Business, you know, may bring money, but friendship hardly ever does.
~ Jane Austen
It’s been a busy time for me over the last month or so, not because it was Christmas either. So busy in fact that I was left floundering like a fish out of water. So in hopes of getting myself back on track I took stock of what I’ve been doing. It’s an impressive list:
- Repaired this blog. Twice. First it was a corrupt MySQL table, then it was a corrupt WordPress upgrade.
- Learned not one, but three major WordPress plugins; NextGen Gallery, WP Shopping Cart and cforms because I had to…
- Build another blog
- (Re)Installed Linux (Ubuntu) alongside Windows and set it up as my web development/programming sandbox.
- I even had to repair my crashed iPhone.
Doesn’t seem like much at first glance, only 5 items, but it represents a significant amount of skill and knowledge and equates to days of work. It also made me realise a couple of things. Firstly, how much of a geek I am. Not only do I possess all of those skills, but I also enjoy putting them to use.
Most important of all however, I realised that I haven’t been paid for all that work. Not one single penny. Why? Because it’s all been for me or for family (fiancée in this case).
Friends Don’t Work for Each Other
My point is not so much ‘never work for friends or family’ – though speaking from experience, that is sage advice – it’s ‘don’t do it at a loss to yourself’. Here I am, using my technical know-how and applying my vast (cough) knowledge to solve problems, but not getting rewarded for it.
Which is silly because I can guarantee you two things:
- No matter what you are knowledgeable about, someone else knows less.
- That someone is willing to pay you to apply that knowledge and solve their problem.
It’s a case of do as I say, not as I do. Or as Bruce Lee put it,
Knowing is not enough, we must apply. Willing is not enough, we must do.
So go out and make a living from doing what you know you can do. Just don’t do it by working for your friends or family.
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{ 8 comments… read them below or add one }
Hey Marc,
Glad to see your site's back in the world of the living – I thought you'd given up on it.
Not sure I entirely agree with you – you get a couple of things from doing unpaid work for family friends:
1) Experience/skills (providing you're doing something you're not already 100% familiar with)
2) “kudos”, “karma”, or whatever you want to call it – as the Godfather might say, “now you owe me a favour” !
But you're right, this sort of stuff can certainly get out of hand.
Anyway, glad you're back online,
Cheers,
Ceri
Thanks Ceri, it's good to be back
Some very good points there, I hadn't thought of it like that. Thank you for sharing an alternate point of view with me.
This happens to Chris ALL THE TIME. I finally put my foot down when his older brother, who NEVER contacts him unless he wants something, called him and made him sit on the phone for hours. HOURS.
The problem?
All the porn sites he went to corrupted his computer. I was like, “That is IT.”
Ahh, the ol’ never calls, never writes family member – unless they need something, for free type. Yeah I know those.
Not on my side of the family though. So you can breathe easy Ceri
I really like your new banner and the site you did for your fianceé.
And I get what you mean about skills. I’ve spent years sharing a lot of mine for free, but that’s probably because I’ve always done paid work that’s ’served’ folk in some way or another, like teaching and coaching, or stuff that’s hard to put a price on, like translation, where getting paid per hour or per page doesn’t cover the heart&soul input or the brain-fry element, that extra something that turns an adequate translation into an inspired one.
When I used to sing in Greece, life was easy; I got free food and wine that evening, and when I was an examiner, I got paid a standard rate per candidate examined. Putting financial value on what I do has always been difficult for me, mainly because what I do is so intertwined with who I am.
I’m not blogging at the moment because it was overlapping into my evenings and taking me away from my husband, kids and homemaking; no matter how satisfying the blogging was or how many people I was enjoying and (hopefully) supporting, I could no longer justify the hours I spent sharing my skills with everyone except the people who matter to me most – my family and close friends.
If I get back in the saddle and start blogging again, I will be investigating some way of monetising.
Glad to see you back!
Thank you Janice.
Part of what I am doing now is making a list of things I can do, as well as cannot do, to see if I can package it up in some way and then put a price tag on it.
The more I think about it though the more I think the skills don’t necessarily fit neatly into a box. Maybe I should go with that ugliest of titles: Consultant.
Yuck. Maybe not.
Hi Marc .. good to be here – and nice to be in touch with someone else in the good old GB .. though like Janice – I suspect you both distance yourself from the English old ‘lass’ down here .. !
It’ll be good to know a geek too .. because by golly sometimes one just needs a quick question answered and away we go .. so look forward to being around.
One thing you can perhaps throw a light on .. is this post the Wigmaker .. is not my most recent .. so not sure where it’s gone haywire .. I’ve gone into Comment Luv and joined – but they’re allowing me to register my details – for what ever reason (I could possibly have signed up in early September before my uncle died and have forgotten about it – so I’ll check that out too – the support said they’ve replied .. but that hasn’t come thru either .. ) – oh well can’t get worked up about it ..
Bye .. Hilary
Have a good by the look of it wet week .. as it is here .. Hilary
.-= Hilary´s last blog ..The Wigmaker, “Cottonpolis” and the first factory =-.
So glad you got up a new post, missed seeing ya.
I agree with you on working for families. And if the families are like mine, doing a few favors turns out to be a long never ending list of things they want me to do. it get’s tiring and sometimes I don’t have time to do my own things. It can get frustrating.
And, yes Marc I need to stop letting them do that, I know.
I’m working on it.
But I do think there are good benefits for doing something for family and friends as long as you remember that it should be give and take and not just giving on your part. At least that’s my opinion.