I received an email this week --actually I have received dozens of the same email over the years-- that said the following:

I read an article online about healthy conflict of yours and wondered if you could offer any low cost suggestions on some training we could provide at our company about healthy conflict? We have introduced Open Book Management about 6 months ago and we have encountered some problems where some folks get offended by employees raising questions and others get out of hand with fingerpointing and blame. We want to encourage healthy conflict and feel we need to train and foster a culture that invites it. Any ideas on how to provide this training at a low cost?

To read the article that my correspondent read, click here.

First, allow me to translate the crux of this request: "I want free advice..."

Second, let me tell you why the Latin phrase "caveat emptor" is part of our everyday vernacular: It's unassailably spot-on.

Nothing we get for free is valuable --from T-shirts to advice. We only value what we work for or sacrifice to obtain. Sigmund Freud said as much in a paper he wrote roughly 100 years ago, titled "Why the fee?" His answer: To ensure that patients (of his) would be invested in the work of psychoanalysis, not take it for granted, and not sleepwalk through the process.

I often adjust fees for clients who cannot afford my "standard" rate. What I do not do, however, is give free advice. It won't help.

If something is important, be willing to work for it. This principle, by the way, is why both the U.S. Military and college fraternities have initiations: So newbies will value the organization they say they want to be a part of. If their commitment is authentic, they'll endure the hazing. If you want my advice, be willing to pay the price.

EgoDoc