A client came to me recently with a question I hear more than almost any other.
"How do I price this?"
He had over 20 years of experience in senior roles at major companies. Pivotal decisions and big budgets were familiar to him. He knew his field better than almost anyone in it.
When it came to putting a number on his advisory work, he froze and defaulted to an hourly rate.
It's a very common pricing mistake among executives who go out on their own.
For your entire career, someone else set the price of your time. Your salary, your bonus, and your compensation package were all arranged for you. You were never asked to price yourself. You were just asked to perform.
That changes the moment you go independent.
If you don't adapt, you'll spend your advisory career undercharging for work that's worth far more than any hourly rate could reflect.
Forget hourly rates
The first thing we did was stop talking about hours altogether.
When you charge this way, you're telling a client that your value is measured in time.
That's not what you're actually selling. You're helping a company fix a multi-million-dollar problem. You're giving them clarity to make decisions they've been struggling with for months.
Instead of asking, "How many hours will this take?" the right question is "What is this worth to them?"
Anchor your pricing to the value of the problem being solved, not the time it takes you to solve it.
Packaging
Once the framing is right, the next step is building a clear, premium offer around it.
For this client, we landed on a $10,000 per month retainer with a three-month commitment. This included:
→ A weekly strategy call.
→ On-call access for key decisions.
→ A review of critical documents before they went live.
This way, there are no complicated tiers or hourly tracking, or invoicing for every email. Just a defined relationship with a clear value, and a client who knows exactly what they're getting and what it costs.
The retainer model works for advisory because it mirrors the way the relationship actually functions.
The retainer buys them access to your judgment, not a block of your calendar.
Hold your nerve
After we put the retainer together, the hesitation was: "But what if some months are lighter?"
That's the employee mindset talking.
When you were on a salary, lighter weeks felt like you were getting away with something. In advisory, a quiet month isn't a problem, it's the nature of the work. Some months are heavy, some are calm.
Remember that the client is paying for the certainty that when the hard moment arrives, you'll be there.
Advisory is a completely different model, and it requires a distinct way of thinking about your own worth. You've spent decades solving problems that most people can't even see coming. That's not an hourly service, and it should be priced accordingly.
If this is something you're working through right now, hit reply. I'd love to hear where you're stuck.
Melina
Curious? Visit my website here.
113 Cherry St. #92768, Seattle, WA 98104
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