Stop Working for Free

I noticed this theme emerging of many people expecting others to work for free. I've also noticed this in a number of people's expectations of me. Remember something, your time is valuable. And also, your value is not a function of your time. The more experienced you become, the more efficient you might become at doing something, but that efficiency does not lessen its value. Keep this in mind when people want you to work for free or lower your rates.

Listen in to hear what else I'm feeling about working for free. Full audio and transcript below. Welcome your thoughts.

Stop Working for Free

(0:01 - 0:30)

What's up friends? I'm fired up about a topic today. I'm on the walk and I want to touch on this because this is what's coming up today, this concept of working for free. Are you working for free? Are you just giving away your products and services and knowledge and experience and energy, your time, all these things.

(0:31 - 1:09)

And this is a topic that you might want to kind of listen into at least, if you care about what my take is on it. It just seems to be coming up today, like I have this conversation and I see it in different ways. You know, people are expecting people to be working for free.

And I think there's variations of free. Okay, there's on the come, which means, you know, you're working now to be compensated later. That's a little different, but it's not too far removed.

(1:10 - 12:52)

If you're in business, if you're in, you know, entrepreneurship particularly, you know, companies are often undercapitalized. And as a function of that, you know, they need to be smart with their money, they need to leverage their funds, they need to protect the Treasury and put it into, you know, the most necessary free developments. Those are generally the most technical of the contributions.

For instance, if you're a mining company, you need to drill. To drill, you need to pay your drillers. To drill, you need to pay your geologist.

Now, some people wouldn't take their fees as equity, meaning they will settle once they've provided their services, those debts for shares in the company or similar. And, you know, that's possible. So that's like a form of working for free, but not really working for free.

What's coming up is, I feel, the amount of value people are ascribing to goods and services, to people's time, to their involvement in a project, to a call, strategy call, all these different types of things. And, you know, I played and dabbled in film and all this for a while and it's a great example. You know, to participate, you have to create these self-tapes and whatever, submit yourself to the project.

But it's a roll of dice in many respects, the time that you're putting in there. But that seems to be a really okay part of the business. You know, you can submit on other projects and put your proposals together and whatnot equally.

But those are really technical, they're really specific, and they do require time, right, to create significance to be considered, I would suggest. And so there just seems to be this whole layer of, like, the free word, the free contribution. And, you know, not compensating people for their time.

And people that are crossing my path, some of them seem to be considering that as well. Like, here's the rub. You know, I've been active in business for nearly 20 years, early stage predominantly, all around the capital markets, raising money.

You know, in the capital markets, raising money, M&A, executive management, you know, HR, all these different hats you wear, depending on who you're working with and what you're doing. And, you know, those things hold a lot of value. And it's not just that you could offer them for free.

It's that, you know, even offering your services in any of those roles also comes with a significant amount of liability. You know, if things don't work out, or something goes sideways, or someone makes a mistake, you know, along the way, you can be associated with that. So if you're giving your services out for free, you know, what resources are you going to use to defend yourself from your participation? So while it might seem like I'll cut you a deal or whatever, you know, it doesn't really make a lot of sense, because you have to consider those intangibles.

It just seems to be that it's really the ask these days, to participate or contribute on this wire. Even still, you know, a recent scenario where I was asked to help someone, I did, and provided, and the provision still was not, like, sufficient. There was, like, an ask for even kind of more and more, even though the work was very clear.

So for myself, I've just been really setting these boundaries, and I'm setting the mirror with this piece again, like, folks, I don't work for free. I have a ton of life experience and a ton of professional experience. And, you know, that's what you get.

It comes with even the service or the product that I'm providing specifically. And that just means to be honored. I mean, that's... value isn't a function of time, right? It isn't just purely a function of the time I spend on something or the kind of thing I spend on something.

It's the value of that thing. And I will suggest to you that... Thank you. I'm valued also because of the products and services I provide, right? I've been held hostage.

I've been through a hurricane. I've been through a whole bunch of wild stuff. I've run public companies, you know, I've done a ton of things, been in pitches, and, you know, it seems to be valued, folks, no matter what the services, you know.

So, putting that down, there's a great... Well, and I'll say this, I think you should too, right? There's a great anecdote. There's an electrician. And the electrician... Well, let's say this, there's an electrical issue at the house.

So, there's this family or a bunch of people, and they're like trying to figure out what's wrong with the electricity, and they're working on it for hours. They can't figure it out. It's a huge problem.

So, they call the electrician. So, the electrician comes down to the place, and he looks around, he checks everything out, and he takes a closer look, finds the switch, he flips the switch, the lights are back on, all the power is back on. Well, Eureka! Everybody's thrilled, everybody's super stoked, and he says, great, I'll send you my invoice.

He sends the invoice, and it's a thousand bucks. And the people go, what? A thousand bucks? All you did was flip the switch. And he says, it was ten bucks to flip the switch, and 990 bucks to know which switch to flip.

And I can't remember where I heard that the other day, but I loved it. I still love it. That's why I'm sharing it here, because it's amazing, and it makes so much sense.

I mean, I think the reason that people are pressuring, right, for like maximum value and lowest cost, lowest dollar, is that people are under pressure. You know, when you look at the Canadian economic picture, you look at, you know, household debt and similar, people are not, in my opinion, particularly thriving. A lot of financial pressure.

And I think ultimately, you know, it's a function of communicating value, and it's a function of recognizing value, in the arts of doing business and providing products and services. But I feel that's where it sources, right? You know, a deliverable, tangible deliverable is a thing, but it's kind of like an iceberg. You might see the tip of the iceberg, but you don't see everything underneath it, that goes into being able to provide that thing, whether it's provided to you in a day, a week, a month, or whatever relative scale that you feel it should be provided in.

You know, the depth of the iceberg is how that thing has been able to be delivered, and at the point that it has been able to be delivered to people. So the relationship is not just the time. It's not just to the item, it's also with respect to experience.

So I feel that maybe it's just a general lack of value and experience, which provides greater return on investment, because you're also not paying for that person or group or provider to do all the research and the work, to learn those things before they're provided to you, right? That person or group or whatever is already, generally speaking, standing on the shoulders of giants, right? I like that analogy, that metaphor, to carry that wisdom and expertise, and that definitely, in my opinion, needs to be respected. Well, case in point, I spent, I don't know, six, seven some odd years just sitting in the bar, right? With the old boys of whatever industry, and clocking shop, and learning about how all these different elements and components work to, you know, build business, finance business, structure deals and transactions, deal with people, resolve issues, and all kinds of stuff. And you pick that up by spending an extraordinary amount of time just in it.

And that's where I've developed, for my part, my skills and awareness in that world. You know, equally, my journey into the more conscious realms of my lifestyle. I spent an extraordinary time doing the work, looking inward, working with other, you know, mystics and conscious spirits along my way, embarking on my own travels and adventures solo, just face my stuff and learn the tools to navigate, manage, navigate, and, you know, release this stuff.

(12:52 - 15:02)

And so to share that is like, major shit of a classroom, you know, to do that. And so that's what you see for this kind of knowledge and wisdom and insight is what you see, then this is part of what needs to be, you know, appreciated, acknowledged and respected. No matter who you're engaging.

And particularly if you're working with or engaging with me. And equally in the creative realms, right? Like I'm submitting for a spot, my body is there for a commercial or whatever. But the ideas are those that have all been formulated, those inspirations are all come from, you know, the culmination of all the elements of my journey.

So, you know, what is my time worth to put all this work together and share those ideas? You know, before I'm locked in or before, you know, before I'm engaged? It's worthy of discussion and consideration, right? As a self respected individual, what the value of my time is, and people will tell you that your time is your greatest asset. So how are you using your time? How are you leveraging your time? And are you respecting your time? With respect to not just the time it takes a present, but the time it's taken for you to develop and formulate and learn the expertise that you carry, the approach, the methodologies, the systems that you carry, to do the things that provide the output, right? The result. So no working for free, you know, a free discovery call, maybe like a proposal, like something light, but you know, we're not getting pulled into working for free in perpetuity here.

(15:02 - 16:21)

That would be my note on that. And that is energy that I am putting out to the world and establishing clearly for myself as well at the moment, because this, this element seems to be popping up a bit. So it's putting into the world, it's established, anything that's coming up around it is hereby released.

I invite you to do the same. We understand our value and our worth, and we are communicating it effectively. We're holding space for it honorably.

If you want to jam with me or chat with me more about any of the things you're up to, looking for my assistance on anything, we can chat about that. I invite you to follow this podcast as I continue to build it out. And we'll talk about more cool stuff as they come up in the flow, just like this did today, related to business and entrepreneurship, personal growth, and similar.

So wishing you a great day wherever you are in the world, sending you good vibes, and we'll talk to you soon.