Well, wish me luck!

[BTM]

Last week I had an interview with a fellow who runs a web design business.  He said he wanted me to work with him designing web sites on Mondays and Wednesdays so he asked me to come by Monday morning at 9am and work for a bit.  From what I understand, he's going to give me a "test" web page to do, to kind see what I come up with and then we'll see from there whether or not he wants to hire me. 

Hopefully, I'll do okay.. my main concern is that I may not know all the technical stuff he wants right now and would rather just hire someone else with more experience than wait for me to learn. 

Course, I guess in truth that's not my only concern though... not really sure how to explain it but... I'm a bit concerned.  You see, I meet this guy at his office at a hair salon.  He said he owned the entire building and had an office upstairs (I didn't get to see the office though.)  He also said he worked with (or maybe for, can't recall) a company that had a branch in St Louis, and even mentioned that there might be an opening there down the road. 

I don't know, I guess part of me is bit worried that... well, the whole thing might be some kind of scam.  You see, years ago I worked as an assistant for a guy who laid carpet tile and vinyl for about a month and a half and, long story short, only got paid a hundred dollars.  Turns out I wasn't the first person he did this to.  I should have quit a weeks into the job but I had just moved to Illinois (back in with my parents) and was desperate for work and he was dangling the whole "I own several apartment buildings in this area and could use a super for one of them" carrot in my face, and my parents were all, "Do a good job Mike!  You need the work!"

Back to the present, the whole about him saying he owns the building, and the mentioning a possible position in St Louis, it cant' help but remind me of the other situation.  Plus, I have to wonder what happened to all the other people who applied for this position.  Surely, I couldn't have been the only one.  Had to have been others (some probably with more experience and knowledge than me), why am I not in competition for the job with someone else? 

Maybe I'm just being paranoid, but I just can't help but be a bit cautious. 

Or maybe it's not that.. maybe it's something else.  I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure the fellow is gay.  Just something about his mannerisms, and he's got this really weird, hi-pitched voice that just seems completely out of place on someone who looks like he's in his mid forties.  I'd like to think I'm not homophobic, but fact is I really haven't hung around with a lot of gay people (that I know about anyway), so maybe some of this "caution" I'm feeling is just me being uncomfortable and blaming it on that.

I don't know... I'll just you know, keep an open mind.  As a "just in case" I'm going to send off an email to my mom, telling her what's going on (well, not everything, just you know, where I'll be and stuff.)  And I'm going to try and pin him down on some specifics about his company.  (I should have asked for a business card... dang it!)

Didn't mention whether or not I'd be getting any money for the two "trial" days, will have to bring that up to.  Problem is, I'm not, by nature, a pushy person (tend to be more pushed than pushy...) 

Just hoping everything's legit and this works out to be something.

[Ash]

I would recommend getting the guy's full name and the name of his organization and Googling them.
If he has a shady past, you might be able to dig up some dirt on him...if there is any.
I would also find out the name of that company in St. Louis he worked for and see if they'll give you any info on him.  They probably won't, but it doesn't hurt to ty.

A little online detective work can go a long way if you know where to look.

Good luck!   

[Jack]

Good luck Mike, should be very interesting    I agree with Ash, a little online detective work might help - if the guy's running some sort of scam you might find out about it.

[Rev. Powell]

Good luck, BTM, I hope the guy is legit.  I think you're right to be suspicious in this case.  But, lets hope for the best.

[BTM]

Well, I think it went pretty well.  I'll be going back Wednesday to work some more.  Fellow was pretty friendly, turns he does own the salon, in fact, that's his main occupation, he does like hair styling and various other things.  As I worked, he talked a lot about his job and things he's done around the world (admittedly, he's not the most modest person, but I can see why one would be proud of the whole traveling the world thing and whatnot.)  

I spent most of the work period (there three hours, had to work that night at my other job, so I couldn't stay too long), trying to help out a website that he had done for a company up in Missouri.  The the spa belonged to a lady who was a good friend of his, so we were trying to figure out how to get rid of a bad review of the it on google (he said the woman who left was nuts).  I didn't know of anyway to outright get rid of it, so we registered his email in several sites that do reviews and I dictated a review from him for the site.  

After that, we spent some time trying to get his scanner to work (couldn't figure out what the problem was with that one.)  Eventually, though, I had to leave so he said he'd just fax them from home (or something like that.)

Guy paid me in cash for that day (nine an hour), without me even asking about it.  I asked him earlier if I got hired how I would be paid, and he asked me how I wanted to be paid, cash or just set up with a paycheck with taxes taking out and everything.  I said I wasn't sure about cash, because, although it sounded good, I had a situation were I worked for some guy who I worked for and he never got around to paying me.  And he said, "Well, that's stupid!  I'd pay every week here!"  

Anyway, we didn't any web designing, we're going to do that next week.  So, so far so good, hopefully this will lead to a job with more hours.  He said he was willing to work around my other schedule, and I told him I'm willing to cut back hours at my other job to work here more.  He said he'd wait and see how much he'd have.  Told me there's a lot of people in the area who seem to want sites but he only had so much time to spare with the salon and other things.

My impressions: he did look busy.  Had several phone calls while I was working, talking to various people.  While I was there I saw a lot of stuff for various businesses he was involved with one way or another.  Didn't seem to be hurting for money either, so I think his claim of owning the building is most likely correct.  

So, yeah, I'm being cautiously optimistic.  Still need to see if I know all the technical stuff he wants (or at least, can learn it quick enough.)  When it comes to web design, I'm a bit lacking in stuff like building sites in Flash and PHP scripts and whatnot.  (Been trying to learn a bit on my own though.)

Like I said, hopefully this will pan out.

Thanks for everyone who wished me luck!

[Mofo Rising]

Well, I wouldn't worry about the gay aspect. Gay people are still people; in a professional situation it should not matter at all. If it makes you uncomfortable, well, you'll get used to it. In the long run, it does not matter at all what a person's personal orientation is.

Your second post makes it sound like it's more on the up and up (still a little iffy, though). You should follow the essential rule: whatever work you do, make sure you get paid for it. A test page sounds like a good idea, but until you get financial remuneration you should retain all copyright on your work. It would be the easiest thing in the world to get somebody to work for peanuts, take all their work and copy it. Especially in web design. If they don't hire you, all the work you have done should return to you.

If you make that clear, you should be golden. If they agree to that, you should be set. If they don't, you don't want to work there.

You said you don't like confrontation, so don't be confrontational about it. It's just one of your working provisions. Remember, your time is more valuable than money, so spend it valuably. You can find another way to make money, but you can never get time back.

[Paquita]

I'd still be careful if I were you!  Make sure to opt for that crazy "paycheck with taxes taken out and everything".  If he pays you cash, there's no proof that you worked for him and you won't be able to count this job as experience for future tech positions.

The way you described him at first reminded me of Judge Doom from Roger Rabbit. 

[BTM]

Well, I wouldn't worry about the gay aspect. Gay people are still people; in a professional situation it should not matter at all. If it makes you uncomfortable, well, you'll get used to it. In the long run, it does not matter at all what a person's personal orientation is.

Well, like I said, that was just another theory I was tossing out about the apprehension I was feeling. 

No clue though if I was right or not, I mean, he is married and has a daughter but, what does that mean these days?  Anyway, you're right though, it doesn't really matter either way. 

Your second post makes it sound like it's more on the up and up (still a little iffy, though). You should follow the essential rule: whatever work you do, make sure you get paid for it. A test page sounds like a good idea, but until you get financial remuneration you should retain all copyright on your work. It would be the easiest thing in the world to get somebody to work for peanuts, take all their work and copy it. Especially in web design. If they don't hire you, all the work you have done should return to you.

Well, I see what you're saying, but I think for the most part he's going to be doing most of the creative decisions and I'm going to just be plugging in the data and stuff.  In his own words, he's the one with the artistic vision and ability to make things look wonderful (like I said, modesty isn't a strong suit here.)

[Rev. Powell]

Sounds like it may be on the up-and-up, so that's good.  I think Paquita is right, going the paycheck route is preferable.  If you're working for cash (under-the-table) you're taking the risk of getting burned if he suddenly decides not to pay you one day, because there's no paper trail proving you worked for him. 

One thing you could do to protect yourself in that situation if he refuses to put you on the payroll is to work as an independent contractor---keep your own records of your time, invoice him for the work you do, and report your taxes to the IRS on Schedule C at the end of the year.