In Princeton

Flew to the US on Thursday for a day of meetings with clients on Friday. I have more meetings with other clients early next week before flying back to London on Tuesday night. Because the meetings on this trip are really ‘prospecting’ rather than delivery, and because they’re all with different clients, there’s no one for me to on-charge my accommodation expenses. This puts me on the horns of a freelancer’s dilemma: where do I stay for the weekend?

I’m trying to build a client base in the North America without having to relocate here, so I’m always minimising the perception that I’m not US-based. There are so many suppliers to my industry that are located here that, to many Americans, using a foreign supplier is just a whole lot of extra hassle.

Never mind that my consulting offering is unique or that these meetings have all been driven by pre-sales of my book; I never forget that the easiest way for a company to rationalise not using me is that I live a transatlantic flight away. I’m also mindful of the fact that I am a solo operator servicing huge companies and that most of their other suppliers are commensurately huge.

So whenever I’m working in the US, I actively try to minimise the perception that I’m a one-man-band working out of England. I’ll never lie about either fact but there’s no point in rubbing anyone’s nose in this, is there?

Hotel choice presents a specific challenge. I can’t put myself in a situation where that most innocuous of corporate conversation-starters, “Where are you staying?” is a something I’m dreading. Being UK-based I can’t go home for the weekend but if the client finds out that I’m booked into the local Howard Johnson’s then maybe its yet another reminder that I’m not McKinsey & Co.

In the past I’ve gone ahead and staying at the cheapest place available yet it always turns out to be false economy. Cheap means noisy. It means less security so I’m always worried about my laptop (or carrying with me everywhere). It means no Internet or gym. Cheap means that I get no work done over a weekend in a strange city where I don’t really want to be. Cheap means that I get to the end of my stay feeling like Willy Loman from Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman.

In other words, staying in a cheap hotel means that I’ll get to Monday wishing that I wasn’t self-employed.

My rule of thumb is that I should have essentially the same level of physical comfort and convenience as I have at home – no more, no less.

I opted for the Marriott that I know the client uses for off-site meetings.