The recent goings-on, regarding the missed opportunity over my “slagging off of clients”, agent ignorance and the whole idea of having a “reputation”, inspired me to write this post.
By the way, the same agency (but not the same agent) that brought the issue to my attention saw my last post, and followed up with
what’s that about?
That statement and the accompanying attitude pretty much sums up what I see as the general problem with employment. All I’m going to say is, if people can’t be bothered to read, I can’t be bothered to elaborate.
Anyway…
Almost everyone looking for work these days have to rely on references: assurances from previous clients that we are competent at our jobs. A good reference often wins hands down against years of experience in the field.
I got to thinking after working for (as opposed to working with) a previous client: if they can give freelancers feedback on their performance in the way of references, why not provide the clients themselves with feedback on their performance?
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Unfortunately, I’ve managed to screw up yet again.
Apparently I was on the verge of securing some work, but the client discovered this here weblog… and changed their mind. What’s particularly disturbing is that it’s probably not the first time it’s happened – but it’s certainly the first time I’ve heard of it happening to me personally.
The main point of contention as that I “slagged my previous clients off” in this weblog, and the potential client as worried that I was going to do it to them. Fair enough point – I wouldn’t want it happening to me (although it probably is.)
Even if I didn’t mention who each client was, me complaining about things probably gives me the public image of being a bitter person.
I will, however, defend myself on two counts.
The first count: although most of the posts I’ve made on here have been about bad experiences, I’m also just as eager to talk about good experiences. I might have made it sound all doom and gloom, but there has been some good.
I had the opportunity to work with a very good client several weeks ago, for example: they were serious about their work and were certainly the most amiable people I’ve worked with in a long time. None of the issues I’ve posted about, such as the high school work environment, appear to apply to them.
There have also been other clients and previous employees whom, although they weren’t perfect, did do some things incredibly well. Despite their many shortcomings, one particular client made sure I was fed during a particularly hard period.
The second count: purely from a personal standpoint, I think it says something about someone if they run away just because they see something they don’t like.
Given the fact that most of my posts are about social issues and not about jobs or clients, whomever was looking at this weblog could have looked at any of my posts and decided to be offended, to the point where they chose not to hire me.
But seriously, it also makes me wonder whether they were planning on doing any of the things I mentioned and addressed. (Remember: if you do it you condone it, and vice versa.)
I’ve been forced to look in the mirror a lot, and frankly it makes me sick that people in general don’t want to do it themselves. I know when I’ve done wrong and messed up, and at the end of the day I take responsibility for all of my actions and the outcomes of those actions. I shot myself in the foot by linking to this weblog from my site, but I’ve taken action to prevent it from happening again.
Let’s be honest: how many people can truthfully say they do the same?
The eighth and final way that people can be part of the problem is also arguably the most prevalent:
A lack of thinking
There’s been an ever-increasing trend for releasing new technology, or introducing new procedures and methods, that were touted as efficient, “smart” and easy to use. The idea was that, if you use these things, your life will be made a lot easier and you’ll have more time to do the things you really want to do.
You might have heard it said many times before: although these things were meant to make your life easier, they end up taking up more resources – especially valuable time – leaving us having with more work to do in less time, with higher expectations. All of a sudden, sacrificing your weekend to complete a project is no longer a “big thing”.
These “smarter” technologies have also had another effect: they’ve encouraged people to rely less on doing anything for themselves. More to the point, technology has eroded the requirement to actually think about what they’re doing.
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Have you ever been in conflict with someone, and they’ve used that conflict to complain, bitch or moan about something entirely unrelated to the conflict?
It’s as if they were waiting for an excuse to get it off their chest, but they didn’t want to bring it up because they wanted to appear like they were the “innocent” party.
I’ll bet you have. I’ll bet you’ve known at least one person who has done this to you, and I’ll also bet (and hope) that your relationship with this So-Called Positive Person has changed as a result.
This is what I call chain-complaining: finding an excuse to start an argument, and then using that argument to create another one.
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One of the reasons for going back to freelancing, instead of remaining an employee and a slave, was the idea of taking control back over my life. I would be able to take time off of working whenever I wanted (that is, deciding when and if I work), so I could spend more time doing other things, and I would be able to pick and choose the kind of work I would be doing. The idea was to live life on my own terms.
On Thursday this week, after experiencing an incredibly rough week on the job, I hastily decided to terminate a contract, on the grounds that I was being made a scapegoat for the client’s apparent lack of planning and organisation. It wasn’t a decision made lightly; I gave them every opportunity to prove that they could manage properly. I even did my best to adapt to the situation, and questioned myself as to whether I was being unreasonable, or if there were things that could have been done better.
I don’t want to say it, but it has to be said: what I experienced when I stood up and raised the issue amounted to blackmail.
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