Advice on reducing work when life is based on billable hours.

[BoredcpaLA]

Hi Everyone -

Read the book and so much of what's in there resonates within me. Tim - it's a great book - and thanks.

My question to anyone - The jobs the book talks about working remotely and reducing hours - seem to be traditional, office-based jobs.

In my situation, while I am office-based, I work as a CPA where my day is measured in billable hours (and ultimately billed) to clients. Our clients pay an obscene amount in hourly fees or a % of income (for entertainment-types) - and as a part of that - we are essentially on-call.

Needless to say - after ten years of this - I've had enough - and have had for some time. It's one of the most boring things imaginable. Any suggestions on how to slowly reduce my hours? It's not a situation that lends itself to working remotely more then a day or so.

Thanks everyone.

[Drewkerr]

Replace yourself with someone else to do your work. Move yourself into a purely managment role. Where you take the important phone calls, shake the hands and have someone else do the work.

If you charge $100 per billable hour, then find someone you can pay for $50 per billable hour. You profit $50 for not doing any of the actual work.

Hope this helps!

Drew

[final_id]

In my situation, while I am office-based, I work as a CPA where my day is measured in billable hours (and ultimately billed) to clients. Our clients pay an obscene amount in hourly fees or a % of income (for entertainment-types) - and as a part of that - we are essentially on-call.
...

It's not a situation that lends itself to working remotely more then a day or so.

Is accounting a service or a product? Turn it into a product.

I think this is one of those situations that comes down to emotional attachment to the workplace. I think you're probably very much "in fear" of the idea of outsourcing YOURSELF -- and your work colleagues and bosses probably would be of it as well. But numbers don't lie: if you're billing $100 an hour, and you hire someone whom you pay $99 an hour to do all your work, all things being equal and ignoring any glitches, you're making $1 an hour for NO WORK AT ALL. The question is, where do you make the cut-off? Can you get decent return on some college kid at $20 an hour, and then you spend ten minutes overseeing his work and covering his butt? Well then, you've got $80 for 10 minutes of work! Since it's piece-work -- each project is self-contained -- it can easily be cut up into out-source-able chunks. Maybe after two or three weeks of your bosses seeing you doing such a great job because of your assistant, they'll agree to hire one for you. Can you finagle that? It's all about interpersonal relationships at work.

The trick will be in figuring out how to coagulate all those saved 50 minutes into usable blocks. Also how to convince your boss it's OK. The biggest concern for me would be the privacy issues. Personal financial data can't be revealed to some college kid. I'm not an accountant so I don't know the specifics. All I can speak to, is the "emotional issues."

I look back now, on a horrendous work experience in which I was expected to forever do more more more -- no matter how effective I was, they required another hour of work -- and I realize, now, AFTER having been fired, that I allowed them to treat me this way. The emotional attachment I had, to "doing my own work" and being judged positively on the basis of "wow you did SO much and you did it SO well" was holding me in the bad situation. It was, in effect, me AGREEING to be pummelled to death.

I was working in a situation which essentially "had to be" in the office, not out-source-able at all. But I realize now, after the fact, that there were a lot of things I could have done differently. I was a Publicist, and in this particular organization it basically meant shipping out lots of stuff. So, as shipping clerk (heh ...) I had to be in the office, near where the boxes and envelopes and Fed Ex pickup would be. And, as instant responder ("Oh Mr. Final: New York Times calling!") I had to answer all phone calls and emails immediately. So, two of Tim's major suggestions would not have applied to me at all. Nevertheless, I see a thousand ways in which I could have taken myself out of the equation, by thinking about work differently.

The changes could have been myriad. For example, I would not have thought in terms of advancing myself on the basis of my colleagues' and bosses' assessments of me. (As I already said, they were predisposed to over-burden me, in the first place, and therefore it's probably pretty likely that it didn't matter how well or poorly I performed, I'd still be pummelled and then fired.) Instead, I would have thought in terms of minimizing the work for myself and NOT CARING whether or not bossy-boss liked or hated it. When he said, "up the ante a little bit," I would have upped it a little teeny bit to the point that he couldn't complain. And then I would have STOPPED and ceased giving up to THEM my value as a person, and instead would do things which I value for my OWN benefit. They started out, as out of line, over-working me; therefore, I owed them nothing but marginally fair work for money. Yet I couldn't get my head wrapped around that idea, because I was so INVESTED in the concept of "being a good worker" and showing off my skills. I wanted them to approve of me, give me an A, treat me like I was the special one who was going to be Director some day. They were never going to do that for me. I was never talented enough at suck-up-to-the-king to actually GET those promotions; I just became addicted to the fantasy of getting them even though I knew I never would, and therefore addicted to the equivalent fantasy of performing my work in a manner designed to supposedly get them.

It's all emotional. After the fact, I can look back on that Publicist extravaganza and realize, I sure could have done like Tim Ferriss, if I hadn't had my emotions so heavily invested. I offer these thoughts just to suggest to you, Mr. Accountant extravaganza, where you might start thinking about your own work-related emotions.

[travelhead]

Since you have so much experience as a CPA, maybe you could create an ebook geared towards other CPA's on helping them run their business, or manage their accounts, etc. After working for 10 years in the field, I'm sure you have good advice that new CPA professionals would pay money to read?

You could work on this second business part time until you can afford to reduce your hours, and eventually, leave the workplace entirely.

Creating an ebook is not the only idea. How about developing some type of web-based CPA consulting service? I know these ideas might not exactly seem like the channel, but try to think of how you can apply your experience or expertise to a new business which does not pay you by the hour. Think about how to create recurring income for yourself that doesn't require a lot of management once it's set up..

[BoredcpaLA]

Thanks for some great ideas and insight. I can safely say that I have no emotional attachment to the office. It's not my firm, so essentially I am the person hired to do the work for the managing partner. Even the other partners kind of work for the managing partner. It's hard to delegate the work because of privacy issues. And the firm's clients are entertainers - so very high profile people - where privacy/confidentiality is especially high. I can't limit client phone calls to twice a day - as suggested in the book. Entertainment people want what they want when they want it. If they don't get the service they need - they're gone. It's a very different anamole in the world of accounting. I can work home - but I'll still have to be reachable by phone, and pc, as much of the information required by clients has to be pulled up live off special PC programs.

The e-book is an interesting idea. I guess it's going to be difficult to simplify my life at this kind of a firm - because it's niche in entertainment. So ideas like an e-book, etc. are good thoughts as to something I can start up on the side in spite of my schedule. Of course I can always walk away and just devote my energies full time to finding my path. May not be financially ideal - but neither is being stuck at the beck & call of actors.

Thanks for the feedback.

[yuugen]

CPA for entertainment world? Surely that's a great niche for information selling!

[monak]

I'm in a similar position as the OP in terms of working for billable hours. I work in the engineering consulting world. Gotta bill your 40 hours, hopefully mostly to clients and the rest to overhead. So, you're "locked" into "doing" something for 40 hours (at least!) each week.

Some of Tim's ideas seem difficult to implement in this type of employment. For example, say I can be ultra-efficient and get my work done in 1 hour as opposed to 8 hours. What do I do with my extra 7 hours of time? Bill it to the client and research my muses? ;) That seems like stealing from the company or more accurately the client. I don't think anyone is advocating that, but the more I think about it, the more appealing it is to reduce the percentage of time spent working for billable hours (go part-time) and supplement with muse income.

On the other hand, I've already negotiated at least one day a week scheduled remotely (ahem, today), and a floating second day on a trial basis.

Your thougths?

[yuugen]

That's my situation too monak, except my job has less earning potential :). I work very effectively, more so than my coworkers, plus the company right now is not that busy anyway, so I want to use my extra 7 hours to do my projects. (See my hire me? thread)...but is it ethical? But on the other hand I am the best employee I can be, and am blessed with free time because of it.

[monak]

Thanks yuugen, I hadn't seen your other thread but I'll take a look :) Our business is cyclical, there are bound to be busy days/weeks and slow days/weeks. You're expected to do whatever possible to stay....here comes that four-letter word....BUSY. Whether it's marketing, staying up-to-date on technical issues, whatever. You shouldn't just be charging your extra X hours to overhead for no good reason. But, when there's nothing else to do, that's when the question about using extra time for, say, muse creation becomes a moral dilemma.

[final_id]

Yeah, I wonder about that. I once had an office that basically was enclosed, and nobody could see what I was doing on the computer because its back was to the door (I faced the office entryway, get it?). So I could have been downloading porn all the time I was clicking away; or working on my Muse. :)

The way most of my workplaces have operated, no matter how much "free" time I had, there were always MORE MORE MORE tasks to put into them. In marketing and publicity, "the job is never done." You can just continue to hustle your product to try to get more sales, more publicity, more notice from the press, more ... whatever. Even if you get a cover story in the New York Times, there's still the Washington Post to harass about it!

So how do you know when "enough is enough" and it's appropriate to expend your 8-to-5 time on Muse instead of on what they're paying you to do? Work isn't always task-by-task, as Tim tends to describe it in the book. Rather, it's often accomplishment-by-accomplishment, or even hour-by-hour. I can't imagine a factory assembly-line worker, for example, EVER being able to outsource, become more productive, and therefore move away from the assembly line in order to devote some of his earned time off towards a Muse. Depending on how far down the totem pole you are, you can't really just disappear the way Tim's Princeton Business School buddies could. Those dudes are already high up in the corporate world just by merit of the degree and the positions that they have, so that some type of outsourcing and liberating becomes possible.

Can a janitor liberate? What about a school teacher? When is it inappropriate for an accountant to liberate a few hours and, even though it's between 8 am and 5 pm on a workday, expend time on his Muse rather than on his boss's instructions?

[monak]

Can a janitor liberate? What about a school teacher? When is it inappropriate for an accountant to liberate a few hours and, even though it's between 8 am and 5 pm on a workday, expend time on his Muse rather than on his boss's instructions?

Great post final_id. Some criticisms I have read about the 4HWW on sites like Amazon have basically concluded that if you aren't in an office environment, don't bother buying the book. I can see where those critics are coming from. It's going to be difficult in the near future (which is hard to define) to get our culture to change from "time-based" 40-hour workweeks which were historically based on the assembly line work environment, to a "productivity-based" culture. One HUGE step forward for this type of movement is what Best Buy has done at their HQ in Minneapolis (and my thoughts and prayers go out to those victims of the bridge collapse there yesterday). I think Tim mentions them in the book, but I've only read through it once so far :o If you're not familiar with their ROWE work environment, check out the article below. Fantastic stuff!

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1083900,00.html

[final_id]

Now I want to work for Best Buy ...

[MyOwnSuperhero]

As a freelance writer for businesses, I completely understand the difficulty of your problem. If you're providing a service, especially one that relies so much upon specialized knowledge, it's espescially tough to get past the fact that your income requires your butt being in the chair.

The solution, however, is simple. Is it your time the client wants, or the end result? If it's an end result, then stop selling that result as a service, and make it a product. Let me explain, using my business as an example.

If a client wants my services on an hourly basis, great. Some tasks make this a necessity, such as editing previously written materials. That's a job that requires time and is generally open ended. Other jobs, however, involve turning in a finished product.

If I've got a project to work on, then it already is in my favor to treat it as a product rather than a service. If I'm working on a project at my hourly rate, than it's in my favor to be a little slow, because I'll earn more. However, by doing this I limit how much I can make in a day. There are only 24 hours available, after all.

If I estimate the number of hours a project will take to complete, then add a few (just in case something hairy comes up), I can make a project estimate, based on my hourly rate. By totalling it up and pricing the project at the total, suddenly, it's in my favor to be speedy and efficient. A 10 hour project pays a lot more when it's completed in seven hours and charged for ten. This way, I'm able to get a lot more profit out of the same number of projects.

[SoloLawyer]

Hi, I'm in a similar boat to the CPA. As a lawyer, I am often paid by my time spent. However, I do have my own practice, which allows me to make all the decisions as far as work schedule, etc. I have a paralegal who does a lot of the work for me, but ultimately I'm the one who meets with the clients, does research, goes to court, etc. I would love to hire an additional paralegal to do more of the work, but at this point I only have enough work for one lawyer. Hiring more help would give me more free time, but would take money out of my pocket. Timothy's book has helped me operate more efficiently while I am in the office, if only I can increase my business.

[final_id]

Hiring more help would give me more free time, but would take money out of my pocket.

Note the logical fallacy (heh ... studying for the LSAT!) in your statement. You have assumed that taking money out of your pocket is a problem. It might not be. Perhaps the time you gain, by hiring additional staff, is actually WORTH the money that you lose. For example, if you hire three new paralegals, spend a week or two training them to operate as a tag-team (each gets 15 hours a week, etc.) to run very much of your business in an automated manner, and then spend a week doing whatever you want? Your total annual income goes down for you personally, but your stress level does, too. And in that spare time (of course!) you can work on another income-producing project, or on any of those annoying things on your to-do list.

Obviously, I'm just re-hashing what the book says. It's fairly obvious. But it's interesting to me that your old assumptions crept back in to your thinking, in that tell-tale phrase! :)

To summarize: At some level, the loss of income is not tenable; but at another level, it is desirable.

[Ricky]

I am glad someone posted this.

While I don't work on billable hours, I'm in a medical specialty that requires late hours and a schedule that isn't completely set by me.

I'm frustrated by a colleague at this job that isn't as focused on efficiency and since we sometime have to work on projects together I suffer timewise because of him. For the majority of the time I work to be efficient and provide quality service, but have a life also on the outside.

My goals are modest. To get a second source of income that requires little time, while I continue to slave away at my main job, which I actually do enjoy quite a bit and would probably love if the hours were a bit more manageable.

[monak]

I think Ricky hit it on the head. It's not that my job sucks so bad, it just sucks having to do so much of it. Cutting back to part-time is in my future, with muse income to make up the difference (and more). Being effective (rather than efficient) and getting the same amount of work done in, say, 32 hours vs. 40 hours and having those extra 8 hours for muse development, dreamlining, personal growth. Now THAT's what I'm talkin' 'bout! :)

[final_id]

I wonder if "part time" is a solution, or if it just looks that way from here. I know that I always thought of doing the same thing for 40+ hours a week, as an IDIOTIC way to spend the week. If you ask me, 40 hours is 39 hours too long. So I am often tempted by wishing to work 32 hours, or 20, or 4. But when I get it down to what I want, I always find that it's too much. No matter how little I'm doing, it's more than I want to be doing. There's this perpetual "grass is greener" phenomenon. I think what I most dislike about "work" is, simply, that I "have to" do it. There are all sorts of productive tasks which I undertake on my own time and even for the fun of it, but none of them is something I get paid for. When I "have to" go in and get paid by someone else, suddenly I hate doing it. And when the task is geared toward making someone else famous, instead of me, then I REALLY hate it. I want to be in the lime-light myself.

[monak]

I want to be in the lime-light myself.

Spoken like a true business owner :D Part-time is in the definite near future (within 6 months), the ultimate goal is to not do it at all and have automated, passive muse income fuel our mini-retirements.