How Much is Your Time Worth? How Much Should You Pay Yourself?

“Time is money.” But how much is your time worth?

We’ve all heard this phrase many times, so much that it’s nearly lost all meaning. But time isn’t only money, it’s freedom, too. How many times have you found yourself at your desk DIY-ing a business something-or-another to save money, only to discover that it takes you about 5 hours longer than you anticipated? That’s 5 hours you could be spending making more money (and probably more money than you’re actually saving, at that), spending time with your friends and family, and/or improving a skill or hobby.

And let’s be honest with ourselves (this is a safe space), no DIY time estimate is correct, whether it be business or home improvement related. Real life example: my partner and I just bought a house that needs a lot of work. We thought we could do the basement floors ourselves in about 2 weekends. As I write this post 5 weeks later, we have some pros downstairs fixing what we did ourselves and finishing the job. Did we save money? Yeah, technically we did. Was it worth the many, many hours of hard work, smashed fingers, cuts, and mystery bruises? Eh…no. Could we have devoted that time to other projects that we could actually finish (and finish well)? Absolutely. Which leads me to our next cliched phrase:

“Sometimes you need to spend money to make money.”

Um, yeah. It’s worth it to spend a bit of money for something that saves you a lot of time, so you can devote that time to something that brings in *more* value. For me, that would be a living room with baseboards installed before the holiday season. For a small business owner, that would be things that bring in more money.

So if you’re asking, “How much is your time worth?”, let’s look at two key areas: automation and sharing.

Automation

From a Data Specialist’s perspective, if it helps you to automate your processes, it’s worth the investment. Not only will it save you LOADS of time on various tasks, it’ll help you avoid errors. I have spent untold hours correcting human errors throughout my career, and the worst thing about them is that most of them are avoidable. These kinds of errors can easily mean:

• That an item gets left out of an event project
• Inventory gets double booked
• Billing and tax errors occur
• Things don’t get delivered on time
• People do unnecessary work that you then have to pay for

The list goes on. Not only will you save on time in the short term, you’ll save on stress and a good bit of money later down the road. Spend a little extra time during setup to double/triple-check your data, then let the software do the rest.

For event rental pros, if you are using a spreadsheet for managing your inventory, please stop and upgrade to an inventory management software. Manual item tracking has too high of a potential to end in disaster. Copy/paste errors, misreading data, typos, poor ability to communicate with your team, simply forgetting to update something— just no. We are in 2020, you should have a software that not only allows you to track and manage your inventory, but also allows you to communicate with your crew. Bonus points if it helps you delegate to your team and set reminders to keep all of you on track.

Another great automated time saver that’s worth it to spend on is client billing management. Find a software that allows you to create invoices and bill your clients within the same program. If it also allows you to set up payment reminders, well, even better! That’s less time you’ll be spending calling you clients about payments. Ideally, it will also tie into your bookkeeping software (please tell me you use a bookkeeping software!) too.

Sharing

Sharing is caring, y’all.

Sharing is also more important than ever with so many people working remotely or on the go. How much time do you lose per day digging for the right file? Those minutes add up. Look for something that lets you store an assortment of files in a shared location, separated by event.

You likely don’t just need shared documents, but also a shared calendar. Having a shared calendar, like being able to issue tasks to your team, will help you stay on target for your events. Everyone on your team will be involved and know what is happening, when.

Earlier, I mentioned having your billing management software also tie into your bookkeeping software— integrations are key. Switching back and forth between systems to input information is not ideal, especially when it comes to financial information. Having a software that ports right in will save you time, but also a lot of headache! Even more bonus points if your payment processing software integrates into the mix too— the less you have to touch, the better!

Put it all together

By now you’re probably wondering when I’ll mention our software— we are an event rental software company, after all— and the answer is: right now. I’m not going to try to slip any hints in here today. All of these time savers, automations, file storage, integrations, sharing— Goodshuffle Pro does that and more. We work hard to understand what events professionals need from their software, and we work to make it happen. This isn’t a multidisciplinary software that does a bunch of things, but only does them “okay”— we’re dedicated to our user base of event professionals and creating a software that works specifically for that industry. Saving you time and stress is a priority for us.

Can Goodshuffle Pro be your key to spending money to make money? Our clients think so. Why not sign up for a demo and find out for yourself.

So how much is your time worth? Figure out what to charge, but there’s no set amount.

• Gusto says a safe starting point is 30% of your net income
• 50% of profits
• See what others with your job title are paid
• What do you *need* to make?