Staff Contracting Policy

Scope

This policy applies to staff members, both those inside the collective and interns. It does not cover contractors that are not on Free Geek staff (for instance most contractors currently working for Collaborative Technologies).

Definition

A contractor is someone who, outside of ongoing waged or salaried work, is being paid by Free Geek for work. This includes people contracting through third party organizations and people contracting directly with Free Geek.

Accountability

Before beginning a project, contractors must brief the Collective on the work to be undertaken. The Collective will ask questions as necessary to gain an understanding of the project and determine how it will impact Free Geek. The contracting work must not interfere with the contractor's regular Free Geek duties.

As the project progresses, contractors must brief the Collective when a change has been made to the contract, and as a good faith procedure when the Collective hasn't heard about the project in a long while.

Contractors must report the details of their work including the number of hours spent and the type of work done to the Collective. The Free Geek Collective, staff, and Community Council must be able to see these details at any time upon request.

Need for a Billable Client

Contractors must be working directly on jobs that are being billed to an outside client. There must be a budgeted line item for the work being performed.

Double Billing

Contractors may not bill a client for hours for which they are also receiving a salary from Free Geek. If hours spent contracting overlap with the worker's regular Free Geek hours, these hours must be made up some other time or taken as vacation time.

Regarding Cost Overruns

In the case of a project with cost overruns there may not be enough money to pay all the contractors in a timely manner. In such cases contractors who are staff members should not be paid until all contractors who are not staff members have been paid.

Hiring of a Contractor

A coordinator may hire another staff member as a contractor providing a standard hiring process for contractors is followed and that process is open and transparent to the Collective members, all other staff, and the Free Geek Community Council.

Reasons for Hiring

When hiring a staff member as a contractor, the hiring decision should be made based on the ability and availability of the contractor. The hiring process should not give an advantage to the staff person over consultants who are not on staff.

Conflicts of Interest

A staff member may not hire himself or herself as a contractor without prior approval of the Free Geek Staff Collective.

Additionally, when something the contractor is doing could be reasonably construed as a conflict of interest by Free Geek staff, he or she should proactively alert the collective to the issue.