Is this ridiculous?

I worked as a technical writer for a few years before choosing to (successfully) pursue freelance editing and writing. Yes, it's a pain dealing with uncommunicative clients, and no, I don't make as much as I did working full time, but I'm much happier. That said, I don't object to returning to full-time work IF it's the right job. Thankfully, I have the luxury of being picky.

I was contacted by Company X's HR rep in regard to a technical writer position, and I was honest in saying it didn't sound like a position I was interested in, but the rep convinced me to come in and learn more about it. So, I went into the interview with no desire to get the job, meaning, of course, they offered it to me the next day.

Honestly, it's not a bad job and there's a lot of potential to do interesting work, but the hours are incredibly off-putting: a 50-hour work week (10-hour days). Is that normal for corporate jobs now? Also, the salary they offered is $47,000. That seems kind of low for such a long work week, at least to me. Is it?

I can't see taking this job, but I'm curious if the work week and salary are typical for tech writer positions in the NYC area now?

I turned down the job, but they then offered me a month-long consultant gig because they allegedly had "a lot" of work that needed to get done until they hired a full-time technical writer or two. It's a lower hourly rate than I get for even proofreading, but I figured it'd be good experience.

I've worked as a full-time technical writer, but never as a consultant. Tell me if this is normal: No one in the department I'm documenting procedures for is ever really available, and when they finally get back to me, it's a five-minute conversation that usually ends with, "Let me send you some files." But those files are outdated and don't answer most of my questions. Sometimes, the files have been updated, but no one tells me about it until the last minute. One member of the department is supposed to write an updated section, but she hasn't gotten around to it.

So, when I submitted a draft version of one manual to the director of the department, she more or less tore it apart -- which was no surprise, given I had almost no help from the department. (Mind you, it took her four days to even get back to me to just acknowledge she'd received it.) She told me if I needed any help from her to "keep bugging" her because she'd be busy, but she'd eventually get around to it.

Uh, yeah.

I'm a freelance writer/editor, so I've worked with a number of clients, and so far, all of them knew what work needed to be done and had the information ready for me or were available to meet with me. To me, this seems to go beyond needing to be pro-active (which is what the director said she wanted in a consultant). Is that normal? Because I don't think it is. I find it frustrating.

Good Word said:

You need someone to go to bat for you, to go to the person in charge of the folks you need cooperation from, and get them assigned to your project. This is possible to do without getting anyone ruffled.

Be pro-active with getting the director to get people to work with you.

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Well, the director of the department is part of the problem. She's usually in a meeting or out of the office, so my main method of communication with her is e-mail. One of the department's employees, who was supposed to meet with me, told me to contact the director instead because she'd "be better able to explain" the information I needed.

So, I contacted the director. A day later, the directors writes back to say that she's "not trying to be rude," but the other employee was in charge of that particular bit of documentation, so I should be speaking with her. But what if she's never available, passes me off to other people or doesn't know what she should be telling me to get the job done?

It's a one-month consulting gig, so I don't feel that invested. I mean, if they want to pay me to just sit around because everyone is too busy to help me with the job they contracted me to do, hey, more power to them, but it's incredibly frustrating. I'd never experienced this before with a freelance job, and I wasn't sure if this is more the norm and I've just gotten lucky with other companies being prepared.

Thanks for the advice everyone. I finished the project last month, which is to say, they plan on revising all of their policies and redoing the procedures manuals some time in the next few months. Sigh. Everyone there was nice, but I don't think they knew what their expectations were or how to communicate them. I found that odd because, usually, when a company hires a contractor or freelancer, it's for a specific need with specific goals and a specific timeframe in mind.

I think the problems were: 1) they initially had intended to hire a full-time writer, but then settled on a contractor until they found someone permanent (and didn't alter their expectations), and 2) the contract ran from one major holiday to the next, meaning there were days when the office was closed and people were on vacation (or were spending their days dreaming about vacation).

It was poor planning, and as an aside, they majorly overpaid me in my first paycheck. I pointed it out, and they thanked me profusely, but if there's one thing I've taken away from my (brief, I admit) career, it's this: You can tell a lot about a company by how in/competent its payroll department is. If they can't keep track of where their money goes, it often means a lack of quality control in the whole operation.