I am thinking about an agreement between myself, my freelancers and my customers.

Ultimately, I want the math to work something like this:

-15-20% to project manager.
-15-20% of revs to salesperson.
-35-45% of revs to freelancer
-20-25% to the ‘house.’

I don’t want ‘business advice’ from a lawyer (anyone willing to sit through law school for three years is probably not going to be a kindred spirit), but I see things as needing to address:

Freelancers:

1. Do they agree to work or not to work with the companies in mind? (i.e. some type of noncompete/buyout)
2. If they want a permanent job and want to cut me out, what is the $ figure that I need ($20,00 seems about right)
3. Do they get to resolicit the client, or must it ‘run through me?
4. If they take the ball and are acting PMs, what additional comp?
5. Do I run everything through my domain?
6. What do I do when they refer me another freelancer that is of sufficient quality? (not really a pertinent question that has to do with the agreement).
7. Bonuses: What if they are early? On time? Late?
   • An explicit bonus structure and presumption that they are early.
8. Rush fees: If the client requests a rush…what then?
9. Default. If client defaults, what then? (We probably pay 60% of anticipated revenue upfront).
10. If freelancer defaults, what are our penalties?
11. What about revisions? We should price assuming a reasonable amount.
12. Subcontracting. Can a freelancer subcontract (probably yes, but we have to be fanatical about standards).
13. Consulting: are they free to help clients, or are they just there as turks?
14. What kind of reporting is required/status updates?
15. What is the penalty for not delivering on time?
16. What E&O are they required to carry?
17. What do we do if they learn that they can’t complete the project?
18. Do we own the code?
    • Yes.
19. For reuse only or for general use?
20. Does freelancer get right of refusal for projects from same client?
    • Yes, and a bonus; we charge the client extra for this.
21. What if the client is “super happy” when we run the scheduling?

I don’t know that this is exhaustive, but if we implement a process that looks for problems and adds stuff to an agreement (remembering to write down stuff when there’s even a vague feeling of tension). There are some things that I want to do to honor freelancers and the contributions they make, and there’s obvious & natural tension between this and that.

Otherwise, things are going well. My goal is then to bill about $17,500/week of which I would collect 20-45% of. I need a competent project manager.

Onward.

2008 was a very good year thus far for me. I’ve lost weight, I got (inasmuch as anyone is able to) clear of the IRS. I resumed writing again on a daily basis, I learned a little bit of PHP, and I discovered the Hold Steady. But the real thing about it was changing my attitude about money. I think, permanently.

I used to see money as finite, and something that ended at a specific time. The money from this ($closing) goes to pay that ($bill). So if I had a windfall, my mind would ‘prespend’ it in my mind. And consequently, I had my bills paid, but I never had the reserves that you want. I saw money as something that was abundant, but finite, or linear. Money was a drug. No flow. And in the mortgage business, I’d know that I was going to have significant money, and for all my life, I’d manufacture (unnecessary) purchases or services that had to be bought[1].

And that’s no way to get wealthy, because the real secret is stuff is clutter, and almost all of it is unnecessary, and almost all of it leads to dissipation. Even magazines telling you to ‘simplify’ like ‘Real Simple,’ suggest that you buy more stuff to do so. Diminishing returns.

Having the IRS’s boot on your neck makes you adapt in ways that you wouldn’t otherwise. You learn to do without, and you can still have peak experiences…without quality cashflow. I learned to manufacture income without the help of vendors or expensive systems.

This is a long way to say that money doesn’t lead. It’s a cliche, but you have to create something beyond money. In Built To Last, Jim Collins says that money isn’t the purpose of any viable business. It’s necessary as oxygen, but men don’t live simply to breathe, we live to create and to extend our horizons. Money doesn’t lead. It follows.

The Owens 2008 campaign was started with the premise that “once we get money, things will rock” (things ARE rocking by the way without near enough money). The real premise shoulda been ‘things are rocking.’ We wanted to raise money to get the message out, when we shoulda thought “How can we kick ass without raising much money.” [honk and wave, baby] The candidate (small ‘l’ libertarian constitutionalist) is killer. I’m proud to be able to work with him if even in the limited role. But we all made a mistake and thought of money as a solution to the problem. Money is part of what’s necessary, but waiting on it to come is insane. And this campaign taught me that lesson again. [[note: there is still time to turn it around if I will]].

Deepak Chopra says [paraphrasing] that when you chase money, it runs away, but when you chase wisdom, money gets jealous and chases you. Some men can chase money successfully. These are the same douchebags that only exist for it, and are slaves to it. The people that rocked the subprime crisis, and the floor traders in New York. The folks that want to get over on anyone that they can. It’s not that I’m more moral, it’s that I can’t exist with that kind of stress and tension. Money is generally nothing to yell about.

Create The Vision First

What I am creating is different–I’ll be tracking numbers, because numbers tell a story (and as Drucker says, what’s tracked gets better). I’m bringing people together: Salespeople, Freelancers, Project Managers, Companies. I’m creating an ultralight, ultra fast way of getting things accomplished. There will be little to nothing ‘new’ from what I’m making, except for the eye that I have on further automating this project.

Salespeople always want something novel and ‘best of breed’ to sell. I am interested in selling ultra-talented freelancers to great companies. I don’t want to be a ‘placement service,’ though I’ll need a release valve for that sort of idea. I want to be a service provider with iterated small accounts.

Project Managers: Need work and need to be able to find meaningful jobs that eventually end. The incentive to ‘always extend the scope,’ in order to preserve an income or job. We want to eliminate that by having short, fulfilling projects.

Freelancers: are the core; honoring the people that are saying ‘screw you’ to being kept citizens is what made me create LOST and is as close to a raison d’ete as I have. The people that are adding value need to be treated like it, and the work and value added, not the ‘time spent,’ are the key metrics of this. The ‘time spent’ ethos that Odesk (and sadly, increasingly edesk) has is another control and obedience test. Insidious, whatever force creates obedience tests all over.

Companies: I love me some capitalism, and getting a channel for Companies to access the elite geniuses that are already in existence

Creating something that automates that, that isn’t ‘elance’ or ‘odesk’ but honors quality people, companies, salespeople & PMs is/can be my ‘contribution to the body.’

[ [1] a side note: how many things did I buy that would pay for themselves with just a closing…I should post on the Arrogance of Vendors because Greg Swann is right: nonpractitioners have the most snidely condescending attitude towards practitioners…i.e. you’re stupid if you reject our service]]

GTD and Ubiquitous Capture.

My prediction is that the jerk faces at GTD agenda will comment in this blog. They have some sore of ‘autocomment’ thing turned on and it annoys the everlovin’ piss out of me. Evertime someone dares mention the phrase ‘GTD’ their spiders find it and make a post.

But I digress.

The real point of this is that I have an acute need for ubiquitous capture and listing. It has to be lightweight, and I have to do it regularly. And there’s the rub: doing regularly feels like a tether that I fight.

Right now, I have a ton of billable work for a ton of great clients to complete. And I have to clear that deck before I can grab my next batch of billable work. All told, I have probably 20 hours of work to do, but it’s spread out among 9 distinct projects. And it’s the niggly little details that absolutely eat me alive. I’m GREAT at getting a ball rolling and started, I’m not GREAT at polishing off details.

I need a (printed) list next to me so I can make sure I stay productive, and I need to write and rewrite my goals down each day.

Once the Election is over, I’m going to focus–and not allow myself to be diffused. One–maybe two–projects is it. And that will suit me fine, because I have the guts to focus.

Not focusing is a coward’s choice. I used to think it made you more secure, having ‘multiple streams of income.’ Not so much anymore. I think that it’s stupid–it’s a way to make sure you stay a mediocrity.

At one point I was deriving income from:

• Mortgages
• Internet subscriptions
• e-books
• Real Estate Coaching
• Doing Websites
• Political Fundraising

Not to mention blogging at places like http://bloodhoundblog.com, http://lenderama.com, http://mortgagecicerone.com, http://blownmortgage.com, http://activerain.com/newmarketsurvivalguide.

You’d think there would be a certain safety and comfort with six different ways of being paid, and a dozen more to promote myself. But it isn’t really secure–there was an endless amount of detail to manage, and an never ending stream of stupid tasks that I had to do, along with the ‘overwhelm excuse’ built into an unsustainable pattern. There’s also a certain cowardice in not taking a tittle shot, and seeing how far it can go. I’m still doing too much stuff I’m still stuck with it (though e-books is truly passive at this point, and I plan to write another one). Managing the tension between it all is difficult–holding on to unprocessed tasks (especially in the ‘doing websites for realtors’ category) blows.

This was about the time I fell off the GTD wagon (of which David Allen says falls off all the time). I have to get a new ‘system’ that works for the way I do things right now. Have to.

So what I’m thinking is this:

use K-notes, pen and paper and RTM? to manage stuff; use “google docs” to manage individual projects. I can get in the habit of hitting “F4” which takes me to the dashboard more or less instantly.

Have legal pad next to me as well.

Once a day, organize & centralize it.

Lather, Rinse, Repeat. I’m doing this daily so nothing surprises me.

I think very soon I’ll be using Heap & Torch. I’ve given them extensive runs, and they do most everything I like (including setting up Gdocs). Exporting is something I’ll have to learn, but it looks very promising. I hope Ben has the sense to stay the hell away from the FIRE businesses.

I love Icosales, and would implement it gladly if there was more time and energy spent on the user interface–or if I had multiple salespeople–or if I I was a mortgage guy. I’ll keep checking their interface, and if I get to the scale I want, we’ll do it.

50 something days till the election…then I can most of my projects, winnowing down to 2.

That’s the brain dump.

I have some substantial posts to be posting about.

• Right Right Now Notes:

I’m going to call my business ‘right right now.’ Maybe write right now. Dunno. Not super important TODAY. Focus: I delivering short projects on short deadlines with an increasingly good basis. I’ve been doing similar work so far, and I don’t have a system in place to ensure that we get things done fast. I’m improving–but there is only so much someone can do ad hoc.

These are all things I’m almost thinking. I may change my mind about some, all or most of these ideas. First of all, not being the cheapest is not going to be something I changed my mind about.

This is mostly ‘attributes,’ I’ll do one on sales strategy (cruise monster, offer project work in lieu of jobs, etc).

Starting Point ideas/brain storm (some well thought out, some just whittle bitty ideas, still cooing and puking)

• instant return. profitable as a JOB by 9/15/08. 3 jobs in by then. find work now, find work before business cards are printed. Sales focus first.
• No investors, partners. Collaborators and advisers, sure, but it’s my ship, my time to rock, my dream/idea.
• 100% high quality, known & vetted freelancers. No race to the bottom, only quality assets delivering the work.
• need: freelancer vetting process
• ability to throw 100 hours a week at a given project with quality people.
• focus on LAMP with the “P” being anything from Rails to python to whatever.
• Some design and writing.
• A good, trusted place for quality workers to send and profit from overflow work (possibly)
• Create gitomer type kick ass elevator speech. (maybe Christina can pitch in)
• Freelancer gets an average of $100/hr++
• 100% of the time, never, ever, ever, under any circumstances take hourly projects.
• Get a crystal clear spec in the beginning.
• Charge for changes suggested by the customer.
• Get a timeline established and agreed to within X of taking project.
• Have a 1 strike-and your out process for missing deadlines. “none of our remaining people have ever missed a deadline.”
  • have some sort of system for personal emergencies that allows us to swap assets

        - point is: company never misses deadlines.

• Collect greater of 50% or $2500 in the beginning. Once rep established, collect more.
  • Easier to find paying clients than it is to collect from douche bags

• Have a project average of roughly 30 hours to completion and $6,000 net.
• All people are 1099’d as legitimate contractors.
• Roles:
  • Sales People (find work, negotiate prices and contracts.)

        - Spec Writers: Can be sales people, the people that get the job order or tech lead/asset.

        - assets: people that do the work that runs the business.
        -         evangelists: find assets.

• Requested assets get an additional 20% in some cases, with 10% extra going to freelancers, 5% going to evangelist. (TBD)
• Contract will not obligate an asset to be used, but that’s not super strong.
• In demand assets get their rates automatically increased.
• NOTHING HOURLY. REUSE WORK, DELIVER A KICKASS EXPERIENCE.
• Agreement:
• Assets will have fanatical devotion to hitting deadlines.
• Deadlines will be realistic.
• Unrealistic deadlines will have premium prices of +75%.
• Unrealistic deadline is 60+ combined hours in the first week.
• All cost of researching EXISTING systems borne by client. i.e. if we have to research a company’s old code, that is the only ‘hourly’ project.
• We can outsource functionary shit, but never architecture/design high end stuff.
• All passwords delivered & code with reasonable comments (what it does, mostly).
• Collect at spec, and have clear agreement that is simple and easy to understand.
• TODO: Get Bonded/E&O.
• Single proprietorship (leaning towards. Name on the door, ass on the line. LLCs are pseudo protection, and my assets are under lawsuit threshold).
• Avg. project is closed out within 20 days.
• Noncompete:
  • 18 months from when we found a job asset and company must buy out at $20,000. Not a big one, but one to keep us from being eviscerated.
• Agreements
• Deadlines: Core of our business. missing deadlines is huge.
  • Negotiate realistic deadlines. Negotiate realistic deadlines.

        -        Once deadline is hit, do it again

• First time assets get hounded by me. We need to get progress reports.
• Assets are graded based on:
  • Client rehires
  • fiduciary values (must care deeply that the client has good tools)
    • DEFINE FIDUCIARY VALUES
  • client happiness
  • communication with team/client and internal.
  • deadline delivery.
  • on budget.
  • Client interactions
  • Referrals of other assets (bonus system/residual must be in place)
  • economy??
  • finding opportunities for work for us??
• Assets must have:
  • linkedin 6 months old or older in active use
• Written process that we are held accountable to and that improves!!!
• “How did we do” after each job, reviewed and process improvements created. 6 sigma.
• Process must manage expectations (skill)
• We want to be “ink dry-to-go” within 24-48 hours.
• How do we make it easy for people to buy our people….?i.e. channels that need to be open, ways to order?
• We don’t have a ‘bourse’ of commodity coders. No no no no no.
• We are ‘cheaper in the long run because we’ll make your stuff work together’.
• Process made crystal clear:
  • Agree to engage us.

        -        Get spec &         Send check.

        -        For new clients, spec-work = billable (again: easier to find a new client than to deal with dickheads)
        -        Register asset (to enforce buyout.)
        -        deadline clock starts…
        -        Work done.
        -        mile stones all have ‘approval & payment deadlines,’ when next deadline up.
        -        each milestone paid prior to beginning of next one.

• clients get credit = to 125% of their last bill.
• We must qualify clients to ensure that they can & will pay.
• Assets Find opportunities naturally.
• Have assets perform without rancor
• We don’t want assets financially dependent on us unless they are ‘money drunk, ‘ and then we can deal with as needed.
• Have this be based on finding short term jobs.
  • Our assets are free to meet one another? collaborate? not a company…but anyway.

Intellectual Property: We’re work for hire with rights to repurpose source code.

RRN= us client= them.
–client gets original code w/rights to reuse.
–author gets no residual|nothing is due after contract is paid to RRN.
–coder can reuse.
–RRN and Client both gets use of code. All are negotiable; not a principle matter, but we want to have understanding of who gets what and when.

More to think about, i’m certain.

[This is sort of a rambling memoir of my formative early 20's.  For Part I,go here, for part II go here]

My first “real” day at bank one in Heath was unspectacular.  I’d been waiting for the bank to open, and the tellers opened the bank pretty quickly.  My boss had nearly perfect local bank manager comportment.  Everything was right, from an uncreased copy of a new management book on his desk, to his dapper blue suits.  He was aware of some of the ‘stir’ I’d caused, but not al of it.  I was fresh from training–where we had 4 or 5 days of sitting around and reading print outs of power point presentations in a stifling room as someone worked the phones selling her Mary Kay Products with zeal.  Since I’m at least an average reader, I was able to handle 100 pages of 24 point type in less than an hour.  This gave me 7 hours to kill.  My mind went wandering during this time.  I didn’t know that my actions had caused me to be earmarked prematurely, and that people weren’t really hankering for the change that Jamie Dimon talked about.

When I got to the bank–more of the same.  People spoke to me like I was four.  Condescending comments like “you’ll learn,” while simultaneously withholding any useful or  actionable information.    I had a storied (and apparently porn-loving, judging by the computer’s cache) predecessor that had made his way to a closer in suburb of Columbus.  I also learned that there was a girl that had wanted my job, but apparently had not passed her Series 6 licensure test.  For all of the financial services professional licensing tests, if you are literate and have a cursory glance at the material, you will pass.  Unless you’re an idiot that is better suited to operating some type of “register” device. 

The staff consisted of–I think–9 women, the male manager, and me.  There was a crazy Mormon “team leader” that had the mind and mannerisms like Tom Hanks from “Big,” who came in two or three times a week.  His name was Michael Orlando, and is the only person I’ll mention by name her on the blog.  His tenure was only about 10 days longer than mine at the bank.  There was an assistant manager who was a pretty, sturdy, good person for the most part.  A perfect assistant.  She was the boss of the tellers. 

My district manager was in about once every week, and he seemed to be a good guy that trusted my manager.  I met him at the grocery store after the fact and he said hello, more cordial and friendly than necessary.  This was after my team leader’s tenure had ended, and I think he put two and two together a little bit.  My team leader got me fired by having a tantrum worthy of an infant in the middle of a bank.  To this day, I’ve not seen a greater display of immaturity, and I am still clueless as to why it did not work.  I almost sued him for assault, because I believed that he was about to hit me.  Others did too. 

At the training center, I was allowed to dress business casual.  At the bank itself, I had to wear a suit.  Since waiting tables doesn’t lend itself to liquidity, I bought some suits second hand.  They had the second hand vibe to them, but I wasn’t going to open up a credit card to buy a wardrobe.  Besides, I was in a rural part of Columbus, so it wasn’t as if people were going to parse what I was wearing. 

The first day on the job, one of the young women (ah, they were mostly single moms, mid 20′s) interrupted some instructions from my counterpart (the person that also had my job, and had picked through my clients), and said: 

“Hi, Chris, I’m [redacted].”

“Hi, [redacted] how are you.”

“Well, I wanted to let you know that I have attitude, and I won’t be taking any crap.”  She was being both ‘jocular,’ and serious.  She wanted to establish a pecking order, but she wanted to do it in some way that was not hyper serious.  This was how she introduced herself.  I cocked my head, and I said,

“[redacted], is that a threat? “

“What do you mean?”

“I asked you a specific question–is that a threat?  I take threats very seriously, and I can’t see any other way of interpreting what you said.”

She was silent, and my counterpart said, “I think he’s serious.”  She turned on her heel and was apparently crying.  At least that’s what the Assistant Manager had said.  (The assistant manager was the lord over all of the processors.)

Attitude, Indeed.

Having made the staff of the bank an enemy as well as the folks at corporate, I was well on my way.  I was afforded some latitude to do my job, so when the actual selling part started, I did pretty well.  Even though the incentive plan was miserly and typical of regional superbanks, I was excited by it.  $32,000 AND i got to get a check for $500-1000 once a month?  Hell yes.   When I wasn’t selling, I was calculating and recalculating my bonus plan.  $20 for a business checking account, etc. The selling part was straight forward an non subjective.  I sold.

Being 25 at the time, I wasn’t blessed with the judgement I have now, 7 years later.  So I would telemarket (pre DoNotCall), and say, “Hi, this is Chris Johnson from Bank One, I need you to call me back regarding your account right away,” on people’s work voice mail.  This worked marvelously, and when I informed them that no, their money wasn’t stolen, they were so relieved that they would be very compliant towards my sales pitches.  This got me to sell a ton of loans.  About 3 times what the plan was. 

Still–I craved the approbation of the mothers of the bastard children that worked at the bank, and was sad that I didn’t have a lunch buddy.  I tried to befriend the people, but when Survivor is the pinnacle of what they can understand, and I am an odd for not owning a TV, there was nothing doing in that department.  The bank manager was wiser than me and didn’t even begin to fight that battle.   Not until the degenerates bound together and decided to make some sort of apparent complaint on his managerial style.  Les Miserables, Indeed.

Another bit of instructions that we were to make was regarding some IRS reporting rules, and structured transactions.  Any time someone was to get more than $10,000 in cash, they were to be reported to the IRS.  Likewise, if someone was structuring their transactions to avoid this, that activity had to be reported to the IRS.   So when my company had repeated requests from the same person for $9,900 bucks (they had it in their account), I was curious.  I asked–without hostility, “How is this not a structured transaction.”  What I was aiming to know was how this didn’t need to be reported, who approved it, and what to do if I was in this situation. 

This question was taboo.  Something like questioning the veracity of Kim Jung Il’s golf game.  I wasn’t questioning anyone’s integrity, it was in fact, a procedural question. My last sort of ally at the bank was gone.  The manager knew that there were some ‘issues’ with me, but regarded me with cautious optimism.  The news of me exceeding my plan by 50% in the first month, as well as the news of my complaints to corporate hit at the same time.

So I’d: made some single mom cry, peed all over bank one, and sold a lot of stuff.  My demise would come swiftly.  While on paper, it was a plausible resignation, in reality it wasn’t my choice.  At the time, I was too obtuse to know that this isn’t the way you do it.