How Much Are You Worth?
September 9th, 2006From Rachel Singer Gordon, one of my first librarian heroes:
“I was chatting this morning with another librarian about giving conference presentations & workshops. When we took the bold step of talking about what we charge, it confirmed my sneaking suspicion that I’ve been somewhat undervaluing myself. (Of course, some of you who have heard me speak might beg to differ! ;)) I think a lot of us in librarianship do.”
“One problem here is, of course, that people are somewhat loath to share what they charge until a program organizer asks; like anything else having to do with money, talking numbers makes us all squeamish. Another is that many of us speak for free or for minimal compensation, in return for some intangible benefit (professional development, tenure requirements, whuffie), or we choose to donate our time and efforts in some circumstances (to an alma mater, to a specific group whose cause we believe in, to online conferences that let people attend for free, to promote our institution).”
Since I am “retired” from the speaking circuit (as of the end of this year, thank goodness!), I can tell you that in my last year of speaking, I charged $1,500 per presentation, no matter how much time I was to speak (ranged from 45 minutes to 3 hours). That’s what I started with when approached by an organization. If they couldn’t afford me (the case about half of the time), I would ask how much they were willing to pay and we always settled on something. I was probably screwing myself, but money was secondary to why I agreed to speak. I’m a terrible businessman 
Of course, travel, hotel, and food were not part of my fees (the orgs would always foot the bill for all three - this was never an issue) and only recently have I added this in as “part of the fee” because I really didn’t care about the money anymore.