Reviews Of Freelancers

This is a post I posted to a thread, & I thought it was soo good, I decided to start tips or independent contractors.

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Geeze, I just seem to be hip hoping around on here tonight LOL

I totally get what you are saying & I respect that, but listen to what I have to say being a buyer…

1. I reject 90% of all providers for ONE reason, they DON’T read the hiring ad & follow simple instructions, so to base my rejection behavior on your next decision isn’t fair to me & other buyers who do the same thing.
2. I know I’m rare, but I tell everyone if I’m not interested, & I’ll even tell them why.

I may not be soft & cuddly about it, but I feel it’s better to be straight forward, than to disrespect the person & just disappear. Also I feel it’s a great learning tool a sharp IC can learn from.

The nasty ones don’t care b/c they don’t want to learn from their mistakes, they just blame others.

Some thank me for my kindness, others flame me & it starts a problem.

The ONLY 2 reasons I won’t tell a person I’m not interested is the following:

a) I end up hiring someone & I get sooo caught up in the work (part of a problem being a very small company, I wear many hats), I don’t have the time to notify everyone.

Now this generally only happens when I post a hiring ad on CL, but it’s happened on bidding sites too, & there have been many times when the project has expired & I still don’t have anyone to fill the position.

b) I used to tell everyone via e-mail why I wouldn’t even go to the next stage in the screening process, but now I just delete b/c I no longer have the energy or the time & if they are that disrespectful, then I shouldn’t waste my time.

I am forced to do this here b/c I have to make a decision on some bidding sites. Others just allow you to delete.

If it’s an ethical professional company, don’t think for one minute the hiring process is easy for them.

Just to hire one position costs me

a) around 3-6 hours of typing time via e-mail, the interview, & reading over their initial response. I don’t read resumes, I feel they are a waste of time.
b) another 30-60 minutes checking references
c) screening any samples they may be required to give

So the energy to do all of this, not to mention the time it takes me to do that when I could be doing other tasks is very taxing.

One last thing to keep in mind if you haven’t already figured this out, small companies don’t have an HR department like mid to large companies do, so it’s usually either the owner or an assistant who does the hiring process & that makes it very stressful, b/c technically an experienced person should be handling that one task, & the owner or assistant is juggling that task & all the other work they have to do.

If you ever have doubts, try hiring just one position for about a week.

Put the shoe on the other foot & see how it feels, you may start to have a newfound respect for certain companies : )

Thank you for listening

Michelle

P.S. I liked my response sooo much, I’m going to put it on my blog : )