The value of history (Part 2)

26 February 2015 – Kathy Shinnick

Editor’s note: During the fall of 2013, the NCPH Consultants Committee distributed a survey to the NCPH consultants community in order to learn more about the community’s members and how best to serve them.  This piece is part of a series examining the results of that survey. 

Last year on this blog, I engaged in an ongoing discussion about how public history consultants determine the value of our work. I proposed that we would benefit from establishing fee standards across the discipline, ideally creating space in the market for consultants to make a living while improving the value of historical work in public spaces. This post came in response to a working group at the 2012 NCPH (National Council on Public History) annual meeting in which independent consultants discussed the need to communicate fee trends while the firms voiced their desire to keep their fees confidential. We all left with a general concept of how to help those who want to band together but not a clear understanding of how to accomplish that goal.

Chart showing public history consultants’ fee scale varying by years of experience. Credit: Kathy Shinnick

As a step towards this end, the NCPH Consultants Committee conducted a survey, which, in part, asked consultants to anonymously divulge information about their fees. The survey was intended to determine trends by cross-referencing the fee scale with categories such as education level, region, and years of experience. For example, we should be able to assess the going rate for consultants in the Southeast who have a PhD and ten years of experience. Due to a somewhat small sample size of 148 consultants, the results leave a few unanswered questions. However, they also reveal a lot that can guide us to the next step.

For the most part, firms have essentially established an industry standard. A significant majority of consultants (67%) at large firms have worked in the public history field for at least ten years and most of them charge in roughly the same higher range, between $80 and $135 per hour[i]. Presumably, these firms have leveled their fee and experience standards to reflect market demands and limits. Cross-referencing all of this data with regional work locations reveals very little variation.

Meanwhile, data amongst the independent consultants varies quite considerably. Overall, the independent fee scales are quite different. Ten percent of these consultants charge $105 to $135 per hour, 17% charge $80 to$105, 25% charge $50 to $75, and 22% charge $20 to $45. However, trends are revealed when fees are cross-referenced with experience. As a general trend, those with 0 to 3 years of experience (40%) charge in the lowest fee range or only charge project fees, while those with 4 to 9 years of experience (20%) mostly charge fees in the mid ranges, $50 to $105. Perhaps the most intriguing statistic comes from the 37% of respondents with ten or more years of experience. Their fees are actually quite evenly distributed between the top three fee categories. This data suggests that those with the least amount of experience either cannot yet demand or are not willing to ask for employers to pay a higher fee, whereas those with the most experience are either willing to ask or more able to demand the higher fees.

Chart showing public history consultants’ fee scale varying by education level. Credit: Kathy Shinnick

When cross-referenced with education levels, the data is quite diverse amongst the categories and does not help us determine trends. This suggests that experience, instead of education level, plays a much larger role in determining the value of a consultant’s work. This may help us answer a long-standing question amongst public history consultants about whether or not a PhD is necessary for our work. With that being said, this data is slightly skewed due to the way the question was phrased, as most respondents chose all of the education levels that applied instead of only their highest level of education. Cross-referencing this data with region uncovered very little new information. Additionally, almost all of the respondents indicated that they work in multiple regions or all over the country, which may make it difficult to determine the going rate for any one region unless the survey questions were repositioned to find that specific data.

The end result is that we now know general hourly fees based on education level and experience, but lingering, perhaps unanswerable, questions remain. Firms appear to have a fairly established fee structure, required experience levels, and consistent work to match these standards, as more than 90% of them reported working full time. Additionally, slightly more experienced independent consultants are apparently also filling a need within the market and are able to find work that will pay mid-ranged to higher priced fees. However, large numbers of independent consultants are still working part-time (70%), but we are not exactly sure why. Additionally, we do not know how many projects exist on the market, what types of organizations are willing to pay more versus those who are forced to pay in the lower brackets, how independent consultants determine their fees, and if years of experience affects the employer’s willingness to pay a higher fee.

Finding the answers to these questions could involve a much more in-depth survey, but at the very least we can start with what we do know. The Consultants Committee can begin disseminating more basic information in a structured, informative format. New consultants could likely stand to benefit from this guidance the most. More than 40% of the independent consultants reported 0-3 years of experience, demonstrating growth in our field that is likely also contributing to an average lower overall fee scale. As I stated in the previous post, as long as any of us are willing to consistently work for $20 per hour, it devalues the field for those who are trying to negotiate fees in the upper ranges. If we can all help guide new consultants toward an industry baseline, it stands to reason that we would all benefit. We still need more specific data in order to make that statement with complete confidence, but the trend is clear. To this end, the Consultants Committee is considering disseminating a suggested fee structure and will continue to evaluate data in order to do so effectively.

This much is evident, we have only just begun the conversation.

What are your thoughts?

What else would you like to know from this survey?

And how do you think we at the Consultants Committee can best assist you with this information?

~ Kathy Shinnick is an independent public historian. Her work focuses on exhibitions, museum education, and historical research and writing with a specialty in sites of commemorative including war, politics, and sports. Her blog, Playing for Keeps  explores the intersection of sports and public history.

[i] This upper register is based on survey question and answer data and does not propose a fee cap.