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I’ve tried and failed to write other entries, but with such an ugly situation weighing upon my head I can’t, at least not until I write these entries.
Beginning in early 2007, I worked with a company which sells items of a sexual nature*. Initially I wrote reviews for them, then later I also began providing “expert help” to site users. The site owner during this period was quite generous to me, allowing me to write about expensive products as well as listening to my feedback on the site and their many excellent programs.
In August of this year, he asked if I’d be interested in taking on more tasks for the company: namely, in providing PR for them and in helping them develop a brand-new blog. I made sure that the owner was clear that my formal education was in the areas of literature, education and the sciences, NOT in marketing. I was under the impression that the main reasons he chose me were because of my many connections in the blogger world and because I’ve got a reputation as a dependable, honest person.
He offered to pay me a straight salary for my work, but I refused. I explained that my working hours were often limited by other tasks (such as writing, taking care of children, grocery shopping, breathing and showering) and that I’d be much more comfortable with an hourly rate as well as a limit of approximately 15 hours of work per week. He agreed, then suggested a rate of pay that was, to my mind, quite satisfactory.
I asked him how he’d like me to keep track of my hours. We settled on a Google Spreadsheet that we’d both have access to; in it I listed dates, tasks, and number of hours completed.
After my first pay period, the site owner was happy enough with my work that he gave me a pricey product as a bonus and increased my hourly pay by a third. I was working far more hours than I’d anticipated, but I found it to be absolutely exhilarating to make beneficial connections between the site and people who could spread the word about the good things we did.
Because of the geographic distance between the company’s main office and my…er…kitchen table, the boss and I communicated solely via IM and email. My IM program logs every conversation and I save email religiously. This was important to me because I could refer back to our oft-times fast-paced IM conversations later, when I was working on my own.
I did not do my work perfectly. I am not trained in the art of SEO, and I readily admit that I made mistakes. In the beginning, my boss gently pointed out my errors and provided written instructions on how to do better. In every possible case, I corrected the mistakes on my own time, without billing additional hours to my employer.
But soon, gentle corrections were a thing of the past, and our working relationship took a difficult turn.
Continue to Part Two
——
*While I’m choosing not to link to them in this post, I’m guessing that regular readers know the company in question quite well, as I’ve written for and about them so extensively in the past. Thank you to Jack from WritingDirty.com for providing an appropriate antomyn with the suggestion of “Nod: Then Cain went out from the presence of the LORD, and settled in the land of Nod, east of Eden.”
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