Trying to shift the entire economy through your own efforts.

A dynamic that came up recently in my small group coaching, has to do with facing the reality that a tiny business can’t adopt pricing meant for a really large audience. For instance, there are folks out there who can charge $100 for a course, or less, and because their audience reach is huge, they’ll get 1000 participants, and generate $100,000 like that.

But, for most solo or micro businesses, that isn’t the case, and the pricing needs to be more sustainable, what is normally called “boutique” pricing, where you are charging more so that you can be supported at the numbers you will get.

There can be a lot of grief that can arise around that, at how unjust our culture is, at how many people are impoverished and can’t access the support they need. It’s all very painful.

And there are definitely ways that we can mitigate that, by making some of our resources free, by having a reasonable number of lower priced or pro bono slots.

But in your journey with this, I want to make a very strong point here.

Capitalism has always, always depended on free labor for it’s so-called success. In the extreme version, that included enslaved peoples, or forced prison labor. It includes excluding women from jobs with the expectation that they will provide free childcare. It includes the extreme low wages in industries where the majority of workers are women or people of color. And that when the demographics shift, the pay goes up.

I mention all of this, because we have been taught all of this unconsciously. I want you to really hear this next point.

You cannot make up for wide-ranging and long-lasting systemic injustices on your own, individual efforts. You underpricing your services, over-giving, or following business models and practices that were developed to be unsustainably profitable for larger companies, is going to do damage to you.

It will do damage to your physical health, to your mental health, and to your business’ sustainability.

We cannot shift the ravages of this economic system by continuing to do what the system has always asked of so many of us: to give free labor to make up for it’s unwillingness to care for people.

I know that we in the United States have a particularly miserable safety net, and that it’s not as extreme in other countries. And yet I don’t think there are any paradises out there, that this still applies, even when the damage is gentler.

I am not advocating, of course, that you swing the pendulum far in the other direction, charging unsustainably high prices.

What I am suggesting is all of these things:

• Grief for those left out
• Create businesses that can sustain us in the reality that is, knowing that most solo and micro businesses only serve small numbers.
• As it’s possible and sustainable, making free resources and a limited, limited, number of low price/pro-bono slots available, without hurting yourself.
• Once you’ve developed a stronger business, strategically, thoughtfully, heart-fully plan on how you can give more, offer more to those in need, without creating a situation that is dangerous for you or your family.

There is so much beauty, and  the gifts you’ve been given are so abundant within you. We all need you to thrive in the long term.

My client came to the conclusion that she loves to write, and that writing is a way that she can give her gifts to her audience, to pursue her dream of writing a book. Not only is it her dream, not only does she love writing, but a book is a relatively affordable way to make her gifts accessible to people.

That’s  not everyone’s answer, but it’s an example of the kind of pathway that can open up when there is room for grief, when we have a commitment to care for ourselves and not do what the economy has always demanded we do, and then listen deeply.

When you grieve and listen deeply, what do you find in your heart?

With love,
Mark Silver, M.Div.
Heart of Business, Inc.
Every act of business can be an act of love.

p.s. next course coming, coaching spots open.

I thought I’d mention that our next 9-week course, priced at pay from the heart, will be opening for registration, probably tomorrow! Details coming soon.

And, if you are beyond taking courses, at least right now, and your business is already functioning… but not as well as you would like… I have just two openings in small group coaching.

The fit is important- it has to be the right person for the already in-flow group. You can be assured I’d rather leave the spot open than put the wrong person in. We’ll both be seeing if it’s a fit.

Details here: Small Group Coaching