On the way home from work the other day, I saw a car advertising the drivers business on it. It started out “Earn What You’re Worth.” It struck me as funny at first and then rather scary…Does someone really want to take the chance to have someone else pay them what they think they are worth? I know that for the most part we all probably over value ourselves. I mean really, if you think that others will value you at what you think that you are worth….you must be either really good and at level far above and beyond most or you are extremely delusional. I think that most of us are the latter. In this day and age you’d have to ask, ‘are you paying onshore or offshore wages?’ Are you paying a flat rate for the completion of the task or are you paying by the hour to complete it?

There are a few daring people who go out and do this…and some of them might actually be worth it. Very few of the ones that I came into contact with while employed by the Federal Government were worth half of what they were charging. There was one that I remember well being worth every penny we paid him. He eventually left the company he was working for and struck out on his own. Taking several of the clients he was working with from his former employer. Are you someone of this vein? I definitely felt that I was not getting paid what I was worth while working for the Federal Courts. (Besides not feeling appreciated or challenged and constantly second guessed by a boss who took the word of an incredibly untalented, unskilled (dated skills I should say) consultant (who charged 4 times what he was worth…literally). So to get a little of all of that, I left.

Now you can’t get all of that on your own. You’ve got to work for it. Now that I am in an environment that I feel is a bit more supportive of my own career goals, I must work to make that happen. If I am going to be someone that is paid what I feel I am worth, then I must make them see that I am worth more than what I am paid. (And money is not the only way to be compensated…there is trust in my abilities and more responsibility.)

So, if you are going to earn what you are worth be prepared to pay to get it.

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