[8] COMMODITY OR CONSULTANT

I have been reading and purchasing some books on self publishing and how to sell your knowledge for revenue. One of my favorite authors is Brennan Dunn. When I ran across his book titled Double Your Freelancing Rate, my first impression was great this guy is going to tell me that he has some magical framework that in just two weeks i can make thousands of dollars. But as i started to read it , it was more of a discussion about if you wanted to position yourself as a commodity or a consultant.

Problem solving vs accomplishing a task:

When you work for a company many jobs involve a clearly defined structure and specific ways to perform your job duties. You are hired to complete those duties for an hourly or yearly salary wage. If you have a issue with a task you can refer to a manual in which it will guide you with words like “if you have this problem, do this or if that does not work do this.” If a manual is not available you will have a person who can instruct you on how to perform a certain task. Many people operate small businesses with this “accomplish a task” goal. You have a hole in your shoe, just go to XYZ shop and they will fix the hole for X amount of dollars. Now you could argue about quality of service and other issues associated with this task but for this article just have that the task is accomplished with all things being equal.

When you go to get your shoe fix, the store owner may ask you a brief history on how this happened but nothing to indepth. You are not there for them to understand the reasons behind the hole in the shoe or for them to customized a shoe plan based on those reasons. This to me is the start of the process to problem solving. Engaging with the client to understand the reasons why they approach the software project in XYZ way. Then anchoring those reasoning with user, project and business goals.

Value Pricing:

Engaging with a client in more of a consulting role does lend itself to charging more per project rather than charging per task. So if you figure you have been working with software in progressing roles for five years, plus your education, plus your ability to problem solve, you should be able to to convey this in a way that the client sees the value in your higher rates.

Cultivating Relationships:

Software consulting projects are more about cultivating relationships. You try through a conversational tone and investigative journalist communication techniques to uncover what do not know they need. They may engage several people to accomplish software task for them which may make a particular project a success at the beginning but fail in the end.

These blog entries which are designed to help a person who is currently involved in a UX related project or for the person / student who has a interest in expanding their knowledge.

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