Doing Ronin

Ronin need to understand how much to charge for their services. It may be referred to as “free”lance, but that means your sword/talent is free to be hired, not free to use. Someone on Twitter suggested the term be changed to “charge”lance.    Calculating an hourly billable rate are is essential. An hourly rate is how much $ you burn to survive and hopefully live to charge another day. Guard that close. It is not for your client to know. (Unless of course they will open their accounting to your close scrutiny too.)    Take your burn rate (your fixed and variable cost) per month. Divide by how many days a month you will work. Divide by how many hours in a day you plan to work. Be reasonable as to how much time you think you will work. Example: $3000.00 per month/ 20 days/  5 hours (you won't have 8 productive hours.) That equals your billable rate. $30 bucks an hour in this case.    So, if you are doing a commission for $60 bucks, spend 2 hours or less on it. After that,

In response to various questions, here's a simple sample of what your invoice should say. One from me and one from the internet (credit lost.) You usually will not be paid until you submit your invoice.

“Insist on yourself; never imitate. Your own gift you can present every moment with the cumulative force of a whole life's cultivation; but of the adopted talent of another you have only an extemporaneous half possession. That which each can do best, none but his Maker can teach him.”  —Ralph Waldo Emerson from Self-Reliance .