51–60 of 121 posts
We’re also YC Winter 18 hopefuls..!
Run the tracker in a virtual machine running locally. Run your “work” apps in that vm. This is so stupid.
I wonder if anyone in developed countries can actually make a living from something like Upwork. It seemed to me whenever I have looked at it, that it's mostly people and companies from the developing world who work for less than minimum wage or close to it in developed countries... and the expected cost matches these sorts of rates. So it does not make sense for anyone other than the most desperate people in the fir…
"Not in San Francisco" and "easy to exploit" are very different. I had great, professional work done in Russia on Upwork. It didn't cost $200 per hour, but it didn't cost $2 per hour either. The engineer who did the work was the vendor, and I was the client, so I was definitely the boss and treated as such, but he was clearly not hurting for work and if I started behaving inappropriately he could have easily dumped m…
I'm a consultant and have been for a long time, and I know this business. I don't think counting keystrokes and in many cases screenshots make any sense, so I think the implementation of this is totally bogus, but the concept makes complete sense. "I've never had a client expect to be able to look over my shoulder" Right well UpWork isn't your client. I don't think your clients should, and to another person's point,…
Isn't there some deliverable that proves the work was done?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
"Not in San Francisco" and "easy to exploit" are very different. I had great, professional work done in Russia on Upwork. It didn't cost $200 per hour, but it didn't cost $2 per hour either. The engineer who did the work was the vendor, and I was the client, so I was definitely the boss and treated as such, but he was clearly not hurting for work and if I started behaving inappropriately he could have easily dumped m…
20 US dollars per hour is already more than I make as a full-time SaaS salesman in New York City, and I'm not even hurting for cash either!
Specifically, Upwork charges the freelancer a fee of: 20% for the first $500 billed with the client. 10% for lifetime billings with the client between $500.01 and $10,000. 5% for lifetime billings with the client that exceed $10,000.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah this is really dumb. If you're charging hourly, but don't trust someone is actually working, don't charge hourly. If you want full control of an employee don't get a freelancer. If you want to constant surveillance of any artists' computer; fuck off. If you don't trust the artist to work, get a new artist.
This, while not really being nuanced, strikes the most important point. Trust. Building trust for a freelancer is hard, especially one working remote with little on-site. Transparency usually helps in these settings. I've had to work on projects as a freelancer where there simply wasn't much progress for weeks because they were such monstrosities, that trust and a prose-documentation of my work was the only thing kee…
My girlfriend is a manager at a writing company. She has a group of about 30 freelancers she keeps in touch with on top of the 10 people who work directly under her at her company. When too much work comes in she leans on the freelancer that best fits what she needs. These are people she has worked with before, has had success with, and most of all trusts. She, of course, has to try new freelancers occasionally. But the bad ones get spit back out.
It sounds like the company you were working for doesn't have very good freelancing game.
I'm a consultant and have been for a long time, and I know this business. I don't think counting keystrokes and in many cases screenshots make any sense, so I think the implementation of this is totally bogus, but the concept makes complete sense. "I've never had a client expect to be able to look over my shoulder" Right well UpWork isn't your client. I don't think your clients should, and to another person's point,…
Isn't there some deliverable that proves the work was done?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
This, while not really being nuanced, strikes the most important point. Trust. Building trust for a freelancer is hard, especially one working remote with little on-site. Transparency usually helps in these settings. I've had to work on projects as a freelancer where there simply wasn't much progress for weeks because they were such monstrosities, that trust and a prose-documentation of my work was the only thing kee…
If you're a company that commonly outsources, you should have good freelancing game. By that I mean you build a network of freelancers you've worked with before or have heard good feedback from trusted sources. My girlfriend is a manager at a writing company. She has a group of about 30 freelancers she keeps in touch with on top of the 10 people who work directly under her at her company. When too much work comes in…
If you want freelancing to stay mostly something for people great at selling themselves, managing customer relations etc. that model works well, but that's IMO not optimal for the company nor the majority of people who would enjoy being freelancers.
Even with this screenshot tracking, I've been swindled on Upwork by fake devs. They take the time to fake it, why not just do the work?