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By: Cleotis
Date: 9/10/98 7:35:36 PM
# Replies: 19
What a letdown...
I've got a good friend who knows about everything there is to know about how the net works. I depended on him to do the things that I couldn't do when it comes to web site design.
6 weeks ago, we left a project in his lap. I found out a few days ago that he hasn't even touched it. Needless to say, I'm now short one client. They'll probably never come back, and I don't blame them.
The worst part about it is that I have such an incredible amount of faith in this guy - plus he's my friend. Nonetheless, I'm left with no other choice. I have to find another Perl stud to be on my freelance team.
It would probably only start out as a few hundred bucks here and there, but we're getting close to a web design gig that would involve lots of database stuff. It would easily net the Perl Monkey 5 figures over a couple of months.
Whoever I find would have to have a day job. This would just be a here and there thing when we needed backup, and when I reach the end of my technical knowhow. Strictly part-time on a per-job contract basis.
Anyone here up to the task?
(sorry, Fang. It's gotta work on a Linux box)
Response #1
By: Homer The Brave
Date: 9/11/98 2:13:52 AM
Sounds like a perfect excuse to learn Perl.
:-)
Response #2
By: Cleotis
Date: 9/16/98 10:06:24 PM
Do, Homer. Do!
I'll even let you use your Mac as long as it works in the end! :-)
Response #3
By: Homer The Brave
Date: 9/16/98 11:40:36 PM
Didja know there's an implementation of MacPerl? You can use it with any number of ultra-secure Mac-based web servers.
Just so ya know... :-)
Atcherly, I dipped into Perl a bit in the past. Maybe I'll get a teach-yourself-to-be-incredibly-talented-in-30-days book and send you a resume.
Response #4
By: rorschach
Date: 9/17/98 7:36:14 PM
lt the tap dancing begin......
Response #5
By: Cleotis
Date: 9/22/98 10:25:19 PM
More bad news.
Not to trouble everyone with my woes, but...
I had a friend of mine doing sales for me. I gave her a fat percentage (and I do mean FAT) of each job because she needed the money. I also told her nearly a year ago that if her billings each month reached a certain level (a very high, almost unattainable level) that I'd give her 1/3 of my company.
Very generous, I believe.
If course, if she had actually attained my goal for her, then she would have earned it.
Anyway, I've had a bad feeling about this for months. So, a few days ago, I leveled with her and told her I had decided to retract my ownership offer, although everything else would stay the same.
Now she's pissed.
To make matters worse, she's also my largest CLIENT. We met because she hires me to do work for the company she's employed for full-time. So now, not only have I possibly screwed myself out of all the potential sales she might bring in on her own, I stand to lose any business I do with the company she's employed for full time. This will all add up to the tune of about $40k per year - maybe more.
All because I changed my mind. I didn't want to be "partners" with her. I wanted my business to stay mine.
Perhaps I should hever never offered it in the first place, but since I did, I would have felt even worse had she started to get close to her sales goal. If she got close and I dropped the no-ownership bomb then, it would have been far worse than telling her I changed my mind now - when she was nowhere near her goal.
I'm bigtime depressed. Just 4 weeks ago, my development schedule was jam packed to the point of having to turn work away. Now, it's almost empty. A few little things here and there.
Let me sulk for awhile. I'll pull out of it later, I guess. This kinda hurts.
Response #6
By: The Sorcerer
Date: 9/23/98 2:40:59 AM
Cleotis Sez:
----------------------
I also told her nearly a year ago that if her billings each month reached a certain level (a very high, almost unattainable
level) that I'd give her 1/3 of my company.
Very generous, I believe.
If course, if she had actually attained my goal for her, then she would have earned it.
Anyway, I've had a bad feeling about this for months. So, a few days ago, I leveled with her and told her I had decided to
retract my ownership offer, although everything else would stay the same.
Now she's pissed.
--------------------------
I hate to say this, but were I in her shoes I might be pissed too. Granted you had no legal binding agreement (I'm assuming here) so she can't really hold you to anything, but still...bad form. If you make those kinds of promises to people you have to be prepared to deal with the consequences of them taking you at your word.
Sorc'(Rev)
When you made the offer were to totally and completely sincere?
Response #7
By: Ralf
Date: 9/23/98 11:44:40 AM
Hmmmm. I'd say you have every right to retract the offer BUT you also have to deal with the fallout, which you are. Seems like a fair deal, cosmic-balance-wise.
What I'm confused about is why you brought it up NOW? Either (A) she hits the goal and you have to deal with it then, or (B) she never makes it and the topic never comes up.
So what event forced your hand and made you retract the offer NOW?
Response #8
By: Cleotis
Date: 9/24/98 9:02:27 PM
What brought it up now? Well, I had been feeling uneasy about it for quite some time, so I let it ride - for several months.
Then, I took a "personal inventory". I felt that my life was getting out of balance in too many areas, and that I needed to act. I needed to start eating right, start exrcising more, start spending more time with my kids, stop working so much, and start reading my Bible more diligently than I have been. All these things are the "right" thing to do, and since I was on a roll.....
Mainly, I wanted her intrusiveness out of my hair. I wanted to strip her of her posessiveness of the company. She would often make statements like "we need to get this" - when it was MY money that would be being spent. It just got a little old.
Plus, when I decided for sure to retract my ownership offer (which there was never a time-frame placed on in the beginning), I couldn't very well let her keep working towards a goal that I knew I'd never give her. If her incentive was ownership, and I knew inside that I would never give that to her, it would not have been right to let her continue working towards that end, I felt.
Basically, I finalized my gut feeling and felt that I had to tell her so that she wouldn't be chasing a nonexistent carrot.
On the bright side, it seems to have all worked out. She got a job offer in another state which she is seriously considering. That, compounded with the fact that she's on thin ice at her full-time job, seems to indicate that a change is in store.
Today, we hashed it all out. I spilled my guts about my frustration with her, she understood and apologized, and we hugged and made up. Now, she's back to selling just like she always was, and my contract with the firm she works for fulltime is safe once again (assuming that I can bid competitively for a '99 contract).
My depression is over. Whew!
Response #9
By: Homer The Brave
Date: 9/26/98 12:19:05 AM
rock on!
Response #10
By: sooz
Date: 9/26/98 2:43:04 PM
You go, Cleo.
By way of saying "Yeah, I understand": I had a woman working for me who became overly possessive of the company Richie and I had worked really hard to start. She said, after about 2 weeks of employment, that "To make this business successful, Susan, you need to do two things..." I stopped her and explained that the business WAS successful, which was why I had to hire on more people.
This prompted me to send a letter to all employees stating some "ground rules." At any rate, this woman (unlike your friend) wasn't very good at doing why my company does, and ended up moving on to other pursuits, and we didn't part on bad terms, thankfully.
Running a business just sucks sometimes. I hate being the boss.
And best wishes on your other resolutions.
Response #11
By: Ralf
Date: 9/27/98 10:29:06 PM
Speaking of which, I started a business.
Yep, instead of hiring on with The Man, my partner and I have started a software business to sell Environmental Health applications. We have our first contract, with a second on the way. I'm coding like mad, but I've never been happier. 18 hour days are easy when you're working for yourself.
We both agreed to keep it a two-person biz for as long as possible, since we both hate dealing with employee issues like this.
AND.... (you knew it was coming)... I don't have to wear pants to work.
Response #12
By: sooz
Date: 9/28/98 9:12:49 AM
Hi five, Ralf! I'm sitting around in a mumu, alternately working and fooling around, right now. Coffee (my kind, not someone else's) is brewing in the other room. I'm doing a load of laundry.
Yep, this works.
Response #13
By: rorschach
Date: 9/29/98 12:55:33 PM
on the subject of businesses, I am soliciting advice from those who have gone before... I've been getting more and more small side jobs recently and the money, while nowhere NEAR enough for either of us to consider doing it full time, is enough that I really need to get right with the man upstairs, you know, the head of the IRS... anyway, to incorporate costs something like $250, that would give me some measure of immunity from liability, however i could start a sole proprietorship a whole lot cheaper. any advice?
Response #14
By: Ralf
Date: 9/29/98 6:47:22 PM
Sole proprietorship, unless you have liabilities and/or risks.
Example: you can't get into too much trouble coding for dollars. It's extremely rare for software to cause death, dismemberment, or property loss. Those EULA documents are made of teflon for a reason -- your contract should protect you. (You REALLY need to work up a good standard consulting contract if you haven't already.)
However, if you hire an employee who dies in a fiery automobile accident while delivering your software, you can be exposed to some risk from his heirs, and the people he/she killed. Your first employee or large investment is a good time to consider incorporation.
That's risk. Liabilities would be (for example) if you buy a ton of computer equipment on credit, and then go out of business. Your creditors can try to collect from YOU if you're a sole proprietorship, whereas a corporation shields you from that. Plus, there are some interesting tax games a corporation can play that a proprietorship can't. It's also a hassle filing quarterly; a proprietorship lets you file taxes annually, as if it's personal income.
Of course, you can sue anybody for anything in this country, so there's no protection against somebody using the legal system to harrass you -- regardless of whether you're incorporated or not.
((DISCLAIMER: I'm an idiot. Don't believe a word I say. Georgia is different than Texas. I don't know what I'm talking about. Seek the advice of an attorney if you're serious. I'm not wearing any pants.))
Response #15
By: rorschach
Date: 9/29/98 8:57:14 PM
i dunno ralf... what happens if you medical database program gets its records screwed up and somebody gets a pennicillin injection when thier chart says they are allergic and they die. sounds like lawsuit fodder to me..... lots of examples of medical code that have caused D&D...
my fear is that if i design something for somebody and there's a product liability claim against it (people do the STUPIDEST THINGS with generally SAFE products...) I could be up a creek unless there's some kind of shield. texas law is relatively similar in gross aspects. there's such a thing as a limited liability partnership here but thats only a partial shield. I do NOT have a good consulting contract cobbled up, probably ought to ask my wife's boss if he has a boilerplate one on the books anywhere i could use, but seeing as how he specialises in real estate law i dunno if he's such a good person to ask... although he gets alot of contract experiences out of it...
do you have a georgia contract i could look over?
Response #16
By: Homer The Brave
Date: 9/30/98 1:23:12 AM
I'd like to see it, too. It turns out that I'm making contacts left and right for potential contract geeking.
Pleeeeeeze, Ralf?
Response #17
By: sooz
Date: 9/30/98 9:30:51 AM
This is fascinating.
We're starting a non-alcoholic nightclub here in Austin, and the big decisions were profit or non-profit (profit, we decided), and corporation or proprietorship (we incorporated, while wearing pants).
Keep this convo public. I'm eavesdropping.
Response #18
By: Ralf
Date: 9/30/98 5:52:57 PM
The situation you cite, Ror, where wacky medical data causes death, dismemberment, etc. is easily handled by liability waivers. If the customer wants your software, they agree to not hold you liable for bad data or even "honest mistakes".
If you maliciously muck with the data and cause injury, that's totally different. But generally, it's understood that the USER assumes all risks of using a given software package.
The company I just left did medical databases for nearly a decade and did all SORTS of stupid crap but was never sued, not once.
And I'll see if I can scare up a generic software/consulting contract. The one we have is worded pretty specifically for the client, and is more of an open-ended service contract with PO's we bill against... but I should have something more mainstream I can share on my harddrive somewhere.
Response #19
By: Cleotis
Date: 10/11/98 12:07:26 PM
Ror*, just get a CPA. They'll take care of everything.
Keep good records, keep all your receipts, and MAKE THAT MONEY!
You don't need to incorporate. Not yet.