My 4 Hours

I just wanted to share a website I recently found. Not sure why I haven’t found it sooner.

It is a great site for those of you who haven’t outsourced before and just want to take a spin without investing more than… well 5 US$.

The site is Fiverr. All tasks cost 5 bucks.

Some examples:

I will setup a wordpress blog for you for $5
I will invite my 5000 facebook friend on your fan page for $5
I will research your legal issue and provide you 5 cases on point for $5
I will record an excellent, professional voiceover for you for $5

(notice: the offers were there when I created the post, they may not be there when you read this, they are just examples of what to expect).

I compiled this list to look back on the last two years of outsourcing.

Though I have outsourced for longer than that it has been much more strategic after I read the 4 hour workweek. I thought that it was long overdue to take a look on some of the stuff learned and try and sum it up.

• It is hard to motivate people sitting on the other side of the world. Therefore it’s better to choose tasks that do not require people to go through hoops and jumps to complete.
• Trying out new ideas is alot easier when you don’t have to do everything yourself
• Even though there are alot of people providing outsourcing services, you need to search alot to find the right people who are both professional and competent.
• People from India cannot do wedesign (I know I’m insulting like a billion people here, but in my research I have only found one I really wanted to hire). It could also be that we just have a different design style here in Denmark.
• Process is everything. If you can define a great process for working with your outsourced team, you are half the way. A clearly defined process gets you fewer questions from your team. This leads on to…
• Task description is also everything . Remember that if the person doing the work does not understand a task, it is not his fault. It is yours for not describing it well enough.
• Outsourcing really don’t have to be that hard. Just start small and scale up as you go along
• There is never a perfect time for starting with outsourcing, and yes you can probably do the task better yourself. But start today anyway.
• Surprise… full time employers need to be motivated in order to do a great job.
• Once you’ve found a couple of freelancers/companies you like working with, you probably want to go back to them again and again. Finding good people takes a while so if something works, don’t fix it

Hope it helps you in your own ventures…

Guest blogger: Kristian Holte of www.simplylaw.dk and Project Getaway

I’m happy to be given the chance of presenting a truly geographically independent project. This project has been 100 % shaped in accordance with core 4-Hour Workweek (4HWW)-principles. Allow me to introduce … Project Getaway.

Project Getaway is a camp for online entrepreneurs taking place in exotic locations all over the world. The first Getaway takes place in Bali this autumn and lasts for 6 weeks. 10 highly skilled and diverse online entrepreneurs will get together, work on existing as well as new projects and enjoy the paradise-like surroundings. I predict that the atmosphere is going to blow off the roof.

We have rented a luxury mansion fully equipped with staff (including chef), three pools and a 5-min walk to the beach. For me personally the living costs won’t exceed my current (I live in Denmark) and I expect actually making money by going. Tim would have liked that, huh? We are actually putting a video together as we speak inviting Tim to join us in Bali. Let’s see if we’ll get past his PA J

We already have a number of sponsors attached and are currently working to attract more. There’s a fantastic energy surrounding the project. Our website and introduction video have already stirred up some serious viral buzz without any special promotion. But then again, would you need other promotion than looking at these pictures?

We will document all our experiences via video, blogs, social media etc. This Getaway will serve as a model for the future Getaways.

Please comment and let me know what you think of Project Getaway. Personally, I’m already in love.

Kristian Holte - www.projectgetaway.net

I’ve recently spend alot of time doing workshops and coaching on the 4-Hour Workweek principles, and I wanted to put it a bit into system. So I have launched a Danish page called 4-Timers Arbejdsuge (yes, it means the 4-Hour Workweek in Danish).

On the site you can also find a Beginners Guide to Outsourcing, unfortunately this is also in Danish, I might consider translating it at some point. So all my Danish readers you can head over to the new site and get a free:

Outsourcing kursus

This blog will still be in English

I’ve recently had an idea that I feel that I must try to implement. It is a “software as a service” (saas) solution in a market I cannot comment on just yet (as we have only just started production). Because I really don’t like sitting and coding all night long (I am currently working with a client in normal business hours), I have hired a full time Ruby on Rails developer in Indonesia.

Actually I tried finding someone in the Philippines, but couldn’t find one with enough rails experience, and with only one developer I really needed someone who could spit our ruby code without having me to slow them down.

Because of the time difference I really need someone who can work independently, and hopefully I have found this person. Right now I think it looks really good (except that the developer’s internet connection has been down for a few days). I am using Basecamp for tracking the project and insists on daily emails stating what the developer did yesterday and what is planned for “today”. In the email I also want to know if there is anything stopping the developer from doing a certain task.

Currently I am considering if I should give the developer a more “official” contract (before we have just agreed on conditions over email, if someone wants to screw you there is not much a contract can do about that anyway).

Well, I’ll keep you posted when I have something to show for…

It has been quite for a little too long, sorry for that. I am in my 6 month period where I work (I work 6 months per year and have 6 other months where I can work on own ideas, have some vacation with my family, educate myself etc.), and I have had a lot of my own ideas that I i have wanted to pursue at the same time.

So… What have I been up to? Well I am proud to say that according to my lifestyle design, my girlfiend and I have bought a second home in Hua Hin, Thailand.

The plan is to spend 3-4 months i Thailand each year just enjoying eachother and our little princess. Most of the ideas I work on can be done anywhere there is an Internet connection, so why not in some nice wheather, great food, wonderful people. Thailand is an extremely cheap country to live in, and we can live cheaper their even when someone else is cooking, cleaning, washing etc. for us. Geo arbitrage is great!

And we’re gonna live in style. The house has 3 bedrooms (each with own toilet/bath), private pool and even a maids room, so we can have friends visiting. It is brand new, so we’re currently getting a kitchen, curtains and aircon installed.

So consider this inspiration to how to organize your life. The only challenge we now have is how to convince my girlfriends job to let her work “from home” 3-4 months per year. But we’ll work hard on solving it

With the low interest we’re currently having you’d be amazed on how cheap this is. Hmm… Perhaps I should develop an info product about the whole buying experience?!

Up until now I have been using Xoom.com for transferring funds to my Filippino workers. But apparently Xoom.com does not want my money, because they are now raising the minimum amount to 50$ (which is ok), but as this blog post suggests, they are also now only accepting US bank accounts and US credit cards.

Damn… Anyone know of any similar services that can be used instead? And isn’t a bit silly that they do now want my money (it typically cost me 10$ per transaction).

So as you might have seen in my last post (Lifestyle Design Coach in the making), I have created a 4-Hour Workweek Forum for exchanging ideas and questions.

Now the problem is with all forums that start up is that noone wants to be part of a forum with no other users. So how should I go about this? How do you bootstrap a forum?

Should I create some initial content myself? Currently this is pretty much the only solution I can find? But any other ideas?

Notice that I will answer questions in there myself, so if you need a good kick in the onions or just som inspiration I will be happy to help you.

4-Hour Workweek workshop

Those of you following me on Twitter know that I have started creating a 4-Hour Workweek workshop.

I held the first module about “Definition” yesterday (the first of four modules following the book’s DEAL model).

The goal of the workshop is to get others hooked on the idea and to inspire them to take action. Hopefully they also have a few good ideas for muses they can create themselves.

The idea is to give one module per month lasting 2 hours. This way I will end up with one full day workshop once all the modules have been created. By splitting it up into smaller modules makes it easier for me to grasp rather than creating one big monster workshop. By doing four smaller workshops over four months also makes it easier for me to adjust the content and structure as I learn what works and what doesn’t.

Well yesterday I hopefully inspired five people to start their journey towards a 4-hour workweek. I have chosen a small group to begin with but the workshop is going to work well with bigger groups.

Lifestyle Design Coach

My goal with this is to become what you might call “Lifestyle Design Coach”. This is just a title I’ve made up but it pretty much covers helping people live their ideal lifestyle using the 4HWW techniques.

I know that the word “coach” is way overused, but I just think that it sounded nice.

A small teaser

Besides this workshop I have also done a new 4-Hour Workweek forum that I am launching soon. There is still some minor issues but if you are interested you can find it here: http://the4houracademy.com/forum.html

and…

I am soon going to reveal one of my dreams that I have reached.

Live your dreams…

Want to start on the 4-hour work week but do not know where to start? Well I have compiled a short list that you can take action on immediately.

1 – Outsource tomorrow

Go out and find a VA. Don’t know any tasks you can outsource? That does not matter. This is an exercise in delegating. My first task was to book an appointment with my hairdresser (over Skyper using my Google Calendar).

2 – Check mail twice a day

Check your mail only fifteen minutes before going to lunch and fifteen minutes before you go home. By timeboxing your email checking, it takes less time and allows you to focus more on getting the important things done.

3 – Go on a low information diet

4 – Find inspiration

Read one article from Timothy Ferriss’ blog or view a video with Tim per day. This is great for inspiration and keeps you motivated.

5 – Brainstorm business ideas

Think passive income (a Muse). You should be able to remove yourself from the organization chart once everything is up and running. This could be in the info product category or similar.

6 – Describe your dreams and set a price tag on it

7 – Get a mentor to help you

Getting a mentor can help you with commitments. When you openly commit yourself to a goal, people tend to hold you up against it.

8 – Try getting a “work from home” day each week

If you are an employee try getting one day per week where you can work from home (read up on the strategies in the 4 hour workweek book).

9 – Start to plan a “mini-retirement”

Plan a mini-retirement of at least 2-3 months. This can also serve as a goal for your 4-hour progress

10 – Continue to read this blog

Shamless self plug. Living the 4-hour workweek is a process, and we share the road. Good luck.