Confessions of a Public Speaker by Scott Berkun Read Free Book Online

you must accept
    that if you feel underpaid, it’s up to you to do something about it—the
    freest part of any market is you . You are free to
    quit and live in the woods like Thoreau, or to start your own business
    where you decide how much you’re paid. For me, this means if I ever want
    to earn as much for a lecture as Bill Clinton or Bob Costas, I need to
    become way more famous by (in increasing order of desperation) writing
    better books, getting a better agent, or marrying Jessica Simpson. Of
    course, we are all free to complain about how unfair things are, as I am
    here. But let’s be fair to people who earn more money than you think they
    should, including LeBron James, Tiger Woods, or even me. I bet if you
    picked an average American with an average job, and asked him using
    average language whether he’d rather be paid $100,000 instead of $50,000
    for doing the same work, it’s a safe bet that, on average, he’d say
    yes.
    The only remaining defense for the speakerfees I’m paid is that I’m compensated for all the things
    everyone forgets I have to do in order to be capable of speaking. A
    keynote lecture to a large crowd takes about 60 minutes to deliver.
    Arguably this is more intense and stressful than the average office
    worker’s entire week, but let’s put that aside. To make and practice a new
    lecture takes two days of full-time work, which is 16 hours. Then consider
    my trip to get to the venue, including the security lines I have to wait
    in, the airplane flight I have to take, the cabs I have to ride in, the
    hotels I have to sleep in, and on it goes. Now, many people can give
    lectures, and I’m not being paid simply for talking into a microphone. I’m
    paid for the decades of experience listed on my resume that, in theory,
    should make what I have to say interesting, provocative, entertaining,
    educational, inspiring, and whatever other adjectives the people who hire
    me mention in their marketing material. I’m good at teaching, which is
    uncommon and worth a few bucks, but lastly there is the ultimate factor:
    I’m paid to speak at one venue instead of speaking at another. When demand
    outweighs supply, there are fees to be paid. The more demand, the higher
    the fees.
    The unspoken risk I run is having no salary. I have no pension. I
    have no extended contract guaranteeing me lecture gigs forever. This book
    could bomb or be destroyed in reviews and my speaking career could come to
    an unfortunate and immediate end, which in the grand scheme of things
    would be OK. I didn’t quit my job with the goal of earning $30,000 an
    hour—I quit to see if I could pull this off at all. And now that I have
    for the past five years, my goal is to see how long I can make an
    independent living purely on the merits of what I write and what I
    say.
    ----
    [ 13 ] There is good anecdotal evidence suggesting that, before
     electricity, most Americans had natural patterns of sleeping soon
     after sunset and rising at sunrise. There’s harder data about recent
     trends: http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2007-08-29-sleep-study_N.htm .
    [ 14 ] “…it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle
     than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God,” Matthew 19:23–24. Or
     Timothy 6:10, “For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil”
     (New International Version).
    [ 15 ] In the interest of transparency and satisfying your curiosity, I
     average 25–30 lectures a year. Sometimes I’m paid as much as $8,000,
     depending on the situation. Maybe one-third are paid only in travel
     expenses or smallfees, since they’re self-promotional or for causes I’d
     like to help. Roughly 40% of my income is from book royalties and the
     rest from speaking and workshop fees. So far, I average around
     $100,000 a year, less than I made at Microsoft. However, I work fewer
     hours, am free from the 9 to 5 life, and have complete independence,
     which is worth infinitely more. I limit travel to