Income or going for your values?

Today, I met a junior designer with a freelance business. One of the frustrations he had experienced, was about what is a fair price? He was asked by a friend of a friend to do a job. She thought his rate was high and had expected to give some discount for work he did. Sadly, it is a typical confrontation freelance designers experience. Long time ago, I have myself also been struggling with balancing free or low priced jobs and getting enough income to support myself.

It is unfair choice to ask junior designers to deliver things for free or under market value. Yes they are passionate about their job, and yes they need experience. But how on earth is it fair to expect from them to put a lot of time for free into something you cannot do yourself? They will create something with high talent and quality of deliverables, so you will get in more clients. It is not a direct one-on-one pay back for you, but I am sure it has effect! You want it right?

Ok, so far my preaching, as many of you who read this are probably designers. You know all this? You have probably experienced it, right? What was your strategy? How did you deal with it? Please share your story 🙂

For future projects, you could use this chart to find your answer. A tip from the designer I talked with today.

Vacation time

One of the treats of academia are the long vacations.

Especially in the summer. In the Netherlands, we generally have 5 weeks without any teaching obligations or related tasks. I usually make some resolutions for these vacations:

visit friends & family, travel, relax at the beach, read good books, write blogposts, spend extra time on my PhD, do more workouts, make some delicious healthy meals, prep barbecue parties, do some house renovations, etc. This year another thing was added to the list. Spend time with my little boy. While I am writing it down here, I notice the large to-do-list I have created for myself to do in the summer vacation.

Usually reality hits me.