(I started this update last Friday…)
Like usual, I have recently added a few new titles to the draft section of my site. I had a couple of ideas of what I wanted to talk about, but I didn’t quite get around to it until right now. This week haven’t been the most productive week for me. It’s already Friday now, and I feel like I haven’t gotten anything done. For the most part, I feel like I might’ve just wasted my time this week (mostly feeling really distracted…likely from my own struggles with my anxiety). Just like I have better days and weeks, I sometimes still experience bad days and weeks too. Things are rarely ever perfect.
I am so glad to welcome a brand new week though. Since I didn’t have the mood to write last week, I’ve decided to just wait till Monday came around before I began sharing what has been on my mind recently.
Talking about gaining a new perspective, lately, I have realized something different about myself. It’s not something that would be obvious on the surface, instead, it’s more of a mindset and how I would see myself as a consultant.
Moving Away from a Small-Time Consultant
One clear change/difference between who I want to be today versus the person I used to be, can be described as “I’m no longer interested in just chasing after the short-term gains, instead, I want to focus on the long-term mission/goals.”
Let me go back into my history for the context of what I’m referring to here. For the longest time as a freelance consultant, I have been focused on trying to survive as a consultant; all I could focus on was securing my next consulting gig. In that sense, I believe there’s an element of “desperation”, and I wasn’t thinking too much about the long-term. All I could focus on during that time was, “I need to secure that gig so that I can make it to the end of the month.” In some ways, being a generalist means I get to be a one-stop shop for some potential clients. It might not have been such a bad thing if I wasn’t so focused on the idea that it’s a means to make some quick money.
The main problem/challenge of being a generalist and one-stop shop is that those gigs usually take up more time and energy. In some of my other posts on this site, I spoke about those challenges in greater detail. Plus because I was acting quite desperately, the quickest way to secure a gig was to price my services at cost (90% of the time). It’s the only way to “beat” the competition if you know what I mean. In hindsight now, that was my old mindset ofcourse. If you think about it long-term, what I was trying to do back then wasn’t sustainable in the long run. To that end, it also made it hard for me to provide the kind of premium quality services I was trying to promote.
The main downside to having that mindset was that I was always chasing after the next gig. It isn’t easy to see past a certain point into the future. Every single plan I have, every decision I’m making, it’s all working toward something immediate, and nothing long-term.
Looking back, I realized that even though there was a part of me that wanted to taking on more high-quality clients (being paid more and being able to produce premium quality deliverables), I was never quite able to make the time for such opportunities. See, when I became so preoccupied by all those smaller consulting gigs, I was no longer available to consider the ones that I really hoped to secure. By the time the right opportunity came by, I was already in a position where I had to say no because I could no longer commit.
When I take all of that into consideration, I knew that I have to resist the urge to react to the temptations of taking on smaller gigs. I am consciously aware now that by taking on potentially low-quality clients, it would mean that I potentially have no time or attention when the right opportunity comes along. The fact is, there are plenty of freelancers with less experience that are looking for gigs as well. And for many of them, chances are, they probably would not qualify for the higher quality clients.
The key thing here is to remember that opportunities are plentiful out there. There’s always more than enough to go around. You just have to focus on the right ones that work best for you. By thinking that way, I saw more abundance and no longer see a limitation to what would be possible.
Focusing on the Future That I Want to Build
When I think about the kind of professional future that I want to build for myself, I’ve started to see everything through a “long-term” lens. Every single decision that I make will be viewed through that prism. Each decision will be weighed between whether it would only bring in something in the short-term or will it something that would have a more long-term effect.
I was recently thinking about a few great examples:
- If you think about things that you would buy, there would be times when you would buy something cheap because some of those items can be used and dispose off once you’re done with it. In those circumstances, it’s often not necessary to spend a lot of money on those items. But if you really want to get something that would last much longer, and would not breakdown or spoil easily, you would be more willing to consider investing more funds into it.
- Another more specific example I can think of is electronic gadgets. There’s often this phrase we locals like to say, “It’s the Apple version of [any product].” What we mean by that is that the product in question is premium quality, hence, it’s premium pricing. In the world of smartphones, for a number of years, it is widely known that Apple iPhones were the most expensive smartphones that money can buy. And the very same thing could be said about MacBook Pros versus all the other Windows based laptops. The same can still be said about them today.
The more I thought about it, the more I viewed the services I provide as something that’s comparable to an Apple product. I care deeply and passionately about being able to produce high-quality (premium) outputs. For that reason, it would make sense for me to price my services much higher than other consultants/freelancers with lesser experience and recognition.
On the flip side, it is also true that because of how I have priced my services, it’s not going to be something that’ll work for most clients that are just looking for a cheaper alternative. I will always respect that there will always be clients who don’t have the budget to pay for my services and what I can provide in return. That’s just the reality.
As I look back, I’ve realized that my clientele (target audience) has shifted. I’m only interested in clients that have the necessary funds and are willing to view what I can provide as a long-term investment. In that context, they will be more willing to pay more for my services, and less likely to try to negotiate the pricing that I’ll be quoting them. That is also true for the majority of regional/international companies.
Constantly Reminding Myself, “Delayed Gratification”
Before I start sidetracking again, I’ll just put my closing thoughts here. At the time of sharing this update, I still haven’t secured any consulting gigs yet. But I continue to believe and have hope that it is just a matter of timing and opportunity. If my past experiences are any indication, it is this, the right opportunity will always come by at the right timing (in my faith, I would say it’s God’s timing). It’s rarely ever the most convenient timing (or the timing that I’m expecting).
The best way for me to describe what it feels like would be this…it’s all about being patient, waiting, and trusting that God will come through. He always does.
So, with that in mind, I’m doing my best to keep reminding myself that what I need/want now is delayed gratification and not instant gratification. There’s already way too many times in my life where I made decisions that were driven by an impulsive need for instant gratification. And each time that happen, the results were more often than not, quite disastrous, or not sustainable in the long run. I might feel good for a short while, but after that, I would end up suffering to some degree. And that suffering/struggle would usually overshadow the short moment of feeling good.
So, no more chasing after those feelings of instant gratification (besides, I already know those feel good moments won’t last very long). What I’m after now are things that would be sustainable over a longer period of time. Plus anything that can last longer is always worth the wait and patience.
As I look ahead toward building this new side of me, I’m holding onto that vision of who I will become when I have managed to turn this desire for delayed gratification into a part of my life (something I live by, and also becomes second nature). For now though, it’s still something I have to consciously remind myself to keep practicing.
Leave a Reply