From the course: Consulting Professional Weekly Tips
Work product vs. intellectual property
From the course: Consulting Professional Weekly Tips
Work product vs. intellectual property
- You need to understand the difference between work product and owned intellectual property. Work product is anything you produce specifically for the client. They own it after the project. You have no right to it unless that's specified in the contract. Your intellectual property remains yours to use on other projects as long as you protect it in the contract as preexisting work, or define it as something you can use going forward after the client engagement. Understand the differences between these two, work product and owned intellectual property. If you don't, you could lose the rights to some of your most valuable assets. For example, for my firm, we teach leadership training courses. We specify in our contracts that the content from our training courses is our preexisting intellectual property, and none of those rights are going to transfer to the client. We also do some limited consulting work. We've done work for one client where we wrote their strategic plan. That strategic plan was work product. The client owned all rights to it after the engagement and we had no rights to any of that content after the engagement ended. Here are a few ways that you can protect your intellectual property. Put preexisting intellectual property clauses in your contract. Insist that those clauses are in the contract or you won't sign the agreement. Mark all of your intellectual property as proprietary, every single page of it. Specifically call out intellectual property in your contract. For these courses, when I teach a course based on our intellectual property, the contract I have specifies that we retain the rights to that IP. Apply for copyright protection. Talk to an attorney who understands copyrights and intellectual property to find out how to protect yours. You need to understand how to protect your intellectual property and prevent it from becoming work product. Your IP is one of the most valuable assets you have. Protect it at every turn.
Contents
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Differentiating your consulting business2m 9s
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Staying connected with clients1m 52s
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Scaling up from individual to team1m 55s
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Pricing matters2m 9s
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Sell the services, not the person2m 22s
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Document discipline2m 32s
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Staying on top of current trends1m 27s
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See every interaction as an opportunity2m
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Pick partners carefully2m 3s
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Take time off2m 15s
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Use partnership agreements2m 36s
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Join loyalty programs2m 21s
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The power of blogging1m 45s
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Picking a salesperson1m 44s
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Writing a book or white paper1m 34s
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Selling to big companies when you're new1m 43s
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Overcoming new vendor requirements1m 43s
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Getting to the decision maker1m 21s
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Set up a tax reserve account1m 33s
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Sales tip: Hey, I'm in the neighborhood1m 48s
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How to set pricing for hourly work1m 51s
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Serving a past employer as an SME1m 28s
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Create a standard proposal1m 38s
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Respecting copyrights2m 36s
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Compensating salespeople1m 58s
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Work product vs. intellectual property2m 19s
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Be a Connector1m 53s
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Build referral relationships2m 30s
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Roll back to different relationships1m 32s
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Make time for sales2m 16s
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Maintaining your brand2m 33s
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Protect client confidentiality1m 29s
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Find mentors and advisors2m 21s
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Poaching client employees or customers2m 5s
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How to set pricing for a project2m 7s
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Attending networking events1m 53s
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Stay away from buzzwords1m 49s
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Use a standard services agreement1m 50s
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Beware of RFPs2m
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Keeping control of a meeting3m 12s
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Know when a project is about to end1m 22s
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The challenge of working from home1m 52s
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Expanding opportunities versus zero-sum1m 55s
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Manage your calendar rigorously2m 13s
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Let clients have good ideas1m 33s
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Challenge your team2m 25s
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Don't be a coworking jerk1m 40s
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Get paid for scope changes1m 46s
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To join or not join professional groups1m 56s
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Saving for your future in the USA1m 20s
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Will you do implementation?1m 38s
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A lifestyle vs. a legacy1m 39s
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