molly.com
Friday 23 June 2006
Will Not Speak for Food
Yet again a major company is putting on a conference and has invited me to “participate” as a speaker. I have received guidelines, plus a date of deliverables, along with my session name.
However, the major company in question, while asking for my apparent expertise and enthusiasm, doesn’t see fit to pay my travel or time. In fact, the entire invitation reads as if I owe them the honor of my presence, and not only that, should pay for the privilege.
I don’t understand this phenomenon, I never will. And from this day forward, if you want me to speak at your event for free, and if you’re a rich corporation with deep pockets and not a legitimate charity or community organization, think about the time you’re going to waste before you take the trouble to type up that invitation.
I can understand the not-pay issue when there’s good cause. Charity, non-profits, community action and interest (that’s why we all dip into our own pockets for SXSW, for example) and truly limited budgets are all real reasons for modifications of a speaker’s fee and expenses should that speaker be so inclined. But this crap of paying for the privilege of speaking, in my opinion, has gone on too long and for all the wrong reasons.
I encourage all people who publicly share their knowledge and travel distances to do so start putting a reasonable price on their knowledge and experience. And yeah, could someone explain this practice of invite-don’t-pay in simple terms that even I can understand?
(p.s. for those who have asked, no it’s not Microsoft)
Filed under: policies,professional
Posted by: Molly | 04:06 | Comments (50)
Molly don’t go. As long as people are willing to work for nothing its inevitable the industry will be rife with exploitation.
Send them a business like memo stating you are sorry you can’t make it but your wages, travel expenses and some degree of profit needs to be in there to do the job.
They are a business and you are a business. That they should understand.
(IMO everyone should say this and curses to the people who work for free and make my daily life a harder struggle – where are all the free mechanics earning their biscuits? The architects who do spec? I mean where is that no wage earning police service? And I’m sure there must be volunteer bricklayers out there!!!)
We are all worth a fair day’s pay Molly.
Norty, indeed! Is it just that intellectual knowledge is valued differently than a real skill with measurable effect?
Yes that is pathetic. Businesses are so strange. I take time to be a certified project manager, certified quality manager and a certified software quality engineer. These certifications are fairly difficult to get. But will the companies that I work for pay for annual fees for membership to the organizations. Of course not. I am suppose to pay. I mean we are talking about $119 dollars a year for a membership. Hmmmmmmm
These are the same kind of people who hold spec contests for their site design no doubt.
Hi Molly,
I think intellectual knowledge is a real skill and does have a measurable effect. For example, I buy a book written by someone with more knowledge than me. I learn things and my work gets better.
On the main issue I would find that rude – athletes don’t pay to be involved in sporting competitions, they are there because they are the best at what they do.
You have to pay for speaking there?? That’s insane. I agree with you all the way.
That is just plain silly. Don’t bother. If you want to speak to my neighbours from my balcony I can offer you coffee, some cookies and maybe one of my fabulous dishes (quick pasta + pesto + grated cheese). You’ll also get the big bed while I’ll be on the sofa in the other room.
If I am going to offer these scrumptious benefits they’ll have to match them (+ travel cost). Tell them that!
When I worked for the Just For Laughs Festival, which is a non-profit, though they couldn’t afford to pay comedians crazy amounts of money to host their galas, they did pay for their transportation and hotel. As for the rest of the comedians who’d perform there, I think they just wanted to be there for the exposure and paid out of their own pockets to get there.
Maybe that’s what company X is thinking, “Molly will get good exposure at our conference, so she should be happy to pay for herself”.
As a photographer, I’ve been asked numerous times to donate a print for an auction, image for a book, etc. for no $$. The auctions, maybe I’ll give a print, depending on the charity, but the books – not until the press is donating ALL of their expenses/time/etc., the writers are donating their work, the distributors, PR, etc. and so on.
Not even paying your travel?? Sheesh.
The web community is one of the most generous communities I have ever been associated with. All of the web guru’s, yourself included, willing give countless hours to write articles and tutorials, man forums and even answer email requests for help. You have GIVEN us all so much knowledge. I hope this spirit of generosity never ends.
But speaking at a corporate sponsored conference is in another category all together. You absolutely MUST refuse to speak without appropriate compensation. I hope you encourage all of your many friends in the industry to take the same stand so that every onference understands they must budget appropriately for speakers.
Karen
Bloody cheapskates. Have you thought of returning their invitation wrapped round a brick, postage unpaid?
I suppose they will not give you a percentage of their profits from the conference or their increased product sales because of your noteable attendance will they. I wonder what will be their next idea to increase their profits while decreasing their costs? Don’t even think of going!
Reminds me of the time when I was DJing. Some clubs asked you to bring your own CD players / decks and didn’t offer you free drinks. Not worth the hassle
Definitely this is wrong. However academia suffers the same problem – I know people who were invited to speak at conferences – no expenses, and they still had to pay the day rate for the day they were speaking! Yes, it’s a major conference, yes it’s influential, but it risks losing that position by excluding people. And, let’s face it, very few people can afford to pay conference fees personally, be they an academic, a professional speaking or a web developer.
For companies to do this: there’s no excuse at all.
I am definetly on the side of ‘what a cheek’. The only way to get around this problem is a long road of people refusing to go.
Hi Molly
Can I book you to sing at my daughter’s upcoming 4th birthday? I can’t pay you anything or contribute to travel costs, but you can sleep on the futon in the baby’s room and have the first slice of cake.
[...] Molly most certainly isn’t speaking for mega-corporations for free. Web developers deserved to be paid. Honest. [...]
haha, I think the personal invites where people will feed me to preach from the balcony or sing to a child, well heck – those sound a lot more fun and well worth the while.
There will always be those who are willing to step in and do it for free because of the publicity they think it’ll bring them. Not that this is in any way approval for what they’ve done. You have every right to expect compensation for your work (your work in this case being the presentation).
@ Matthew Pennell: “Can I book you to sing at my daughter’s upcoming 4th birthday? I can’t pay you anything or contribute to travel costs, but you can sleep on the futon in the baby’s room and have the first slice of cake.”
Will Molly be allowed to blow out the candles too?
Actually there is a very serious point in all this. Travelling across the world, crammed into cargo class seats takes a real toll on health and wellbeing. Bodies just weren’t designed for that stuff. Added to that the stress of airport connections (sometimes less than 40 minutes between flights) can be incredibly stressful.
The best conference organisers know that when you take into account the days(s) before and after an event that you need to spend in a place, plus the time that it takes to write, test and rehearse new content (Molly rarely does the same talk twice), that the speaker fee should cover much more than the hour on stage.
My guess is some people see lectures as a self-promotion of the speaker or the company. But there’s a difference if I invite somebody from Sun or Microsoft to promote their products to a selected audience where they can expect some ROI, or if I invite Molly®, the hard-working self-sufficient expert. Perhaps some people also think all your trips get paid by the W3C? Doesn’t I18N stand for jet-set? Don’t you have the platinum W3C credit card?
BTW, it was good to meet you in London. I’m glad you seem to have found some new perspectives. I never had a problem with alcohol, simply because I don’t like the taste of beer, but I can assure you, it’s not easy to order some softdrink in a London pub and get a look as if you just said something obscene to the waitress. Hmmm, on a second thought, if they treat me like that anyway, maybe I shouldn’t disappoint them. Let me know when you need a friend.
Molly its just because when someone says no in this business 100 people say please pick me!!!
We shoot ourselves in the foot without the big budgets of advertising firms and we can’t afford to keep doing it. The No Spec campaign is closely tied to this issue.
We perpetuate the myth any kid with frontpage can do what we do… its very sad.
Are you honestly saying that all you CSS gurus really do sometimes pay to pass on your knowledge. Aside from impressing me greatly, that really drops my jaw – you’re all the geek equivalent to movie stars. Under what circumstances would you ever pay?
[...] There was a heartening post over on Molly Holzschlag’s this morning – Will Not Speak For Food. It was heartening not because of the situation but because it dawned on me the industry has this issue at the top and I am not the only person feeling under pressure to give for free or even meagre income. Its the bane of our industry to have an expectation for anyone to work for even one minute of their life for free. Further, this working for free degrades our industry and leaves the common perception any high school kid with FrontPage may replace us within the iota it takes to hit delete on our Instant Messenger contact. [...]
I don’t quite get the SXSW thing. Although the ticket price is relatively low compared to most other conferences, they attracted over four thousand people to SXSWi this year, and any which way I look at it they must be making a lot of money (much more than many “community-focussed” conferences that pay fees, accommodation, travel, etc.), especially with the numerous sponsors, no-frills approach, no catering, and next-to-zero money spent on speakers.
I think SXSW is great, but why are speakers not only willing, but thoroughly enthusuastic to spend so much time, effort, and money to take part?
Hi Molly,
I think someone’s pockets are probably getting ‘lined’ as a result of you being there.
Good speakers draw in people, and those people undoubtedly will spend money on something.
I guess if you want to ‘get suggestive’ you can say if you speak the price of ‘something you’d like to donate’ can be added to the cost of admission and included in those peoples tickets at the door, or their meal. Whatever…hehe..
get’em with a counter offer
Thank you Molly, this really needed to be said.
I’m with you!
B.L.
Will Not Speak for Food
The fabulous Molly Holzschlag writes that from this day forward, she will no longer speak for food. I’m with Molly on this one. About being asked to “participate” in a conference without pay, she says:”… the major company in question, while askin…
I’m pleased people are agreeing with you on this. People strongly disagreed with me when I said the same thing. Apparently only some of us are justified in trying to make a living.
Someone up above compared this with the No-Spec initiative. Perhaps that’s not a bad idea. “No-Speak,” anyone?
“Dear Hollywood star,
I am planning to shoot a movie in a large city. Please play lead role, it will cost you only $5 million plus of course your own expenses and travel. Free bagels on day 2 of shooting, don’t thank me, I’m just a nice guy.
Yours meanly,
Wealthy Hollywood Director”
Couldn’t agree more with all that has been said, Molly. You and many web-gurus have not only great talent to get your passion, knowledge and convictions accross to the public, but also great commitment, you do enough for those who deserve it, don’t let those who can afford it cheat you out of an honest wage !
It could be that this organization has underestimated the establishment of your career. I would think that, like Snook said, an organization would invite you to speak, no expenses paid, if they felt your benefit from contributing would be worth your investment. Maybe for someone else this would be a chance of a lifetime for networking and exposure, who knows. That just doesn’t happen to be the case for you though.
[...] Molly Holtzschlag (famous XHTML and Web development expert) writes that she will not speak for food anymore. I’m quickly arriving to the same conclusion. Speaking is fun and all (and good for your career — one speech I did at a Silicon Valley user group back in the mid 1990s got me a $10,000 raise. So far that one speech has made me about $100,000). [...]
Any company inviting guest speakers should:
1) pay for all their expenses and travel arrangements
2) pay for the speaker.
If they don’t and you don’t see a reason to do so (ie Charity or non-profit org) then just send them a curt letter explaining your needs. If they aren’t met, just don’t go.
Go Molly! Go Molly!
I so agree.
Conferences seem to find ways to pay themselves, the printer, the caterer, the hotel, the entertainment, but no money for the speakers, the “raison d’etre”!?? When you do the math, a small amount could be added to the registration fees in many cases and there would be plenty for the speakers.
How about open book accounting for conferences?
Of course there are always new people wanting to get started and who love the exposure. A conference organizer can simply set aside a % of sessions delivered by “upcoming talent” who are willing to forego a fee. Otherwise, yes, pay all speakers’ expenses, and add a fee to those who’ve earned it.
I think this would improve the quality as well. Let’s face it, when it’s free, I have a lot less incentive to put my best work forward. (It’s just math – a time and money equation) This is especially true when I am busy and have paying clients who demand and deserve my best work.
I agree completely, not only should your expenses be taken care of, you should be compensated for your time. I assumed almost all organizations at least ensured travel arrangements (air-fare and hotel) were taken care of.
There’s a simple factor here – If your IP was not worth the time they wouldn’t be inviting you to begin with – good for you for taking a stand.
shane/www.graphicalwonder.com
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Why would anyone in their right mind want you to give away for free what you have paid such a high price for through time, expense and experience. Too many companies and individuals are looking to better themselves at others expense.
You are above this. You deserve fair compensation for your expertise. Turn them down cold but tell them why. It only costs a little more to go first class!
ok
[...] Molly Holzschlag declared in 2006 that she will not speak for food any longer. [...]
Yes, it is a very sad state of affairs. I’ve placed very low day rate fees for travel and smaller organizations–and they still complain while they rake in the conference registrations and vendor booth fees.
I quit speaking for free several years ago and my venues have decreased but I can say the ones I do are great–I believe there has to be a good exchange. Feeling valued and honored for your expertise is non-negotiable.
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