Ever wonder why your freelancers are hypersensitive to changes in explicit agreements about payment, deadlines, or, really, anything? There’s a good reason for their mistrust. Too many companies try to take advantage of them.
It happened to me recently. I was solicited to write for a nationwide Web site. There were several red flags, the reddest of which was that during the recruiting/vetting process—during which I spoke to at least five people of increasing seniority in the organization—nobody would show me a contract. That’s only available after the whole startup process, when you’re ready to post your first item, when you can read it and click OK.
So I wrote two short posts, got ready, logged on, saw the agreement—as usual, a long document visible through a tiny window. I printed it out and read it. It explicitly noted that no payments would be made; that if the Web site decides to establish a paying relationship, it will require a separate agreement.
Of course I didn’t start writing for them. But I know at least one person who’s doing it, who accepted the document without reading it, was promised payments and hasn’t received any. I suspect that more than a few people did this.
In fact, just about any freelancer you hire can tell you a story like this. But on the other side of the coin, if you treat your skittish freelancers fairly, making your expectations explicit and paying on time, they will stick with you, because they know what a mean world it can be.
