Star, that’s quite a situation! I’ll bet there was a lot of Schadenfreude going around. ;->

I worked off that money. But if I may be a little indiscreet, what goes around comes around. I truly have seen that play out time after time. You just have to live long enough. This guy ended up cheating his second wife by involving her company in some skanky hedge fund he started in Europe, was sued for divorce–she fired him and his girlfriend in HER office via fax, hired a forensic account and TOOK HIM DOWN! All his little lawyers could not save him.

The latest – in January I took on a grant writing client who I knew through some other work (press releases, online newsletter shorts, etc.) I did for her. She was late with payments and expected revisions up the whazoo, only to ultimately scrap her revisions and go with my original “final” version. Well, the economy tanked, my clients retrenched, and I became freaked out! So, when she asked me to write the grant, I said yes. We sat down to talk terms, and I gave her several options (I write and shepherd the whole grant process; I write the narrative, the organization is responsible for the rest; or I serve as grant narrative editor and review the final application packet as a consultant, but the nuts and bolts writing is done in house). Each comes with a different compensation matrix, which she was well aware of (from my very detailed scope of services). She opted for the cheapest option – I review and edit. I waited for the copy (4 weeks!!!!)…. grant deadline getting nearer and nearer…. finally a week before said grant deadline (from a federal arts organization – no leeway on the deadline!) She throws the whole project at me, frustrated because she’s overwhelmed by the writing – the narrative is incomplete – I had to write substantial sections from scratch and rewrite others! The budget wasn’t done – had to do that, too. Because the option she chose was the one I charge for by the hour, I charged her by the hour – but I gave a small discount out of pity.

She has a habit of changing the actual scope of the contracted project midstream in hopes of getting more for less. I knew this from the other work I did for her… and I still went back…. It took months to get her to pay me for the work. Oh… and in the end? Her organization got the grant – every cent they asked for, not to mention some residual recognition that will pay off later on as they seek more and higher amounts of funding.

What a nightmare!!!!

June, good question. I think having tight deadlines made my co-author MORE demanding! She wanted Eric and me to get in chapters way earlier than her deadlines with the publisher because she wanted to leave a big buffer — so she micromanaged everything. At one point, we had to turn in five chapters BEFORE receiving an approved table of contents from the editor. Eric tried educating her on the publishing process to tone down her expectations, but no dice.