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A Real Life Extra: $100 to Look Employed
In these desperate times, all the world's a stage, and your co-workers merely players.
Last week, Shakespeare's famous words were illustrated more vividly than I could ever imagine when I took the easiest -- and most bizarre -- freelance gig of my life.
As many of us 20-something liberal arts grads know all too well, these desperate financial times call for creative measures when it comes to making ends meet. As a freelance assistant for TV and film production, I found myself eager to jump back into the job market after a hectic holiday vacation, only to find that times were a bit slow. Despite some effort, I remain unemployed (although I have decided to refer to my present situation as "in between projects" to my general acquaintance, thank you). My little unemployed heart beat wildly with glee last week when I received a call from a friend who works at a boutique architecture firm in TriBeCa. The lack of new projects her firm was taking on had forced its owner to lay off most of his employees, and apparently the office all but had tumbleweed blowing through. A meeting with an important client was scheduled for the next day and, in an attempt to flesh out the office and save face, he was offering $100 cash to employees' friends who could come in during the meeting, sit at desks, and look busy. Would I be able to help them out? Hold the phone... pretend to be an architect for an hour and get paid $100?! Yes, please! Pass the foam core!
I showed up bright and early the following morning dressed in a button-down tuxedo blouse and houndstooth trousers, an ensemble specifically chosen for its "artsy but practical" vibe. I settled in next to my friend at the shared workspace, and was given some random paperwork to "peruse." From across the room, the owner nodded his approval and jokingly assured me that I looked "like a real architect." At that moment I realized the truth -- I was a real-life extra. As an unemployed person, I was being paid to pretend to be that which I inherently was not -- employed.
I used the time at the office to catch up on email and start teaching myself the computer program Rhino (hey, if real architects use it, why couldn't I?). When the client arrived, he spent most of his time absorbed in paperwork, and hardly looked up to notice the rest of the office. When he left, my fellow "co-workers" and I (there were four of us total) each received our cash stipend and went our merry ways. The whole experience lasted about an hour and a half.
With more people being laid off these days, office spaces are no doubt looking more and more barren. While this fact is indeed depressing, and I feel for the poor employer who is forced to resort to such desperate tactics, I wonder if there isn't a new niche market opening up here... At low overhead, these extras may give clients just the right amount of bolstered confidence to jump-start a drained business. I wouldn't be surprised to see more of this kind of gig opening up. As for those of us hired extras, we would end up being employed to look employed. Maybe this is the answer to my current joblessness! Why work on a set when the office has become its own playing space?
The whole thing smacks deliciously of subversive guerrilla theater, except that we are reinforcing our old-fashioned capitalist values in the spirit of a newfound patriotism rather than undermining these establishments. Fair enough, but I wonder how beneficial it was for this architect to put up a cheap veneer that denied major structural weakness. What are his long-term plans, and how much will he ultimately be willing to spend on keeping up appearances? On a broader scale, how much of our vulnerability are we willing to deny in the spirit of adopting a sunny outlook through this recession? Whatever the answer, at least we can count on Shakespeare to hold up the mirror, yet again.
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As any architect will tell you, it's not always the most talented, competent or hardworking that wins the contracts! You've got the starchitects, the well connected on all fronts (hobnobbing around with politicians, celebrities, you name it!), the academics with a few published treasties - then you've got the guy working his butt off, great ideas but a downright "unprofessional looking" office! Come contracting time, the client will definitely (or that's usually the case) play it safe...your renderings are rarely convincing enough on their own! So cut the guy some slack....maybe someday this debacle will be a footnote to a great career (even though the description given - "boutique architecture firm" doesn't seem to fit the starving architect molde!)!
I hope the customer that was duped is reading this.
Seems to me a fraud was perpetrated.
This is just wrong.
How would you like to hire someone and find out the company is a sham?
This is downright ethical in Architecture terms.
Some firms fired long term employees (5 years IS long term in architecture;) and are now advertising for replacements at half the cost with minimal benefits.
Doesn't anybody else have moral qualms about using the unemployed as stage props? Have working people no compassion for one another?
If asked to be a stand-in for someone who'd lost his or her job, I'd have declined in a heartbeat. This practice just makes it easier for employers to fire employees without repercussions and contributes to the whole culture of mendacity in business.
Like the old Soviet saying, "We pretend to work and they pretend to pay us."
An extra in a real life economic collapse drama. Is this real or fake.-Memorex or not? A real life mannequin or stand in for the missing. That reminded me of a film by David Mamet where a con game scam went down and the entire setting was staged in order to get, what I vaguely recall, was a scientist's book. Wasn't Steve Martin in this film? Business is not staging a pseudo-reality play. This is unbelievable!!! Bring in the zombies to play real people, and earn $100 bucks at the same time.
http://eye-on-washington.blogspot.com
It is kind of like what the Bush administration was all about. Come in to the office and "act" like you belong there. Gents have to wear a jacket and tie, and ladies an appropriate business suit. No real knowledge required...............LOL! Bush giving real meanig to the term, 'bush league".
Lauren, an illuminating piece on many levels. I'm as envious of your writing as I am of your $100.
There must be some online temp employement site that has a handle on this new niche-- the founder of which certainly would make an easy million or more before the year is up. Capitalism does imitate capitalism-- it would be interesting to see a landscape where more fake jobs exist than real ones. Oh yeah, we already had that the past decade.
Without bursting your bubble, I should tell you that this is not an original experience.
At one point, Enron brought people from all over their headquarters building, gave them a brief acting lesson, and created the illusion of an active energy-futures trading floor for a group of potential investors..
I learned this story from one of the participants. Enron had just died, and he was looking for a new job. We sat next to each other on a flight to Indianapolis in late 2001 or early 2002.
One thing that I cannot forget is his description of a man giving directions with a bullhorn: "SLAM THAT PHONE DOWN! LEAP TO YOUR FEET AND WAVE YOUR HANDS AT THAT GUY!"
Then: "YOU! GIVE HIM A THUMBS-UP AND THEN SCRIBBLE IN THAT NOTEBOOK!"
Interesting story. Wow! P.s. I used to work for a company with about 100 employees where they would ask us to take lunch early or late if there was an important client coming into the office, just so the office would "look busy." And this was in good economic times! The company just had a crap business plan, and no number of bodies could stop the bleeding. The "important clients" were probably people thinking about acquiring the company.
It is an interesting story.
I found it particularly stunning the understanding and sympathy expressed toward the "poor employers", who need to resort to these kind of practices - how about sympathy toward the laid of employees? Instead of celebrating the birth of a "niche market" maybe one should worry about the customer who is mislead about the health of the company, let alone the laid of employee, who may also have a use for the $100.
I am speechless.......
Gosh! I have been unemployed for months now, and I wish I could be an "extra." --Must be nice!
Great story...CONGRATULATIONS!
Let me congratulate you on a cool choice for software-cover. What did you think of Rhino?
From what I gather from reliable sources (relatives on the ground), many, or even ALL of the demonstrators on the ground in Iran when the TV cameras are on, have been paid to be there. Even travellers to the place have told of people saying (quietly) that they really don't hate America - quite the contrary.
Gee, another case of vested, privileged elites creating the appearance of more substance to their little tiny world than is actually there.
Can't these people at least occasionally go camping? Feet on the ground & that sort of thing?
Why is it such a big surprise to them to find that they share the planet with billions of nonprivileged, who actually are affected, sometimes negatively so, by their policies?
Separateness is a complete illusion. I'd rather be poor and surrounded by hordes of honest, fiercely loyal friends, or even just allies, than be exclusionary and isolated...
Can I be an "extra" too?
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