Forum Moderators: phranque
My sites had become a good amount of tedious work and it was about that time. "That's what employees are for"... is one of the messages I got from this past New Orleans conference hosted by WW.
If you are doing well with Adsense, don't stop. And, don't limit yourself. Good luck, everyone.
let's not beat about the bush, it's basically stealing, isn't it?
Otherwise you're just taking advantage of someone else's time and work, aren't you?
Let me know if I'm missing something, because I haven't yet been presented with a single convincing argument as to why I shouldn't reward someone with at least 85% of the additional value they create on top of the total profit of the company.
Can someone who thinks this plan is objectionable / wrong-headed please indicate why this will herald the collapse of the business or why my competitors will have me for lunch as a consequence?
Broken record time (sorry!). No one can be exploited in a VOLUNTARY system such as every free nation has. Employment is based on a verbal or written contract in which BOTH parties agree to the terms. Employer agrees to pay X and employee agrees to receive X. This is the component your side is ignoring. Now, if employers were lying, promising X and then not providing it, I'd agree 100%. THAT is exploitation. Otherwise, it's an agreement between two consenting parties.
Economics aren't nearly as simple when you get down to the nitty gritty.
If you want to spend all your time hiring (including placing costly ads), dealing with incompetent employees and those who don't work hard, then by all means pay the very least you can get by with while still attracting the bottomfeeders.
I'd much rather have competent people who could make more than minimum wage if they went elsewhere, and for that reason I would pay them a living wage.
Economics can explain this perfectly, but be sure you are taking all the different costs into account. In the end you get what you pay for. (You're not exploiting a lousy worker by paying them minimum wage if they're going to do minimum wage work)
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I think I'm talking about something slightly different, which is how you should treat employees you wish to keep around. It's a symbiotic relationship.
If you're just paying $5/article on a freelance basis, then by all means take them up on it. It won't give you a warm fuzzy feeling (the cash might) but that's a moral issue.
I guess I just have yet to find a freelancer willing to work for $5/hour that could create content I would feel alright putting on my website.
May as well get drunk, turn a tape recorder on, and talk about futures and commodities for a few hours. Unfortunately that drivel might outrank real content.
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After I saw how high the union-recommended rates were after I took on my new freelancer, I had thought I would have to give up any plan of taking on any employees. But, it seems that paying over a long-term using a royalty system I will be able to equal or exceed the rates the NUJ is recommending, while maintaining a sound business model.
I'd much rather have competent people who could make more than minimum wage if they went elsewhere, and for that reason I would pay them a living wage.
I agree. I mentioned in an earlier post that I would pay a highly skilled person much more than $10/article if the topic required advanced knowledge or research skills. But for a basic 300-word article about a commonly understood subject, $10 is actually higher than you could get someone reasonably competent to do it for if you hired them from some of the freelance writing sites.
I'd also mention that farming out work on a piecemeal basis isn't the same as hiring an employee. I'd be far more rigorous in that case, especially if they were doing multiple jobs for me.
I know a cavedude. He pays his employees more than they can get elsewhere.
Why? To keep them, of course. And, because cavedude is happier when he is surrounded by happy and productive people.
But if cavedude paid them 50% of what they 'generate' he'd have to pay them more still. How is that possible? Because as a group, owing to the management skills, industry knowledge and expertise that cavedude injects, his organization is very efficient. Without his knowledge and expertise, and/or the risks he has taken, and/or if they had to go work elsewhere, they'd all be making considerably less than they are now.
In a well run organization, the sum of the parts is far greater than the value of the parts individually.
Group B will talk and think mainly about their security, Bonus, company retirement plan, sick leave policy, extra time off, 80 percent of all non productive personnel, they view their jobs a sort of necessary evil or a compulsory punishment.
Group A they are mostly concerned about their future, wants valuable suggestion for faster progress and growth, they expect chance, eager in learning process and to upgrade their knowledge and skills, knows the time management skills and more thoughtful and concern about their efficiency and productivity and they make suggestion for your business progress.
We should think how to convert the Group B to Group A for existing staff.
However if you are going to hire a new technical person as per the merit of your requirement, you will find it is easy to put him in Group A, subject to that you have selecte him by undergoing rigorous sort of interview process and proper scanning.
Don't overpay or underpay to a person whom you are going to hire.
I think that some of the comments on this thread reveal the lack of experience that some people have in employing others. I currently have 10 employees and it is a royal pain herding them all in a resonably productive direction.
To pay them 85% of the value they generate is absolutely insane.
My background is commission sales, and if there was ever an employment model that directly rewarded the employee for his efforts, that is it. The best compensation I ever heard of in that field was 50% of profits. And that was always filled with disagreements over what the profit was.
I wonder how many of you have employees and for how long? And for those of you who don't, remember that an $8 per hour employee can cause $800/hour in damage. Or more. I know from experience.
Yes, everyone, hire someone to work for you if things are going good! Work together on a project, it's much better than working alone.
My situation is working out perfectly so far. I love hearing "Yes, master[webmaster], I'll get on that right away."!
Think about what all you could accomplish, if only you had some good help... the possiblities are endless....
Just writing a check and sending him a 1099 at the end of the year.
FYI - If your employee/contractor works 40+ hours a week, on site, has no other employers, takes daily direction from you, is paid a set amount per week, etc. then by most government agencies tests such as the IRS and worker's compensation boards I believe he would be considered an employee and not an independent contractor.
The IRS generally uses a 20 question test to determine if your hired help is an employee or contractor:
[buy.uth.tmc.edu...]
If you treat an worker like an independent contractor in cases where state agencies or the IRS would classify him as an employee, and you get audited or your contractor ever tries to file for unemployment insurance, then there is the possibility of significant fines and penalties. These would be for infractions such as not witholding taxes and not having workers' compensation insurance.
FYI - If your employee/contractor works 40+ hours a week, on site, has no other employers, takes daily direction from you, is paid a set amount per week, etc. then by most government agencies tests such as the IRS and worker's compensation boards I believe he would be considered an employee and not an independent contractor.
Sounds familiar... whatever the case is, I'll find out when I go to file this year. He owns his own computer business and has been filing as a business owner for several years now so that might make a difference. Just that, right now, I'm nearly his only client.
My boyfriend was getting very jealous of my computer, I was on it constantly, trying to keep up. He'd get home from work... I was glued to the computer... he'd wake up at 3 AM... I was glued to the computer... If you are in the same boat, you know what I'm talking about.
After a beautiful evening out together, we arrived back at the house and he was looking forward to spending more time with me... I was looking forward to checking my stats...
Long story short... he smashed my computer to bits. I called the police, he went to jail, then I called someone I knew who owned a home computer repair business. I called the number on his business card and he arrived at my home the following morning to survey the damage. He took the parts that looked like they could be saved back to his home office.
At this point, I'm standing in my living room looking around, computer parts everywhere... monitor in the front yard surrounded by broken glass. I decide to leave and head over to the home computer repair shop to see if my hard drives could be saved. Drive C... nothing... dead... unsalvageable. Drive D... contains all my pictures... 95% of the data was able to be saved after some long, tedious work by my future "employeee".
We got to talking and come to find out, his fairly new business wasn't doing so great and he needed some extra work. Also, he had just cleaned out his extra bedroom(or at least was in the process of doing so) and was looking for a roommate. I decided to leave the computer smasher, room with and hire the computer repair guy full time... he now codes for me all day long.
Overall I think the employee should have trained one and expertise on their respective field and it is important that they should take their self initiative.
By organizing internal training program you can be able to put extra skills, situational skills and time management skills to them as they should be familiar with these important factors to increase their individual effectiveness. They should be also familiar with your company goals, your culture and environment.I think such training program is much helpful to motivate them.
