Every freelancer starts out undervaluing their work • Hacker News Board

Re: Every freelancer starts out undervaluing their work

#11

Post by SilasX » Fri, May 08, 2015, 3:38 PM UTC

WA wrote: post #9

And yet, nobody answered question #2 ( What was your defining moment when you realized you were worth more than what you were charging ) like so: "I read a blog post or a book on how to charge more." This is not to say that a post like this doesn't have any value - or a book like Brennan Dunn's book. But sometimes, when I read stuff like that, I wonder how much is actually survivorship bias and how much one can REALL…

I agree. I constantly see advice of the form, "You just need to insist on being paid what you're worth", as if a furrowed brow and a firm handshake can make just anyone able to charge enormous amounts.

To be sure, for some freelancers, timidity in asking for more is holding them back, but it has to be combined with an honest self-assessment of how much you could reasonably ask for.

Re: Every freelancer starts out undervaluing their work

#12

Post by jbhatab » Fri, May 08, 2015, 3:39 PM UTC

"When I first started, I charged less than $100/hour."

Clearly some of them were on very different paths than me. I taught myself and charging anything over $30/hour would have been deceitful. I couldn't imagine delivering that much value when I was starting.

Re: Every freelancer starts out undervaluing their work

#13

Post by kyleslattery » Fri, May 08, 2015, 3:55 PM UTC

WA wrote: post #9

And yet, nobody answered question #2 ( What was your defining moment when you realized you were worth more than what you were charging ) like so: "I read a blog post or a book on how to charge more." This is not to say that a post like this doesn't have any value - or a book like Brennan Dunn's book. But sometimes, when I read stuff like that, I wonder how much is actually survivorship bias and how much one can REALL…

For me, reading blog posts helped build my confidence to be able to ask for higher rates—seeing that lots of other people charge over $100/hr can really help to convince yourself that you're worth that.

You are right though, that reading blog posts is not going to create that change—for me it really came the first time I said what I thought was a high rate ($135/hr), and there was no pushback at all from the client. I was kind of amazed at first that they thought I was worth it, but with one success in the bag, it gave me the confidence to move forward.

Re: Every freelancer starts out undervaluing their work

#14

Post by ryanwaggoner » Fri, May 08, 2015, 4:00 PM UTC

WA wrote: post #9

And yet, nobody answered question #2 ( What was your defining moment when you realized you were worth more than what you were charging ) like so: "I read a blog post or a book on how to charge more." This is not to say that a post like this doesn't have any value - or a book like Brennan Dunn's book. But sometimes, when I read stuff like that, I wonder how much is actually survivorship bias and how much one can REALL…

I am that person. Read Brennan's book in 2012 and im making 3-4x as much net today as I was then. Is it entirely due to that book? No, of course not, but it did shift my thinking and start me down a road of continually pushing the boundaries to charge more. Which I often feel I'm pretty terrible at, but at least I'm trying.

The set of freelancers working right at the rate they should be is orders of magnitude smaller than those who are far undervaluing their work because they've never even really tried to dramatically increase their rates.

Re: Every freelancer starts out undervaluing their work

#15

Post by nightski » Fri, May 08, 2015, 4:02 PM UTC

soft_dev_person wrote: post #7

> No one is paying you for your “time,” they are paying you for a result, so stop charging for your “time.” I wish regular employers would adopt this more as well. My value is what I do/produce, not how much time I spent doing it. Some days I produce massive amounts of value, while others I barely get anything valuable done. I'd like a work place that would encourage me to go home and enjoy myself on the bad days and…

Value of items produced isn't always so easy to measure.

Re: Every freelancer starts out undervaluing their work

#16

Post by rogerbinns » Fri, May 08, 2015, 4:07 PM UTC

soft_dev_person wrote: post #7

> No one is paying you for your “time,” they are paying you for a result, so stop charging for your “time.” I wish regular employers would adopt this more as well. My value is what I do/produce, not how much time I spent doing it. Some days I produce massive amounts of value, while others I barely get anything valuable done. I'd like a work place that would encourage me to go home and enjoy myself on the bad days and…

I charge by time, even though I am producing results. The biggest advantage is that it deals with changes in the specs, addition or removal of features, new environmental issues (eg also test on ARM, use a cluster).

If you charge for results only, then any change in what is desired means a renegotiation. Attaching a dollar figure to every "could you also ..." gets old quickly.

For your regular employer what you are after is ROWE - results only work environment - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ROWE

Re: Every freelancer starts out undervaluing their work

#17

Post by JoeAltmaier » Fri, May 08, 2015, 4:08 PM UTC

rogerbinns wrote: post #16

soft_dev_person wrote: post #7

> No one is paying you for your “time,” they are paying you for a result, so stop charging for your “time.” I wish regular employers would adopt this more as well. My value is what I do/produce, not how much time I spent doing it. Some days I produce massive amounts of value, while others I barely get anything valuable done. I'd like a work place that would encourage me to go home and enjoy myself on the bad days and…

I charge by time, even though I am producing results. The biggest advantage is that it deals with changes in the specs, addition or removal of features, new environmental issues (eg also test on ARM, use a cluster). If you charge for results only, then any change in what is desired means a renegotiation. Attaching a dollar figure to every "could you also ..." gets old quickly. For your regular employer what you are a…

A hybrid approach works fine too. A fixed price for the prototype on a date; time and materials for changes after that point.

Re: Every freelancer starts out undervaluing their work

#18

Post by bshimmin » Fri, May 08, 2015, 4:19 PM UTC

Svenstaro wrote: post #4

mcdougle wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What did they do? I don't notice anything different.

Smooth scrolling but that interferes with my scroll rate and vimium which also optionally does smooth scrolling. Generally, web designers really shouldn't touch scroll behavior at all, it's rather bad practice.

I noticed this and was instantly aggravated by it (it's especially obvious on a Mac because it doesn't do the "rubber-band" bounce at the top and bottom). What purpose does it even serve on this page?

Re: Every freelancer starts out undervaluing their work

#19

Post by Swizec » Fri, May 08, 2015, 4:26 PM UTC

jayshahtx wrote: post #5

> pass on the cheap, low-value projects. Hold out for the clients that have budgets and value your time. Every second you spend with clients that don’t have money and don’t value your time is another second you have wasted. I just finished my first 8 months of consulting work and while this is true, it is so difficult to actualize. When we had zero projects, I would take any meetings I could get. A part of me would h…

The other problem with not taking undervalued work is that your runway is not infinite, while the market's is. So you might just run out of money before you land that client you're holding out for.

And when the end of runway is approaching, you will become desperate, and you will take on a terrible project. Then it will take a really long time before you build up your runway again to the point where you can hold out for better projects.

Basically, hold out, but don't wait too long.

Re: Every freelancer starts out undervaluing their work

#20

Post by Swizec » Fri, May 08, 2015, 4:30 PM UTC

soft_dev_person wrote: post #7

> No one is paying you for your “time,” they are paying you for a result, so stop charging for your “time.” I wish regular employers would adopt this more as well. My value is what I do/produce, not how much time I spent doing it. Some days I produce massive amounts of value, while others I barely get anything valuable done. I'd like a work place that would encourage me to go home and enjoy myself on the bad days and…

> Some days I produce massive amounts of value, while others I barely get anything valuable done. I'd like a work place that would encourage me to go home and enjoy myself on the bad days and stay as long as I want on the good days, instead of expecting a regular 40 hour work week every week (I have flex, but on average...).

In the words of Stephen King, "Amateurs sit and wait for inspiration, the rest of us just get up and go to work."

Very often the value is in just showing up and doing the work. Even if the work isn't your best work, it's still better than no work. You can always fix bad work later. Even if you throw it away and start again, you've already primed yourself on the problem.