Jason Cohen, founder of WP Engine, talked a bit about this when he interviewed[1] for Mixergy: Yeah. I’m a big fan of, I think Don Mershaw[SP] was the first pe

Jason Cohen, founder of WP Engine, talked a bit about this when he interviewed[1] for Mixergy: Yeah. I’m a big fan of, I think Don Mershaw[SP] was the first person that told me this, but he said a founder needs to value his time at $1000/hour ... Which he justifies: So, what if you had a consulting customer that said, “I’ll pay you $200/hour but there’s only a one fifths chance that I’ll actually pay you.” Now, what hourly rate would you quote? Now you’d quote more like $1000/hour, because you probably won’t get paid, but if you do you need to be paid disproportionately high to account for the fact that you took on the risk. That’s exactly what’s happening in a start up, and that’s exactly why it needs to be $1000/hour. [1] http://mixergy.com/jason-cohen-wpengine-interview-2/ http://mixergy.com/jason-cohen-wpengine-interview-2/