Thanks to Nick Parker and his weekly email “The Notices” for this today, a reminder to work on your own terms. As Nick puts it:
When Nirvana asked Steve Albini to produce their third album, In Utero, Albini wrote the band a letter setting out his creative terms. A link to this must cross my path about once a year (this time it was via Josh Spector’s For The Interested newsletter). Every time it does, I read it in full. It’s an inspiring reminder to work on your own terms, to your own standards, and with a healthy scepticism towards the processifying of creativity. Rock on.
The whole letter by Steve Albini is pure gold, an artisan who knows what he stands for and knows his values. Two particular thoughts from it for me are a) Pay me what is fair, and b) Work on your own terms
Pay me what is fair
In the letter, I love Steve’s summary about what to pay him. After some detail on why he works the way he does in terms of how and what he is paid for, he concludes:
Whatever. I trust you guys to be fair to me and I know you must be familiar with what a regular industry goon would want. I will let you make the final decision about what I’m going to be paid.
My core value is FAIR, and though I have standard retainer rates, from time to time (and typically where the value of the work is clearly higher than a standard retainer), rather than negotiate or try to put a price on things up front, I have worked on the basis of simply telling the client “pay me what you feel is fair”
Work on your own terms
I am in the business of focussing on my clients and providing them with value. Over time I have therefore refined how I work so as to work on my terms and so, like Steve Albini, seek to do my best work and provide the highest value to my clients. A few notes on that from my perspective:
- Choice of clients
- I work only with clients who fit what I am good at and what I love to do, as well as being the types of clients that are purpose-led, brave and ready for what’s next being of impact. In short, I follow my Ikigai (“Can you do what you love?” Yes, and I do).
- Through those lenses, please at my home page. It gives a clear positioning statement around the type of clients I love to work with, what I offer, and so what we can achieve together. It also is designed to put off any visitors that do not fit that mould.
- My retainers are for a minimum of six months before moving to a rolling month-to-month. This is by design to ensure that clients are committed to change, both in terms of financial investment and time investment.
- I also tell all new clients that my client engagements typically are for at least 18-24 months. This is indeed the case and also is a reminder that every successful leader will invest in anything that can make them and their business better, and that is what I always am there to do.
- Sourcing Clients
- I choose to work with a maximum of six retainer clients at a time
- All of my clients (with very rare exceptions) come from referrals, so my website is primarily there to provide confirmation once they have been referred (including links to testimonials etc). I am far happier being introduced to a potential new client by someone who knows me well and is very clear on what I do, who I want to work with, and the value I add. I want to spend my time helping my clients, not getting new clients.
- Add the average duration of client relationships being around two years, I only therefore onboard around 2 to 4 clients per year at most, a place I am happy to be in.
- Terms of Work
- My 1:1 client work is on a retainer basis. Clients invest in access to me and I am available as much or as little as they need me. It is important that they feel they can contact me as and when they feel to, as I am very much NOT “on the clock”
- I bill monthly in advance with payment due on invoicing. I am not in the business of billings and collections, but of doing the work for my clients. All of this is in my contract terms and signed off on by the clients. If a corporate client has a process that means they take a month or more to pay, we simply agree that I bill two months in advance so that they can remain in compliance with my terms.
- Workload
- I have no staff apart from my awesome VA, and my Chief of Staff, both of whom take away work I don’t enjoy and make my life easier.
- My client work does not (with only occasional exceptions) involve any deliverables, so I rarely have emails to clear or tasks on a to-do list, I am simply present for my clients whenever I meet or otherwise talk to them
- Most of my work is on video calls, so I have very little travel time.
If you take all of this together, what this results in is:
- I have a select group of clients who come first and foremost for me and are always in my mind
- I spend no more than 25% of my time on client-facing work
- I spend less than 5% of my time on any sort of admin
- This means I have 70% of the time to “meet interesting people doing interesting things” and to focus on “people and ideas”.
In short, I work on my terms.
Oh, and this is consciously designed and took time. If you go back to 2015, I flew 369,000 miles as a CEO with responsibility for staff and clients in almost every continent and it never felt like I had a spare moment (as I really didn’t!). By the end of 2016, I realised things had to change, so I sought counsel from some wise friends who knew me well. The result was a choice to go independent and bring a clear and strict focus to the work I now do. I have moved from spending 120% of my week between client work, travel, management, and admin and brought that down to 30%.
I don’t work with rock bands as their producer, but I am privileged to work with wonderful leaders who are all rock stars in their own way!