Value-Based Fees, 3rd Edition

Ethics and Fees, Fees and Ethics: A Mid-Book Practicum

Since the first two editions of this book were published and more and more practitioners and firms have adopted value-based fees, I've received thousands of inquiries about ethical considerations. These are encouraging, since they are well thought through and very well intentioned. I've summarized the most frequently asked questions here. Since I believe ethics are a central issue of our work, I thought it would be appropriate to place this in the middle of the revised book.

• Q: Can I charge different fees for the same work to different clients or even within the same client organization?
• A: You can and you should. Value-based fees are based on the value being delivered to the client. Let's suppose you are using a common coaching methodology without any change at all (although that's rare; we'll use an extreme for our example), with two different people:

The first is a call center manager with 10 subordinates, no direct budget responsibility, and call content dealing with general inquiries for directions and basic technical problems. The goal is to improve her talents for providing employee feedback and reducing average call response time. The annual improvement is estimated at about $100,000 and higher morale.

The second is a vice president of sales with 150 people in the operation and a sales goal of $24 million. She has a budget of $4 million, and the goals are to improve her ability to retain and develop top talent. ...