Women Deserve to Be Paid More
In all the years I’ve outsourced freelance work from my digital media businesses, women were ALWAYS the better service providers.
The ladies I worked with were talented, committed, responsive, and an overall pleasure to work with. No excuses, no missed deadlines, no bullshit. Unlike the guys I hired. Sorry.
These women never let me down and I loved it!
My only complaint about working with women was their pricing. They simply never quoted or charged enough for their services.
The female freelancers I built a working relationship were often apologetic about their rates, always timid to even quote subpar pricing. Usually they’d tell me a rate that was well below standard, and before I could even respond, they’d quickly discount their price even more.
Unfortunately they were fearful of losing the project and would almost give it away. UGH.
Even though I can’t relate to the struggles of women — with the exception of hot/cold flashes topped off with laughing and crying at the same time — I know what it’s like to work for free and to be abused for my talents.
All of us want to be valued for our work and to be paid fairly for what we bring to the table.
So I wasn’t going to let these gals down!
Every proposal or quote they sent me was always met with the same response,“That’s too low! How about I pay you triple that?”
Of course they were always shocked or perplexed, and admittedly, I’m a horrible slum lord boss. But I absolutely refuse to take advantage of people even when I could profit from it greatly. Because again, I’ve been there.
They never deserved to earn less for being a female. Especially if they were older, inexperienced, or stay at home moms.
And I let them know that.
Every time I paid them what I believed the project was worth so they could gain confidence. I’d also use the opportunities to encourage them to see the true value they were bringing to the world, my business, and the clients.
The greatest reward though was never the work they did.
It was when they’d call me with total excitement because they had just closed on a project that paid thousands of dollars instead of hundreds, all because I kept coaching them to charge more and sell on value.
I’ll never forget Rebecca.
She was gonna charge $1,500 for an eCommerce project that should’ve been a minimum amount of $8,500. I lamented she was being way too cheap; pushing her to be confident at all costs. Finally she quoted the project at $10,000 and she got it!!!
Knowing this made me so happy.
But this post isn’t about me. It’s about those of you who identify as women.
If you’re a female struggling to earn fair pay, don’t give up and don’t give in. Don’t tolerate the bullshit. Ever.
Of course it’s easy for me to say and there are no simple solutions for being treated fairly as a woman in the business world. Men can be real assholes. And I certainly wish I could offer you more than a motivational quote.
Yet I can say this.
Believe in yourself, your talents, and what you offer to the world. You deserve to be paid what you’re worth. Nothing less.
Good luck!
