How I priced my services with zero clients and zero data

When I launched AnchorPoint Rising, LLC, I had 20+ years of federal executive experience, a clear sense of the value I could deliver, and absolutely no idea what to charge.

I did what most people do: researched the market, looked at comparable rates, and almost underpriced myself out of the gate.

What the “transition guides” and various “support” groups don't cover is the instinct to be "reasonable" and not seem like you're asking too much.  That's usually just imposter syndrome wearing a blazer.   And for people coming out of senior government roles, it runs deep.

The GS scale did the thinking for us

In federal service, your worth is codified. There's a pay table, a grade, a step and your title does a lot of the talking. When someone asks what you do, you can say "I'm an SES" or "I ran a $400 million program" and the institutional weight of that lands without you having to explain it.

Walking away from that structure is disorienting in ways nobody warns you about.

I knew what I'd managed, including multi-million-dollar portfolios, complex regulatory environments, teams under real pressure, and decisions with real consequences.  The kind of work that takes decades to learn to do well, and even longer to learn to do well.

But standing outside that structure, with no letterhead, no grade level, and no agency acronym to anchor the number, I had to price the expertise itself. Separate from the institution that had been validating it for two decades.  That's a different skill entirely.

The question I was asking was the wrong one

Most pricing advice for new consultants goes something like: look at what others charge, consider your experience level, pick a number in that range.

That approach has a problem. It anchors your value to what the market has already decided, which is often based on people who undersold themselves first.

I kept asking, "What should I charge per hour?" And I kept second-guessing whatever answer I landed on.

What finally shifted my thinking is that I stopped asking "what should I charge per hour" and started asking "what does this problem cost the organization if nobody solves it?" That reframe changes everything.

A nonprofit running on disconnected financial systems, with no one who can translate the numbers to the board, isn't just inefficient. They're making budget decisions on bad information and they're at risk of audit findings. They're one leadership transition away from a compliance crisis they won't see coming.

What does that cost? I bet it’s a lot more than a consulting engagement.

When you price from that angle, you're not justifying your hourly rate. You're helping a client understand the cost of inaction.

What I actually did (and what I'd tell someone starting now)

I didn't have a client to point to. I didn't have a case study or a testimonial. What I had was a track record of solving hard problems in high-stakes environments, and a clear picture of the specific pain points I could address.

A few things that actually helped:

Audit your body of work, not your title. Go back through the last ten years and list the specific problems you solved, not your responsibilities. Look at the actual before-and-after, and what was broken, what you did, what changed. That inventory becomes the foundation for how you talk about your value, and it will surprise you.

Get granular about who you serve. The more specific you can get about the type of organization, the stage they're in, and the problem they're sitting on, the easier it is to price with confidence. Vague positioning leads to vague pricing. "I help nonprofits" is harder to price than "I help nonprofits under $5M who are scaling into government contracts and don't have the financial infrastructure to support that growth yet."

Price the problem, not the hours. This one takes practice. But when you lead with the cost of the problem rather than the cost of your time, conversations go differently. Clients stop comparing you to a cheaper option and start thinking about whether they can afford not to fix it.

Don't start with your highest-ticket offer. I built a low-stakes entry point on purpose: a diagnostic engagement that gives a client real, actionable insight with a defined scope and a defined outcome. It lowers the barrier to saying yes. And it gives both of us a chance to see how we work together before a longer commitment.

The identity piece nobody talks about

Pricing is practical, but underneath the practical question, there's usually an identity question.

For people who spent careers in public service, asking to be paid well for something can feel like it conflicts with the reason you went into that work in the first place. Service isn't supposed to be about money. You stayed in government when you could have gone private. You took the harder path.

That story can quietly hold your prices down.

Here's what I've come to believe - charging well for this work is not in conflict with being mission-driven. The organizations I serve are trying to sustain themselves. They need infrastructure, financial clarity, and strategic leadership. If I can provide that, and if I undercharge to the point where I can't sustain my own business, I'm not helping more people. I'm just burning out on a discount.  Pricing your expertise appropriately is part of the work.

Where I landed

I don't publish a single rate because the work varies. A focused diagnostic engagement looks different from ongoing fractional CFO support, which looks different from a strategic turnaround for an organization in real trouble.

What I do is price based on scope, stakes, and what the engagement actually needs to accomplish. This is not based on what feels safe to ask.

Getting there took some unlearning. The number that used to feel like too much is often closer to the right one.

If you're in the middle of this transition, the pricing uncertainty is normal. It doesn't mean you don't know your value. It usually means you haven't yet disconnected your value from the institution that used to name it for you.

That's learnable. It just takes a little longer than the other parts.

AnchorPoint Rising provides fractional CFO and COO services for nonprofits and government-adjacent organizations. If you're trying to figure out whether your organization needs that kind of support, start with a conversation.