"Will they be using me more than I'm using them?"
A screening question for making decisions, e.g., how to decide what invitations/jobs/offers to accept
"Will they be using me more than I'm using them?" If the answer is yes, decline.
"Using them" includes:
money/pay
gaining new ideas for oneself
advancing your own work
gaining benefit for those around you
An important sub-case of making decisions: How much should I be charging for in-person speaking?
Short answer (from RG): $5,000 minimum.
Addendum to short answer (from RG): If asking $5,000+ makes you nervous, start at $1,000 or $2,500
Longer answers
RG: You can calculate your hourly rate at your main job. Add up the number of hours you'd spend for the speaking engagement: preparation, travel time, recovery time, etc., in addition to time at the event. Multiply by your hourly rate by total number of hours. (This amount is in addition to the host paying for your travel and lodging/food. Covering travel and accommodations should be a given.)
TMC: Get on a speaker planning committee (WRR:... to see how the sausage is made)
All agree: Once you see behind the scenes, you will witness the huge inequities in whom is paid what:
"There are so many boring White men giving boring boilerplate talks and requesting (and receiving!) **SO** much money." RG, TMC, and DM have all seen this and emphasized how audacious it is: there's so much money being spent on speaking engagements, and there is so little correlation between the quality of talk/draw of the speaker vs. the amount of money speakers are receiving.
A story to demonstrate the open boldness of the devaluation of, for example, Black women speakers. TMC was once on a speaker committee where a Black woman's name was floated as a speaker. There was a lot of excitement about the speaker. Someone offered, "Oh, let's invite for Black History Month instead: then we don't have to pay her." And that's what they did!!! They didn't consider her for the main series! (And this is the origin story of TMC not scheduling speaking engagements in February.)
DM: She knows that she underprices herself for speaking engagements. But, all of us humans have our stuff. For now, it is what it is. She does use her status to push for inclusion of types of people often overlooked for high-profile speaking engagements.
Working with others who are (or should be) there to support your creative work
Nurture relationships with the professionals (editorial, marketing, etc.) there to support publication of your work
"People work harder [for you] when your face is in their minds" (TMC)
Ask for something concrete, like a marketing plan
Talk to them a lot to stay on their radar
What if you're not getting the support you need, e.g,, not being understood?
Try 1.5 or 2 times to explain yourself then MOVE ON (in the spirit of, "Stop wasting my time and energy.")
We shouldn't exhaust ourselves trying to be understood
TMC tells an illustrative story of an editorial/marketing person digging in on the idea that Tressie should change the title of "Thick." :-O TMC ended that particular working relationship.