aka The Picasso Paradox
Picasso was walking through the market one day when a woman approached him.
She pulled out a piece of paper and said, “Mr. Picasso, I am a fan of your work. Please, could you do a little drawing for me?”
Picasso smiled and quickly drew a small, but beautiful piece of art on the paper. He handed it back to her. “That will be one million dollars.”
“But Mr. Picasso,” the woman protested, “It only took you thirty seconds to draw this little masterpiece.”
“My good woman,” Picasso smiled, “It took me thirty years to draw that masterpiece in thirty seconds.”
Imagine you come home from work one day and find yourself locked out of your apartment.
You call a locksmith to help you get in.
A junior locksmith arrives and gets to work. He seems quite new to this. After an hour of work, he manages to pick the lock and get through the door.
“That’ll be $100,” he says. You happily pay him the fee, satisfied with the significant effort and ultimate outcome.
A year later, you find yourself once again locked out. This time, you’ve got the number saved in your phone. You call the locksmith, who quickly arrives at your door.
But this time around, he’s clearly quite seasoned. The year of experience has done wonders.
Within two minutes, he picks the lock and gets you inside.
“That’ll be $100,” he says.
You frown, confused and annoyed by the steep fee.
“But it only took two minutes,” you argue.
He stares blankly at you. You pay the fee, frustrated, and walk inside.
The output of the two scenarios was the same, but your perception of the value of that output changed based on the input required to achieve it.
We overemphasize input over output. We have a tendency to undervalue something because of the low visible input required to create it, despite the output being exactly what we requested or required.
- Focus on the value the customer receives, not how long it took to create that value 1
- Challenge: Need trust foundation
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Whenever you can, separate time from your service pricing and charge based on deliverables. ⌃
