Cheap, Fast and Good Pick 2

A long time ago when I worked some dismal job at a warehouse, I noticed someone had posted on a wall this following statement outside of the break room: â€Å"Cheap, Fast, and Good: Pick Two† Ever since then, I’ve thought about how inescapable these parameters are. Boiled down to the three possible outcomes, it follows: If it’s cheap and fast, it won’t be good. If it’s cheap and good, it won’t be fast. If it’s fast and good, it won’t be cheap. I encourage you to read those over and over again to really internalize them because Ive never found an instance where they havent panned out. No matter what type of endeavor, these rules hold true. Choosing two excludes one. Perhaps these sets of rules are a satirical way of demonstrating efficiency, pricing, and quality, but I can find no better example of them than being a freelance writer. By having an in-depth understanding of just how each rule applies to our business, we can treat our clients better,   get fair rates on our subcontracted work, and negotiate contracts that are more in-line with our abilities. Let’s take a look at each of the outcomes and see how they affect our freelance writing business. Cheap and Fast Work that you produce quickly and for little money certainly won’t be good. I’ve found that if I’ve low-balled a contract, I tend to lose steam if the deadlines are too close, with the work tending to â€Å"drag† on my subconscious while I complete it. It’s hard to fight the temptation to just cross the finish line with whatever fits the minimum requirements. One surefire way to spot these types of clients is a low-price coupled with an overeagerness for content—often, they are only interested in short-term results. This also holds true for content mills or â€Å"race to the bottom† sites, where quality is not the foremost and the only directions are â€Å"300 words on organic perfume.† Because producing something with a quick turnaround does take time out of your other projects, doing it for cheap does your business AND your future portfolio a disservice. Think about it: would you be comfortable showing a potential employer a clipping that you didn’t put your best effort into? When in doubt, if you’re trying to negotiate contracts like these, it may be better to just walk away if they won’t budge on their budget. Cheap and Good Projects that don’t have a short-term deadline tend to be cheap and good. I believe this is where a good number of assignments tend to fall, though it is up to your salesmanship to determine just what â€Å"cheap† is. While some of my clients fall into this category, I find that I handle them differently than my most common clients (see Fast and Good). If their work has a deadline of â€Å"whenever you can get this back to me,† I lower the priority-level of the client. Part of me realizes that these clients may not have the budget for a quick turnaround, but are more interested in having something completed that â€Å"softens the blow† of what they have to eventually pay their freelancers. While I wouldn’t necessarily say that I would turn down projects that are cheap and good, I do tend to put them on the backburner. Worse, if I do forget them while working on higher-priority projects, I usually have a last-minute scramble to get the project finished with a high-level of quality. The reason why? Parkinson’s law, which states: â€Å"Work contracts to fit in the time that we give it.† The best strategy I find is that if take the first steps towards completing a project, I can estimate how much more time and the work involved in the project. Setting a second deadline is an effective strategy to not only finish lingering assignments to make room for new ones, but also as a way to renegotiate higher-paying contracts in the future. This naturally leads us to the last permutation†¦ Fast and Good If the work is produced quickly and to a high standard, then you should feel entitled to price your work at a premium. The reason is that you are blocking off your near future’s responsibilities to create an interjecting work—that type of exclusivity should be priced higher. I would say that some clients that demand work quickly and for a decent price have tested my output. After giving an assignment, they’ll often say, â€Å"give it to me whenever you can.† My interpretation is that clients like these are â€Å"giving you enough rope to hang yourself.† Especially with the hyper-competitiveness that comes with sourcing quality freelancers online. There are plenty of qualified candidates that would be happy to have high-paying work. If you turn in an assignment in a longer-than-usual period, clients like these will tend to limit future assignments to what workload they feel you are â€Å"capable† of. The Balance and Estimates If you’ve found yourself feeling a little put-off about the three outcomes, don’t be. The takeaway from the three outcomes is that there is another way: finding a balance between a project’s deadline, the project’s budget, and the projected quality. Think of each of the three parameters as being codependent on one another, and pick what is important to your business model. As for my personal preferences, I’d pick cost as one of my must-haves that I base my decisions on. If I have a bulk project for a client that needs the work completed ASAP and isn’t too hung up about the quality, I’ll take it on for a quick lump sum. Similarly, if I have a bulk project with a way-out deadline, I’ll take it on for an okay payout. When negotiating a deadline, one question that always comes up is â€Å"how soon can you get it done?† If I see this, I know that I can throw out a few prices based on turnaround time. Speed and pricing become the two variables to steer the client towards their needs and my capabilities. Throwing out a reasonable large number can be rewarded, or it can be a means of steering a client towards the lower-priced further-out deadline. Similarly, when subcontracting, I make sure to offer a bonus if their turnaround is quick, as this helps free up my worries that their work won’t sync up to my project’s self-set deadlines before the client’s actual one. It becomes difficult to explain to your clients that your hired help is dragging their feet when all they care about is when the project is finished. * * * As you can see, picking two out of three has its advantages and drawbacks. It’s up to you to determine—client-by-client, project-by-project—just what you’re willing to take on at the expense of some negotiating factor.