Better Without Bosses?

[nemorathwald]

Maybe some situations would be better without managers, but not necessarily Better Without Bosses. Most of us are better off if we look to "hire" a boss to do things that, frankly, most people are bad at, and don't want to do. A boss exists to reliably transform your work into your money, and take part of it for the service. This is better than doing a lot of work and getting little or nothing in return.

A boss task:	Be your own boss but don't possess boss skills:
Figure out what people would pay for.	Hope against hope that there is a market for your skills by themselves, not incorporated into some larger product.
Figure out who can do that work well and would actually get it done.	Hire a freelancer who never actually completes the job; or squabble over whether the result is worth paying for.
Tell the world your work exists and persuade them to choose it.	Have no clients.
Find out who has both the need and the money.	Get clients who could only pay you a fraction of your rate.
Make the client pay what they owe.	Spend time nagging for your invoices to be fulfilled, time that would be better spent using your skills to earn more money.

From the outside, these tasks look like magic, as if only certain mages can perform the incomprehensible rituals to channel the eldritch forces outside the ken of mortals. If you can do all that for yourself successfully, and not die of boredom, then you're better without bosses. If what you really want to do with your time is to do work and not worry about getting paid for it, "hire" a boss to provide you with that brokering service.

Comments

[matt-arnold.livejournal.com]

I hear a disagreement between you and them. Are you saying "no, one has to do these things one's self"? They say you don't have to, but as you have said, you yourself have not contracted with freelancers.

Also, so far as I can tell, you didn't start out by trying to figure out whether a sustainable number of people want to buy ceramic beads. You started with ceramic beads as a given, didn't you?

[earthenwood.livejournal.com]

a disagreement with me and who? I agree with what Jer said, especially that one cannot sustain being a one person show for very long and that outsourcing is probably a good idea for growth and sanity.

I am saying that *I* had to do these things for myself, but that it is probably not really the ideal situation. I am at the point of starting to want to seek out people who will be able to help me now. Does that make more sense?

I do think that while a Boss does not necessarily need to do everything themselves, they should at least know how to do the tasks in question, and know when and how to let go of those tasks and outsource when it would be more efficient. That's where I am at now.

Hmm, did I start as ceramic beads as a given. I suppose I did, in a way. I knew that I wanted to be an artist, and so much more of my time has spent on the business stuff (marketing, accounting, blah blah blah) trying to figure out HOW to do it, and finding the people to sustain it, than actually making art.

[matt-arnold.livejournal.com]

That makes your position more clear. Thank you.