Increase your value offering and increase your worth

Mark Zuckerberg was offered US$1 billion to sell Facebook. It seemed crazy at the time that he would turn down so much money, but today, Facebook is valued between US$5-15 billion. In the real world we determine the worth of any product based on its ultimate value to us. You pay more for something you consider valuable to you and less for something of less value. This is not being mean to the little guys, it’s just reality. Increasing the value of a product automatically increases its worth.

We understand and agree with this concept when it concerns products and services that we are willing to spend our hard-earned money on. But there is a reservation when it comes to people. Some people are worth R10/hour, while others are worth R1 000/hour or even R10 000/hour. I can hear you protesting about equal rights and equality. While it’s true we’re all equal before the law and before God, our worth in the marketplace is determined by our value to the marketplace.

This means you can increase what you are worth by simply increasing your value. Do you want to be worth more than what you are being paid now? What a dumb question, you might think – but the reality is that many of us simply do not think about increasing our worth at all. We complain about soaring prices, interest rates and unlivable salaries, but we hardly ever see ourselves as the answer. We think that maybe if we change companies or jobs, our situation will change. Many move from company to company only to find they are still worth the same. The only way to change your situation is to change your value to the marketplace/company.

How To Increase Your Value

- Make Your Contribution Stand Out
Your job is an opportunity to contribute a value to your company in excess of your cost. In its simplest terms, your job is as secure as your ability to render value in excess of what it costs to keep you on the payroll. If you want to earn more money at your current job, you have to increase your value, ie your contribution to the enterprise. It’s the same for entrepreneurs – if you want your customers to come back and spend more money on your service or product, simply give them more than they pay for. Your contribution determines your value. If you try to get by with as little as possible, you will also get as little as possible in return.

- Add Value Consistently
I keep my clients for my training and development services by delivering a quality service every time. Every time I am employed to speak, train or facilitate a workshop in a company I make sure what I do adds value to my clients. The consistency of this value-adding automatically leads to me increasing my value to them. Initially, people might complain that you charge too much for your services, but if you continually add value, they start to see your real worth.
How can you add value for your current employer or clients? Find the answer and you’ll see the impact on your bottom line. If you want job security, you must continually work at maintaining and increasing your value in the competitive marketplace.

- Value Yourself First and Others Will Do The Same
We get what we deserve in this world. If you think you deserve little, your contribution and value-add is often little as well and that’s exactly what you get. When you believe that you are worth more, you will find a way of increasing your value, in order to be paid more. If you see yourself as a person of low value, it tends to become a self-fulfilling prophecy but when you value yourself more, others tend to follow suite.