No, You Can't Pick My Brain [NOOK Book]

What started as a blog post on Forbes.com in March 2011, launched a worldwide conversation for weeks after. That conversation has been reignited in 2012 and people are more heated than ever.

Many service professionals have no idea how to assign value to their knowledge and most don’t know exactly how or where to draw the line between free friendly advice and fee based consultations. They find themselves being taken advantage of by people looking to get maximum information for no cost. Some people will say you have to give away a lot of free to earn paying clients. But I say that’s the quickest way to train people to expect to always get free stuff from you.

It’s time to teach people where the boundaries are and how to value our expertise.

In No, You Can’t Pick My Brain, It Costs Too Much, author Adrienne Graham gives practical advice on determining your value and enforcing your rules to stop the brain picking. In this book she shows you how to:

* position yourself as (a respected) expert
* differentiate between legitimate requests for advice versus free consulting
* draw the hard line between fee based consultation and free advice, and make it stick
* keep job interviews from turning into surprised brain picking sessions (who hasn’t gone through that before!)
* manage habitual brain pickers
* communicate your message with people so they understand what they get for free and for fee (and be OK with it)
* remove the guilt from charging what your worth
* establish your fees (and get them)
* balance volunteer/philanthropic giving and paying clients
* and more

This book is for anyone who:

* has a service business
* is a service professional
* is always the “go to” man or woman by friends and family members
* is uncomfortable setting fees and rates
* has difficulty saying “no” to people who want to get endless freebies because they feel entitled
* needs to differentiate between consulting and advice
* is tired of being taken advantage of and not compensated
* wants to sincerely balance giving freely and selling

"You’re in business to make money. Some people will tell you this is the wrong attitude, but I tell you it’s the right attitude to help you stay in business. There is nothing wrong with giving free advice to people who genuinely need it or to flex your knowledge in an interview to show you know your stuff. But it’s not OK for someone to keep coming back expecting you to hand them a finished blueprint or do their work for them without any compensation. Your knowledge is valuable. YOU are valuable. Stop letting others take advantage of you. Learn to control how, when and to whom you give free advice to."