[consulting] Established clients seeking technical training.

[Jerad Bitner]

While I can understand your want of job security, if everybody in the
Drupal community took that stance, we would not have the awesome
community we have today.

The community takes more of a "Teach a man to fish..." approach,
rather than, "A plumber wouldn't teach you how to fix the pipes."

In this way, we all become knowledgeable and are able to build on each
other's knowledge. This is a basic difference in 'Open source mindset'
vs. 'proprietary'. You said you use Drupal and so are benefitting
directly form this, so please don't take the opposite approach.

I'm not saying you should teach him if you don't have the interest or
time, but make that your reason rather then you don't think you
_should_ teach him. Teaching is a great way to put yourself in the
'expert' chair to those you're teaching as well, and this can gain you
more respect and clients than trying to keep it all to yourself.

I guess I'm encouraging you to teach your friend, and if he really is
your friend, I don't think you would actually mind doing so. If you're
just looking to make a buck off of him, well you might want to
redefine your relationship a bit. That sounds more like a client
relationship, than friend. Though the two are not inseparable.

Hope that made sense...

On Tue, Nov 17, 2009 at 11:42 AM, Chris Miller
<chris at trailheadinteractive.com> wrote:
> Hello all,
>
> I have a friend employed by an established and profitable client of 3 years,
> that is asking for independent training and instruction on Drupal
> development.  This friend has a few basic technical skills, and dabbles in
> side projects.  We're using Drupal for several projects at said friend's
> job.  I've heard the analogy that "A plumber wouldn't teach you how to fix
> the pipes", and I'm looking for a nice way to say that to my friend.  Has
> anyone else had to deal with this situation?  How did it turn out?
>
> Honestly I have no interest in training anyone to independently do the work
> that puts food on my table.  I've thought about just charging 3x my normal
> rate and milking it.  Is that wrong?
>
> --
>  Chris Miller
>  Trailhead Interactive
>  http://www.trailheadinteractive.com
>  406-750-0107
>
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>



-- 
~Jerad Bitner
CTO ~ Rapid Waters Development
http://rapidwatersdev.com