Zero. I don’t charge by the hour, I charge a mutually agreeable percentage of the value I help my client partners create. Keeping the numbers small and simple, I’ll charge you more for helping you realize a $1 million Big Hairy Audacious Goal than for a $100,000 Big Hairy Audacious Goal.
This value-based fees model is used by consultant Alan Weiss and a bunch of other professionals (such as some architects and engineers and attorneys) who prefer to treat their client partners and themselves better and get paid for value created instead of hours burned. It has these benefits:
- Faster results for you, because I’m motivated to deliver the value, not rack up billable hours.
- Transformational buy-in for you, because you become convinced of the value early on—motivating you to stay committed to it.
What this means in practice is money doesn’t change hands until we’ve had several conversations about your Big Hairy Audacious Goal and its value. In the process I end up giving away a bunch of value, because we have to start designing your Big Hairy Audacious Goal to figure out its value together—but I’m OK with that if you are.
For more on value-based fees, see:
- Alan Weiss’s book, Value-Based Fees: How to Charge – and Get – What You’re Worth.
- Redesign Your Profits: Value-Based Fee Structure—Architects and engineers.
- Senior judge wants limit on time charging—A Victorian Supreme Court judge in Australia criticizes attorneys billing by the hour.
