Finally at the End of the Project

After working until just a few minutes ago, I finally finished up my work on the project that has been giving me so much angst and overtime. I wrapped up my last set of changes, and submitted them to the person I hired to do quality assurance on the project.

Normally, this is work I'd do myself, but since the project went from being a three or four month, after-hours project to a rush job that had to be completed in six weeks, I had to hire help. Not only did I hire a QA person, I also recruited FosterEema to do some of the work as well.

This was an ugly, difficult, rushed project. It would have been fun if I could have completed it according to the original time line, but circumstances beyond my control changed the project due date.

So this evening I sat down and figured out how much time we had invested in the project. Not counting the time my QA person spent, FosterEema and I invested over 370 hours in the job. I did close to 90% of the work, and I think I was averaging over 50 hours per week on the project, in addition to all my other client work.

The past six weeks have sucked major donkey, not only because of the overtime, but for a variety of other reasons as well. I'm glad the job is complete, and I'm hoping things will go more smoothly around our house.

What hurts the most about the past six weeks isn't the fact that I had to bust some serious ass to get the job done. The bummer is that I busted major ass to earn only 27% of what I'd normally make on a project.

Why did I make so little on this job?

Three reasons:

1) It was for a non-profit, so I quoted them a very low rate.
2) I was working with a new set of skills, and planned to use this project as a "earn while you learn" job.
3) I underestimated how much time and costs it would take to complete, especially once it became a rush job.

I'm glad I took on the project because I've helped a non-profit, I've learned some new skills, and I have some money I didn't have before. But I'm also very glad it's over, because I'll have my life back, at least for a little while, before my next round of overtime kicks in with my main client.

At least that job pays more.