Re: Sample document creation for contract position

[pro -dot- techwriter -at- gmail -dot- com]

Hi Melissa:

This is a new one for me also. I have been asked for writing samples to be  
sent ahead, which I also do not do. I tell the company that I am  
intereviewing with that samples will be provided at an interview. I tell  
them that by agreement with past employers, I cannot leave samples or send  
them early. (I do not provide past salary history either.) I do, however,  
have some samples on my web site that people can look at.

I must admit, I am a bit cynical in my outlook, so I would be very  
concerned about doing a week's worth of work without compensation. A small  
sample would be all right, but 10 - 15 pages seems a bit excessive.

NOTICE * I am not an attorney, so do not construe this as legal advice. The  
following comments are based on my best knowledge of copyrights and how  
they apply to individual work**.

Of course, being as cynical as I am, I would do part of it, and put my  
copyright notice on every page. Any work done by you is automatically  
copyrighted, unless you either sign away the copyright (for a charity, for  
example) or you have a signed contract between you and another party that  
states all work you do for them is a "work for hire." Since there was no  
contract about "works for hire" and no compensation :-).(right??) that  
means any documentation you produced belonged to you.

Any employer who tries to take advantage of you even before an in-person  
interview, in my experience, will continue that behavior after you start  
working for them. I would have walked away too.

Hope this helps.
PT

On Mar 20, 2009 10:35am, Melissa Lowery-Smith <artsyreader -at- yahoo -dot- com> wrote:
> I have been out of the job market for over 2 years, so perhaps things  
> have changed since I last interviewed for technical writing jobs. I hope  
> that TECHWR-Lers will be able to help me determine whether my recent  
> situation is normal or whether it was a strange as it seemd to me. I was  
> recently asked to create a 10-15 page document (they referred to it as a  
> technical test) based on a brief interview with an SME as part of the  
> interview process for a 3-6 month technical writer contract. There was no  
> discussion about reimbursement for the time that this document creation  
> process would require. They wanted to interview me on Monday, during  
> which I would spend time with the SME discussing the type of information  
> to be included in the document, then they wanted the completed document  
> returned by Friday for review. They also wanted me to forward some  
> existing writing samples to them before the interview. I felt very  
> uncomfortable about being asked to send ahead

> my writing samples by e-mail (as in I don't do this ever) and then  
> additionally being asked to produce such a significant new writing sample  
> in order to get a short-term job. Did I over-react to something that is a  
> reasonable request for a contract position? I might have been less  
> apprehensive if this had been for a permanent position or if it had been  
> proposed as a paid trial. This is a very small company that has not had a  
> technical writer previously, so maybe they didn't realize how their  
> request was going to be perceived. I pulled my name out of consideration  
> for the role, but I am wondering how other writers would have responded  
> to this situation.


^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

ComponentOne Doc-To-Help 2009 is your all-in-one authoring and publishing 
solution. Author in Doc-To-Help's XML-based editor,  Microsoft Word or 
HTML and publish to the Web, Help systems or printed manuals. 
http://www.doctohelp.com

Help & Manual 5: The complete help authoring tool for individual
authors and teams. Professional power, intuitive interface. Write
once, publish to 8 formats. Multi-user authoring and version control! http://www.helpandmanual.com/

---
You are currently subscribed to TECHWR-L as archive -at- web -dot- techwr-l -dot- com -dot- 

To unsubscribe send a blank email to 
techwr-l-unsubscribe -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
or visit http://lists.techwr-l.com/mailman/options/techwr-l/archive%40web.techwr-l.com


To subscribe, send a blank email to techwr-l-join -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com

Send administrative questions to admin -at- techwr-l -dot- com -dot-  Visit
http://www.techwr-l.com/ for more resources and info. 

Please move off-topic discussions to the Chat list, at:
http://lists.techwr-l.com/mailman/listinfo/techwr-l-chat