The computer screen glows with a soft blue backdrop. The table with the notepad sits at my left, as does my
landline phone (yes, such contraptions still exist). I’m ready to work…except
there is no work.
Is there any sadder, more pathetic
tableau than an eager worker ready to work with no
work?
The foretold email came
Monday morning. Changes were afoot, we were forewarned from the masters at the
part-time, at-home copyediting job I’ve toiled at for a year. The harshness of
those changes become painfully apparent after reading the email. My hours were
cut, and not just by a little, but a lot.
My hours have fluctuated
from between 18 to 24, an acceptable rate for a part-time job. This time,
however, the cut in hours dropped to a shocking fewer than nine. Egads! Not
only that, the editing queues I was switched to were clearly the dregs with
very little copy to edit, ensuring I wouldn’t even reach that puny limit.
Thinking it may have been a
misprint (yeah, right), I inquired whether those hours were correct. I sent
another email to another supervisor, again asking why my hours were slashed so
dramatically.
The responses I received
were both hurtful and confusing. The one supervisor said the head honcho was
concerned over my “mistakes” (more on that in a bit) and wanted me to improve
my editing before I would be given any more hours.
Yet that very same head
honcho later replied that those hours were the best they could do and that more
editing opportunities may open up in the future. No mention of “mistakes.”
What is going on here?
Let’s first address the
“mistakes.” (Apologies at the onset for what is surely self-serving and
passive-aggressive excuses on my part.) Did I make mistakes? Yes, as does every
copy editor. It’s the nature of the job — you only get noticed when you make a
mistake, never for the numerous times you caught a misspelling or corrected a
wrong fact or rewrote a horrible piece to make it readable.
Some of the mistakes were
legitimate and on me. I misspelled a proper noun. Others classify as more
subjective, and based on the preference of the head honcho. In some instances,
style points were not clearly defined, at least in my mind. I could argue those
points, but to what end?
To what end, too, can I ever
hope to get back in the good graces of the head honcho? I know from painful
past experience, once you get a reputation as a “bad” worker, it’s very
difficult to change that perception (especially when your workload has been
slashed to near nothing. How am I to prove any improvement?). Indeed, it’s
nearly impossible. When I asked the head honcho twice to clarify what he meant
when he told the supervisor about my mistakes, I never received a reply, which
I think is disrespectful.
Yet I’m also getting a
feeling there is more going on here than my mistakes. The head honcho’s first
reply indicated there were cutbacks in assignments from the clients. And the
supervisor also mentioned in a later email that the head honcho was under
pressure from his bosses.
Yet as someone who has been
laid off twice due to corporate budget cuts, I’ve become accustomed to being
jerked around by bosses. None of this surprises me. In fact, the signs started
about six months ago when they outsourced some of the writing responsibilities
to the Philippines. (I kid you not.) Then they pulled out the go-to corporate cheap trick of hiring an intern (aka free labor).
This is merely the logical progression of vicious, zero-sum corporate cost-cutting. What’s next? Robots to write and edit the stories? What happens when those AI marvels make mistakes? Slash their hours? Replace them with a newer technological model?
This is merely the logical progression of vicious, zero-sum corporate cost-cutting. What’s next? Robots to write and edit the stories? What happens when those AI marvels make mistakes? Slash their hours? Replace them with a newer technological model?
I also wonder if the other
copy editors’ hours have been slashed similarly. I thought about asking them,
but thought better of it. It would be intrusive and they are under no
obligation to tell me. Since I was the last one hired, I stood to lose the most hours versus the more senior copy editors. They have seniority.
I wonder as well, why go
through this pretense of stringing me along? Do they want me to quit? If there
is no money to pay me, then lay me off. Or, tell me there is no work right now,
but there may be in two months and I can start up again at that time.
Hey, I’m a part-time 1099
worker for this company. Meaning, I receive no benefits nor do I possess any
employment rights. When an employer wants to rid itself of a full-time
employee, they typically make his or her life miserable in the hopes they will
quit, thereby freeing them of any unemployment payments or severance pay. I
know how this game is played. I’ve been there myself and seen it happen to
co-workers.
But in this instance, that
is not the case. They can let me go without any explanation or payment. Just a
fare-thee-well email. So why jerk me around like this? It’s unnecessary and
frankly, cruel.
Now, I’m thrust back into
that same bad
place I fell into after my two layoffs. One night, as I nestled my head on
my pillow, tears stung my eyes: I’m stupid,
I’m incompetent. I’ll never work again.
What do I tell my family and friends? That I was let go because of my mistakes? Then,
they’ll think I’m stupid and incompetent. I know my sister. If I told her, and
I haven’t yet, she’ll profess sympathy to my face, then cut me to piece in
front of her friends. “Oh, my sister,
what a stupid idiot.” Better to say my hours were cut and leave it at that.
I’m also irritated and
ashamed of myself. I worked hard for this godawful company. I took on extra
work when asked, toiled over the weekends, declined other jobs when offered, all because I felt loyalty
to these bottom-line loving jerks. Ha! I was the jerk, thinking my hard work
and loyalty
would ever be reciprocated. When will I ever learn? Maybe now I have.
This whole distressing incident
underscores how precarious my financial situation is as well. Between this
part-time copy editing job and my content marketing writing duties, I was
pulling down about half of what I made in my previous full-time job. Not flush
by any means, but I was able to pay my bills without dipping (too much) into my
savings. Now? Well, it’s going to be a lot tougher, and I’m not sure I can
survive much longer.
Right now, I don’t know what
my next move is. Right now, the fall chill has descended and my beloved Mets’
mangled season came to a jolting yet fitting end. I need time to think and let
my simmering depression lift. Perhaps my hope of cobbling together two or three part-time jobs is no longer financially viable. Do I try for a full-time job — even though my chances of getting one are pretty much zilch at this point?
For now, I’ll wait a bit to see if
the head honcho comes through on his hint of more editing opportunities and
therefore, more hours.