The Badmouther is one of many lowlifes you’ll meet in your freelance
adventures. Learn how to handle them, and in a way that doesn’t reflect
poorly on you.
Despite the pressed suits and crisp shirts, the business world is a dirty
place. Whether it’s the
or the sadistic manager, sooner or later you’ll run into someone whom
you’ll wish you hadn’t.
One such unsavory character is the Badmouther. These people try to pin
their shortcomings on you. The real pros do this when you’re long gone and
thus can’t defend yourself. Badmouthers may be managers, coworkers, or
even people you meet in other departments at the site client.
The game of Blame The Guy Who’s No Longer Here is bad enough on its own;
but for freelancers it does the extra damage of souring your professional
reputation. That impacts your ability to attract repeat business and new
clients.
Liars often have their excuses cooked up in advance and hope to catch you
off-guard with wacky claims. We all know this game: the person who looks
stunned and can’t answer questions is usually assumed guilty. The best way
to fight a liar, then, is to have concrete evidence in your defense.
Four words: Get It In Writing.
Certainly, you’ll sign a contract and/or statement of work on your way in;
but there are smaller things — day-to-day tasks or sub-projects — that
you’ll likely receive verbally. Do yourself a favor and ask for an
e-mail “reminder.” Anyone who refuses to put their request in
(sort of) written form is likely to change their story later. Watch out.
Those reminder e-mails are but a portion of your evidence kit. Enhance it
by taking notes at meetings. Offer to be the secretary
and e-mail the minutes out to everyone when the meeting’s over. This gives
everyone involved a chance to make sure you’re all on the same page, and
inhibits any person’s ability to “change history” a few weeks or months
from now when that meeting is long forgotten.
E-mails are also useful for tracking client satisfaction. If you’re on a
long-term contract, ask your client for regular status
reports. Take special note of any kudos you receive. These
comprise the freelancer equivalent of the employee review, and will come
back to bite anyone who later claims you did a poor job.
Be sure to get a (handwritten) sign-off on a timesheet
before you send an invoice. A manager can’t claim you’ve fudged an
invoice if they’ve already signed off on the billable time.
For greater defense in the eyes of a billing dispute, keep a
(private) record of how you spend your billed time. Your invoices
aren’t enough: they merely have terse line items, and if you’re on a
revolving-door and/or staff-augmentation assignment, those line items
aren’t too descriptive. You’ll have to be able to further explain
“technical consulting services” a few weeks or months from now, when
everyone else has forgotten.
Maintaining an evidence kit is not unlike an insurance policy. Chances are
you’ll never cash in on it; but when you do, you’ll be glad you took the
time to put it together. As an added bonus, you don’t have to get involved
in petty my-word-versus-yours debates, which further tarnish your
professionalism. You can quietly present the (documented) facts and let
them speak for you.