My Guitar Teacher and His Time Value

Since June 2008 I have started taking guitar lesson every Saturday. My teacher Mr. S is 24 years old, very talented in playing guitar and in teaching. He is always calm and patient and never gets angry.

26 years ago I also learnt playing guitar in Germany for one year and then stopped, since I was too busy with the study. When I think back, that time Mr. S was even not born. Now, he had learnt playing guitar well, had become a teacher with around 100 students. Time changes everything.

Mr. S has a regular job at the government institution. I could never figure out what he is doing there. My impression is though that the job must be boring, because he gives 40 hours of guitar lessons per week in addition to his regular job. He does it well and has fun obviously.

As a guitar teacher he works for a music school. Since the demand for leaning guitar is growing recently (talking about recession), he was asked to teach additional students. Because it is impossible for him to spend more time, he came to me und asked if I would be willing to take a large class instead of one on one lessons, so he can add more students.

The deal is structured like this. I would pay only half the price and would stay double the time with him. So the price per hour would be only one fourth. It sounds a good deal for me. He will take up to 8 students in the large class, so the total income for the school as well as for him per hour would be also doubled. This is a truly win-win situation.

The moral of the story: there is a limit of how much time you can work per week, even for a talented and ambitions Chinese like Mr. S. If you want to get more done, you have to increase the time value.