Time is Money

I just got off the phone with a good friend of mine. She’s “been there” for me through thick and thin, good times and bad, lean times and fat and happy times. She’s finally decided to start a business of her own, quit her job and try making a living at what she is awesome at—human resources—since she rocks at people skills.

But, she needed start-up advice, had questions about blogging, ebooks, website stuff and on and on and on. She’s been buried in a cave in corporate America for 30 years, so she hasn’t needed to do all that. So we talked for two hours, and I gave her the intense overview and low-down and all the background/consulting/how-to I know. I referred her to other connections in the industry and I know I gave her enough info and resources to get her started. Sweet deal for her right? Yeah, but for me too, because she’ll hire me at my going rate when it comes time to DO the work.

I’ll be here for her when she has questions and wants to pick my brain, because I KNOW when she’s ready to write that ebook, or put up that website, she will pay me my usual rate. No friends and family discount, no freebies. Why? Because she respects me and my skills, talents and abilities. She’s done the same for me over the years, and has given me free advice and opinions and commiserated with me, but has charged me for things that take up her time, and that, as a professional, she charges other people for. As friends there’s a mutual giving and respect and payment plan for work performed. And it rocks!

Brain Pickers and Freebie Seekers

Today I also turned down three requests from people for help getting them media attention, writing press releases, collaborating on a series of ebooks and writing webcopy for them. Why? They, “can’t afford it,” or “don’t have any money,” it’s “not in their budget,” and so on. When their ship comes in, they win the lottery, or a publisher discovers them, they’ll make sure I’m paid, but until then? They just want to pick my brain, or have me do the work that they’ll benefit from down the road. They’re offended that I charge for the work they value. They call themselves “friends,” yet in five years none of them has done anything for me and I’ve done more than any sane business person would for them. I only hear from them when they need something. Sound familiar?

Another client I’ve done several small projects for in the past, also asked me about partnering on an upcoming contract—nothing firm, but he’s looking for sourcing information and network connections because he’s looking for funding to create an app. I countered with an offer of a finder’s fee if the info and resources I have work out. He’s thinking about it. He has a problem paying me for something that will make him money if he can get the same info for free.

In any given week people will pick my brain, attempt to pick my brain, or ask if they can pick my brain, or get free work. I will say, “Yes, no or maybe, or ‘get thee behind me Satan!’” depending on who they are and how and why they ask. Apparently I’m not alone in this struggle. These, by the way, are the same people who will scream that no one wants to pay THEM for their product/service. Hey, what’s good for the goose is good for the gander eh? Still, people come around asking for help. Some get it, some don’t.

So, what are the differences between good and bad brain picking, and how can YOU become one of those good “pick my brain for free” people?

Potential Customers Can Pick My Brain for Free: What’s a potential customer? They’re someone who contacts me because they’ve seen my work, love my work, or have been referred by someone they respect and trust. They want to pick my brain to see:

How I work
What my process is
What I bring to the table
What I think about things
Who I know
Whether I have a sense of humor
Am I likeable?
Am I ethical and honest and authentic?
What previous clips or articles look like?
What I have done for someone they know?
Where’s my portfolio?
What do I charge?
What do I expect from them in a working relationship?
What kind of contracts do I need?

They’re picking my brain for ways to collaborate, for ways and things that will benefit us both. They have something to offer in return, either pay, or pay and barter of services, partnership or networking. They’re self-supporting. They value their time and mine. They’re picking my brain with an end goal of establishing a mutually beneficial relationship, not for finding a solution to THEIR problem. They may hire me now, they may come back in six years or a month with a job. It doesn’t matter. They’re doing their due diligence. I respect that and am happy to sit down over lunch and pick their brain in return. It’s mutually beneficial. These people are rarer than hen’s teeth.

People Who Cannot Pick My Brain For Free: These are people who claim to be a potential customer, but they’re not picking my brain for mutually beneficial reasons, or to see if we “click.” They’re just trying to get information for free. They want to know how to do something, get something, or proceed with something because they don’t want to pay for it. They ask “how-to” or “what do you think about this?” questions. They take without giving or having any real intent of becoming a client. They’ll say they are, “as soon as the money comes in…”

They’re prospects, but they don’t ever intend to become paying prospects. They want an opinion, a critique, advice, suggestions and tips. They will nibble and nibble and nibble until they’ve nibbled away as much as they can without pissing me off or alienating me—in hopes that I’ll cooperate the next time they need/want advice. They will never, ever become paying clients. They will:

Promise to refer all their friends who will in turn, make me a millionaire (tip: their friends are nibblers too)
Talk about how much “great exposure” my working with them for free will give me
Name drop famous people they’ll refer me to if I’ll work for free (they never do)
Promise to hire me as soon as their ship comes in, the budget is awarded, the job is won
Say, “I’m just curious,” or “I was wondering,” or “I think….” and then wait to see my reaction and how much I know or will ramble on about something. Then they’ll say, “How would you do that?”
Insist that what they need to know will, “Only take a minute.” (like the friend who wanted me to teach her everything I knew about “advertising sales” and writing ad copy in three minutes)
They’ll call me multiple times, with different questions about different problems, always looking for advice for specific solutions.
They will thumb their noses at the suggestion Google knows more about that than I do

People I Might Let Pick My Brain For Free: I have a current client who is paying me to write an ebook. She’s one of several great clients I have right now. She pays promptly, respects my boundaries, and plans to hire me in the future for other projects. She wants to pick my brain by asking:

What should I do next? Website or webinar?
What kind of budget should I be putting together for the next phase?
Who would you recommend for a web designer?
Do you do brochures and web copy or just ebooks?

Her questions are attempts to determine what direction to move in and are assessment questions, not consultation questions. I love how Adrienne Graham distinguishes between assessment and consultation. I might let my client pick my brain for quite some time for free because she has demonstrated she values my time by paying for it. The time I invest in her picking my brain will almost certainly result in paying work. If it veers too close to DOING the work, then I just say so, “That’s getting into consulting and more time than I can give up, let’s set that aside until I can draft an estimate.” An example might be: Brain picking = this is why you should do your website next and what should be on it, versus, consulting = these are the 10 points you should have on the main page, and follow up your landing page with blah, blah, blah…” specifics. See the difference?

Assessment = You gauging what their needs are. Can you work with this person? Are you a good fit? Do you share similar ethics and values? You’re not there to give them all the answers, but to determine if you can work together. The “brain picking” is about your relationship, not their issue or problem. An assessment might involve giving the person general or generic information they could find on the web for free, as in, “There are several plug-ins you could explore, like XYZ, or I think FedEx offers that service.” But you’re not doing the research or phone calls or follow up for them.

A consultation is information they pay for. It’s THE WORK. Work = You’re calling FedEx for a price quote, or posting their project to 99designs.com, or giving them step-by-step instructions on how to post a blog post to WordPress. My assessment vs consultation gauge is, consultation takes 15 minutes or more and involves instruction or teaching or specific problem solving. I have a floating 1-3 solution limit. I will give specific advice to solve a problem 1-3 times depending on the solution, the client or potential client and the value of the solution. After that, I charge.

You have to define your own lines, and you have to learn to drawn a clear boundary so that when people start skirting your boundaries and getting more from you than you’re comfortable giving, you know it’s time to say, “this is beyond the scope of what we agreed to and I need to start charging you for anything else from here on out.”

When you give people more, hoping to entice them into paying you, they don’t. Why buy the cow if the milk is free? If they don’t have to pay you for your services, they won’t pay you for your services. They’ll actually use you for all the free stuff they can get, then take the money they saved by getting you for free, and pay people who value their time enough to charge for it.

Brent Leary interviewed Adrienne Graham about this topic. Adrienne’s Forbes Post kicked off a huge conversation about this topic and resulted in her writing a book about it. (Nope, that’s not an affiliate link). I bought the Kindle book and it’s well worth the $10 I paid, and I plan to buy about ten paperbacks my next payday and send them to friends around the country who are suffering from scope creep and brain pickers as well.

I’m a generous provider. I go above and beyond and care about my clients, and it shows. They get connected, extra value and a person who cares as much about the successful outcome of their project as they do. There’s real value in that. They get more than their money’s worth. In the past some have felt that after the project ended and they paid me, that I was still there to provide the love, business advice, project resources and project solutions they enjoyed as a paying client, only without paying now.

They failed to realize that I have new clients and my time is taken up with providing paying clients with that same business value. I’m friendly, generous and have wonderful working relationships with clients while we’re engaged. After the project I’m happy to continue to swap recipes and forward photos and be friendly, but if they want business advice or solutions, that becomes another project and they pay for that.

Some aren’t happy, but I know that if I approached them for a free loaner car, or a free week’s stay at their hotel, they’d balk. Why? Because those are things THEY charge for! Just because someone likes you and is friendly, they’re not your mommy, or your sugar daddy, willing and ready to ensure your every desire is met, for free. People can be friendly and still charge for services. It’s the way a civil society works.

Tired of Brain Pickers?

If you’re tired of people picking YOUR brain for free, be glad, not mad. People don’t go to stupid people for advice or help. They value you and what you have to offer, or they wouldn’t be trying to get inside your head for free.

People aren’t generally evil (okay, some truly, truly are), and the fact they’re trying to get something for nothing is more a reflection of their values, than yours. Your not giving the farm away is healthy. Their trying to take the farm away from you is selfish, unethical and unhealthy. So, it’s their problem. If they become psychopathic assholes about wanting stuff from you, then they may be narcissists or sociopaths. See my blog on narcissists about that: http://thenarcissistatwork.com. No matter where you are in the pick my brain equation, you can learn to set boundaries. If you’re one of those people who honestly thought it was “okay” to pick someone’s brain without paying, or you’re thinking a $3 cup of coffee or lunch at Chucky Cheese covered it all, then think again.

Learn to set and enforce boundaries. Have a rate sheet printed out and refer to it. People that don’t like it would be lousy clients. People who get it, will respect you. People with no money will flee. All are good things. That’s NOT to say that brain picking is bad. It can be very, very good if you follow the rules:

Ground Rules for Brain Picking

If you want to take someone to lunch or dinner to pick their brain on a business matter, then you should tell them that upfront. Offer to not only buy the meal, but to pay their hourly rate and cab fare or expenses if those expenses are involved. I had a would-be Brain Picker insist I drive two hours to meet her in her hometown for tea, (I would buy my own of course because she was “on a budget.”) I should drive to meet her because she was “famous” (in her own mind) and “too busy” to meet me halfway. She “just wanted to get to know me, and had a few questions to ask.” Yeah. That felt a lot like being summoned from the slave’s quarters. I laughed for an hour after I hung up on her. When hell freezes over baby.
If you invite someone to lunch for a social occasion, then keep it social, even if they want to talk business. Set the tone and keep the tone. They may be testing you to see what your true motives are. If you jump right in and take advantage of their generosity, they’ll see you for what you are—an opportunist.
If you can’t afford their $150 hour fee, then ask for a portion of that time at a reduced rate, tell them you have $50 and ask if you can pay them $50 to answer ONE question. You’re showing your respect, valuing their time and still getting what could be the crucial answer to your question. I have an attorney who charges me flat rates for services. I know exactly what it costs to have a contract or letter drafted. I call her up, she gives me 15 to 30 minutes to get the information she needs, I send her a check and she does her thing. She’s friendly and funny, but at the end of our conversation, she gets paid. I’ve used $49 ticket items to pay IT folks a flat rate of $49 to fix something on my website. It may take them 10 minutes or 10 hours, but they guarantee whatever it is will be $49. It’s just business. Don’t take it personally. You have the money or you don’t. You don’t go into a restaurant and whine and cry and pitch a fit like a two-year old because you can’t afford their $8 nachos and $3 draft beer right? Grow up. Business is business and because someone provides advice, writing or other services besides alcohol and carbohydrates, you still have to pay.
Be clear and matter-of-fact about what you want—business advice. Don’t invite someone out on the pretext of socializing with them, then ambush them with a Q&A session. People don’t like to be blindsided. I’ve been asked to lunch or dinner, much like Adrienne, only to discover the people who invited me wanted my expertise, not my charismatic and charming personality. I simply handed everyone my business card and said, “Wow! Sounds exciting, but I’m just here for the entree and the company.” Of course no one called me, but then I knew they wouldn’t. Most left my business cards on the table. No loss to me. I still enjoyed the meal and the football game on the big screen. Screw them. Most bugged out after the salad and my handing out my cards—remembering bigger things they’d forgotten, like taking advantage of someone else, I’m sure.
Give people the opportunity to participate by offering other value. I have a few clients who have done some great work and made money on other projects—like ebooks, business launches etc. They come to me with an offer— “I can pay you $500 or $1,000 or even $25 now, and a percentage 50% usually” of the first year,” or “I’ll help you fix your van if you’ll help me with my website.” Lots of times people are willing to barter, trade or swap services—although there are a lot of times you may not have anything they want. Be prepared with solid options and be honest with them about your ability to pay and what you want in return. I once wrote an article for a guy in exchange for five t-shirts. They were left over from some event, but were brand new shirts. I needed t-shirts and we both considered it a fair trade.

Don’t wet your pants, stomp your feet, and cry like a little baby if you’re turned down when asking someone if you can pick their brain or get their services for free. I’ve had people scream, cry, pitch a fit, call me names and even try to sue me when I’ve set boundaries and said “no,” to working for free or brain picking. People can be real nut jobs. When you act like an asshole, you are an asshole. Word gets around and good luck ever being taken seriously ever, or ever working with the person after that. Be an adult for gosh’s sake. If you’re upfront and the person says, “Thanks for thinking of me, but no thanks, I charge for that,” don’t launch into a whiny-baby-poopie-pants-victim-mode and start in with the, “I don’t have any money. I can’t afford it, it’s not in my budget,” blues as if it’s the other person’s problem that you’re broke, or worse, their responsibility to fix it! Speaking of which….
It’s NOT that you can’t afford it. You just don’t want it badly enough. You have a car? Food? Rent? Cable? Internet access? A computer? A laptop? An iPod? iPad? Smart phone? A cell phone? Gas for your SUV? Vacation out of town? Plane fare to a conference? Tickets to something—even the local high school football game? Coffee from McDonalds? Eat out a couple of times a month? Credit cards? Then you have money. It’s NOT that you can’t afford it, or are too broke. You just don’t want it badly enough to prioritize what you want, within your budget. Whatever it is you want isn’t worth sacrificing what you’ve got to get it. When I was living on the street, I knew homeless people who’d beg and whine and claim they had no money for bus fare— .75 cents, then get the bus fare and go buy a $10 bottle of booze, a pack of cigarettes and dinner from the dollar menu at McDonalds with a $20 bill. They HAD the money for bus fare. They just didn’t want to touch their stash. Whether it’s a $20 bill or a $200 or $20,000 budget, if you want something badly enough, you’ll find the money, sell something for the money, or get an extra job and make the money for it. When I hear, “I don’t have any money,” what I hear is, “This isn’t important enough to me for me to make it happen right now on my dime.”

So, if you got this far, you know how I feel about people picking my brain. If you want to pick my brain about your business, you’d better come to the party prepared.