I have been fired, I fired myself and then I fired myself again a million times in my life.
But this time was different, this was the time I did get sacked together with other 200 people and without doing anything wrong.
We were all working for this London-based media intelligence company in the capacity of freelance media analysts.
A media analyst is somebody who reads and analyses thousands of multilingual cuttings per week from the clients’ press coverage following a set group of different metrics in order to measure the effectiveness of their PR campaigns.
You’ve got to have an excellent eye for detail, a genuine love for reading and the perfect command of at least two (four in my case) languages.
Not to mention that you must never miss a deadline and that your grammar and spelling need to be impeccable.
You also need to be prepared to become an expert in the weirdest industries and the most random things and items, such as drones, hair curlers, dog shelters, the Channel Islands, American hospitals, the Czech Republic, and diamond mines in Nigeria.
At the time, the company’s business model relied totally on freelancers.
Despite all the skills (and the patience) required, the job wasn’t well-paid, but if you worked enough, you could bring home something vaguely similar to an entry-level, full-time salary.
The perks included that you were able to choose how much, when and where to work, payments were always made on time and you received a lot of remote support from the in-house team: even if you worked remotely, they were doing their best to make you feel part of the business.
They would send us a cool monthly newsletter completely dedicated to freelancers featuring a section where managers would thank us for completing last-minute or additional work. I was listed there twice, and when I moved house and I needed references, the boss (whom I had met in person just twice) signed off a reference letter especially for me.
You couldn’t ask for more from a freelance job.
But one day, the company was sold to a larger American corporation.
In a matter of months, things started to crash, they lost dozens of accounts and clients, their best managers left and were never replaced.
In the end, they fired their whole pool of contributors.
There were 200 of us in total, most of which had spent nearly a decade working for them.
For most, that job was the only source of income to support themselves and their families.
They let us know by group email.
In their message, they gave us notice that it wasn’t their policy anymore to provide references.
Our tasks were sub-sub-sub-contracted en block to random companies based in nice little places such as Hong Kong and India.
But these companies didn’t have the slightest idea about the work.
They lacked industry experience and all the necessary know-how.
They didn’t have employees qualified to carry out media analysis and didn’t know how to recruit some.
Eventually, they were given our contacts.
Now, the worst part wasn’t that they offered us to perform the same job for half the pay: the worst part was that many accepted.
I know this lovely South American girl that is still working for a sub-contractor, four years on.
She says that they’re all fucking bastards, aren’t they?
Aren’t they?
Well, this is not the point, nor is this the answer.
This is not even the question.
The answer, the only answer that matters, you have to search it among the clothes you pay £3.
The answer lies within the kitchen blender that gets broken perfectly on time, just hours after the 2-year warranty period has expired.
The question itself has gone on beyond any reasonable doubt since November 1991, when we suddenly decided that walls had to separate us from countries much poorer than East Germany, but that we were going to rule and regulate those countries according to the same and only custom-free and hypocrite open-space.
It’s weird what Capitalism does to our brains: whether we believe in it or not, Capitalism is the only thing that is constantly letting us down and down and down but that we continue and continue and continue being led by without even realising it.
The only other thing apart from love.
from The Shortlisted https://ift.tt/37yMo6E
0 Comments