. It is, by its nature, complex, because the human body is, by its nature, complex, and complexity, by its nature, breeds errors. So do people, and there are lots of people involved. And, as noted in Number 1 above, the information systems those people are using are about 25 years behind the times. So do your best to help everyone involved avoid imperfection, but know also that you, yourself, will be imperfect at this task.
6. Prepare Yourself for Ambiguity.
Along with all that complexity and imperfection comes difficult decision-making. There are few questions that lead to yes/no, 2+2=4 sorts of answers in this realm. Enjoy them when they come your way, and set your expectations for most of the decisions in front of you involving a balancing of competing factors of pro and con. Know also that two doctors will often disagree among themselves on what the best course of action is, and that many (most?) doctors will not tell you what they think you should do, and will not tell you what they would do if they were in your shoes. Expect these things and you will be less put out when they come your way.
7. Prepare Yourself to Be Pushy When You Need to Be.
You need to bring both your biggest bulldog and your most charming self into this arena, and be prepared to use both as the events warrant. Most people you are interacting with will have their heart in the right place, but some will be rotten to the core. Most will be competent, but some will be idiots. Most will be in a right frame of mind, but some will have woken up on the wrong side of the bed. Bring whichever of your behaviors to bear on all of these folks that will get your loved one the proper attention as quickly as possible. Above all, get pushy and squeaky-wheely instantly when something is not right. Do not hesitate, and do not assume that things are going as they should be if you sense that something is off.
8. Divide the Tasks.
Your loved one has one main task: to sit there and lie there and be poked and prodded and to simply be the patient. Most patients want to do a lot more — they want to know exactly what’s going on, they want to make decisions, etc. — and that’s great. Your task is to do everything else, and it is especially your burden to run interference and to shield your loved one from 100% of the unpleasant raise-a-stink sorts of things.
9. Pace Yourself.
Your loved one is going through something not great, but so are you. Cut yourself some slack, and make sure that you can get away from it all when you need to. The medical world has a concept of “respite” for caregivers, which acknowledges that caregivers need time off on a regular basis. Make sure that you do not run yourself ragged — physically or mentally — and that you give yourself adequate respite.
10. Be in Action.
Most medical problems worsen with time. Help your loved one face reality and, if necessary, be a gentle or even not-so-gentle nudge to get your loved one the care s/he needs.
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Great things happen through medical journeys. Patients usually end up far healthier at the end of the journey than at the beginning. Keep this in mind, both for yourself and for your loved one.
Remember also that, by being prepared throughout the journey for imperfection and ambiguity and busy docs and information vacuums and the like, you’re apt to be the best guide possible for your loved one.
Top 10 Ways to Be Smart When Helping Loved Ones Journey Through the Medical Services Industrial Complex
Monday, September 9, 2013 at 12pmBy John Friedman
One of the central roles of a financial planner is that of being a guide — of helping clients find and then take their own unique, and hopefully best and brightest, path through the external financial world out there. We are, after all, all of us forever in its force field, every moment of every day.
That external financial world is a big mystery to many folks. They understand what it is to make a living and (sometimes) what it is to live within ones’ means, but they do not understand all that much about taxes and estate planning and retirement planning and insurance and investing, etc., etc., etc. That’s because it’s all wicket complicated and, though surely the Internet has helped, even with that fine medium’s able assistance, most folks can use some help putting that fire-hose flow of information together into something that makes sense for them and is a bit more bite-size.
So when it comes to navigating the external financial world out there — the commercial part of which I call the Financial Services Industrial Complex, or FSIC for short (pronounced EFF sick) — it often proves helpful to just have some help.
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As a longtime student of the FSIC, that’s a big part of the service I provide. It’s what I do.
As many of you know, I am also a longtime student of another huge industrial complex — The Medical Services Industrial Complex — though my study of it came about in a very different way. My study of the FSIC came about because . . . well, just because that’s the way I was and still am wired, but my study of the MSIC (pronounced EM sick, and, ahh, t’is a nice abbreviation, t’ain’t it?) came about through necessity, as I helped various loved ones make their way through the MSIC.
The MSIC and the FSIC have much in common. Both are big and complex and scary for many folks. Both, I would argue, have been badly hobbled by greed. Both, I would also argue, hurt more people than they should (with the FSIC hurting a far greater percentage than the MSIC, but that is faint praise indeed!).
And, like the FSIC, you better believe that the MSIC is a big part of people’s financial world. Most people doing retirement planning, for example, have a lot of fear centering on the MSIC in their later years — about whether it’s going to break their financial health (and, though technically speaking “long-term care” is not “medical” care, in this context I include long-term care facilities within the MSIC concept).
And then there’s also the Insurance Industrial Complex (with the also very appropriate abbreviation IIC, pronounced ICK). The IIC is where the MSIC and the FSIC have, with totally unholy results, cross-bred for generation upon generation. It is, as most of us are well aware, an abomination, possibly more responsible for the sorry state of the MSIC than anything else.
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My wife and I have a dear friend who is currently deep inside of a big, gnarly, complicated MSIC journey of the sort you never want to be on (but which most of us will most assuredly be on sooner or later) and, talking to this loved one and the loved one’s spouse over the weekend, it got me a’ hankerin’ to put down a list of suggested MSIC guidances — a list of the things I’ve learned over nearly two decades of heavy-duty MSIC-interacting when a loved one is very sick.
I learned many of those things the hard way, because, as best I can tell, I was not a particularly good guide through the MSIC when first called upon to act in that role — not a natural at it — but over the years I think I’ve learned quite a bit, and can hopefully save you, dear reader, some time and some heartache and some anguish by maybe, just maybe, helping you bypass a bit of the learning-it-the-hard-way part of your own learning curve.
The list is most useful for people helping very sick loved ones go through their MSIC journey, but it can be of use to all people who . . . know people with physical bodies.
And now it’s on to the show.
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A Scale-Tale: How Big is a Business with 400 Employees?
Thursday, August 15, 2013 at 2pmBy John Friedman
I am a student of scale — a collector of scale-tales.
It all began decades ago with the wonderful book The Seven Mysteries of Life, by Guy Murchie, a life’s-work sort of undertaking for him, full of interesting notions interspersed with the author’s cute drawings and beginning with a chapter on scale (ok, Ok, OK! Yes!!! I admit it! It’s true. I never finished the book. There: I said it. But I did read the chapter on scale, and I did read that chapter several different times . . . ).
What really got a hold of decades-ago me in Seven Mysteries was Murchie’s discussion of how, if we were somehow able to make a human twice as tall, it simply would not work. That is, if you were to stretch a 6-foot tall human into a 12-foot tall human without any further tweaks, the structure of the now-taller human would be quite unsound; the 12-foot tall human would crumple into a figurative and near-literal bag o’ bones because, when doing that stretching, you would also need to make the structural components of the 12-foot tall human somewhat bigger — not twice as big, I imagine (that would look out of scale, yes?), but, as an engineer could no doubt calculate via slide-rule and square roots and pi and such, a very certain amount of biggening to afford the double-tall human a structural soundness sufficient to pass code and muster (alternatively, you could just remove the 12-footer to a place where the gravity pulls less hard and some of the mountains up ‘n float).
So size is of a given context; everything exists within a scale so that, when taken out of its scale, something quite drastic is apt to happen.
My current scale-tale fave is the notion that the human scale of things is just about midway between the scale of the subatomic quantum world and the scale of the universe at (very) large. Wild, eh? We are, all of us, Goldilocksian — somewhere just-rightly betwixt the large-scale structures of the universe and the small-scale structures that are way, way, way within that which is way way way within that which is the stuff of atoms. Now that’s what I’m talking ’bout — that’s what being built into the fabric of the universe is all about!
Hospice: A Few Surprises for Those First Learning About It
Friday, July 26, 2013 at 12pmBy John Friedman
Hospice care is the sort of care that we get when we are on our last legs. Most of us know that.
But what hospice care truly is, once you dig into it, is quite surprising to a lot of folks.
This piece aims to fix that. It talks about hospice care from a lay perspective, and it also, at the end, addresses some of the wonderful things that can come about via hospice care. It’s not an easy thing to be part of, but it most assuredly can be a wonderful thing to be a part of.
I have learned this stuff over a few years, and today I was part of a hospice conversation involving my family, so it is all very fresh right now . . .
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Hospice Care: It’s About the Kind of Care, not the Time Left to Live.
Hospice care is care that our loved ones (or ourselves, for that matter, but here we’ll talk about loved ones only) can receive when they are no longer trying to improve their medical situation. You can think of it as the time period after our loved one has decided not to fight any more — has decided to let things take their course, with assistance from a full-fledged medical and nursing team to help the loved one have a great exit from this mortal plane, but otherwise to allow things to play on through.
So all the Dr. House sorts of doctoring — where the doctor heroically brings someone back from the brink of death to go on to live a normal life — is off the hospice table. Dr. House is not in the room, let alone at the table. That means no surgeries, mostly no fancy wiz-bang technology stuff (MRIs, etc.), and, in general, no aggressive this that or the other thing, etc.
Instead, hospice care is about maintaining the comfort of our loved one, and about doing whatever it takes to ensure that our loved one has as excellent a quality of life as is possible, given the circumstances.