Lies, Deception, and Subcontracting
April 13, 2010
Imagine for a moment that you decide to treat yourself and a few friends to a fine and expensive meal at a prestigious restaurant. You arrive to find the restaurant décor refined, the atmosphere elegant, service crisp and fastidious. Your orders are placed and a cook’s assistant is then sent to the nearby grocery store for the appropriate assortment of frozen dinners. After a few minutes in the microwave, the sous-chef plates the orders with precision and the expediter finishes the presentation with a flourish.
Bon appétit.
In all likelihood, you find the above scenario problematic in several ways. The most important of which is the fact that it means that you paid for something you didn’t get and the results were tangibly inferior to what your understanding and tacit agreement suggested you’d receive. In such a situation you would feel betrayed and deceived because, in fact, you were.
The problems in this scenario would be further exacerbated, however, if when you asked about the quality or details of the meal you were told, “Ah, yes, we do sometimes use outside contractors to prepare the meals, as it says on the back of the menu. But we oversaw the process and you did get the benefit of our expertise to ensure a satisfactory experience.” Really? Satisfactory for whom? What you actually got was the fancy restaurant’s comparatively high prices for a product you could have directly procured for 1/10 the cost. And without the deceptive dog and pony show.
The pièce de résistance, however, is that when you balk at such behavior to the maître d’ you are told, “Oh, this is quite a common practice. It’s just what’s done.” See, everything is just fine. Apparently, you simply have a small-minded view of the restaurant industry’s time-honored traditions, right?
Okay, this apocryphal story aside, I think everyone can understand the deception inherent to such arrangements. It would be one thing if an establishment made it clear that their product is often not their own product and that their expertise is not always directed toward production, but is more often that of coordinating with various suppliers in order to deliver other-branded products that meet agreed upon specifications. But everyone understands that doing so without full disclosure is an entirely different and dishonest beast.
The tangled web
Taken to the design, development, and programming industries, the same unethical, time-honored traditions exist. As the maître d’ explained, often it’s just what’s done. Despite what is “just done,” there is an ethical way to use subcontractors and plenty of unethical ways to do so.
Professional ethics demand that we employ only the ethical way and not participate in any (grossly or mildly) deceptive schemes. As we’ll examine shortly, professional ethics in these cases relate not just to handling things when they go well and as planned, but especially for when things go awry. For now, though, let’s get to the positive stuff.
The one and only professionally-appropriate use of subcontractors involves the client being fully aware of who is doing what for their project. If ABCdesign is the primary agency for the client’s project, the client must be informed that XYZdev will be doing the backend programming for the project. In the professionally-appropriate scenario, things go exactly like this:
“Yes we can, but in order to meet all of your requirements we’ll need to bring in some folks from XYZdev who will work on these specific portions of your project. Their responsibility is described fully in this section of the contract. Is that okay with you?”
With perhaps the addition of:
“We do wholeheartedly recommend XYZdev’s work and we’ve worked with them on this project and this other one, too. I can have Dave from XYZ call you if you’d like to chat with and get to know him and how they work…”
In some cases the client will not be comfortable with such an arrangement and will decline to sign onto the project with you. And that is entirely appropriate; as the alternative is that you deceive them and trade your ethics and responsibility for profit. Those comfortable with such practices have nothing but very unfortunate clients. And unfortunate employees.
The described scenario is the only appropriate way to handle such situations because professional relationships are based on information, face-value, understanding, honesty, choice, trust, and responsibility. When you eschew one or some of these and/or rob your potential clients of any of these, you’re crafting anything but a responsible professional relationship. You are, in fact, practicing deception in pursuit of gain at the expense of—rather than with the consent of—your clients.
Observe, the swelling scene…
The unethical tenor of blind subcontracting finds its full voice in those cases where things go awry. In problematic scenarios, the chances of spiraling exasperation and exponential growth of anger—not to mention greatly expanded potential for litigation—are nearly unlimited where blind subcontracting has been employed.
Imagine for a moment that the backend development the ghost contractor did for your project was flawed, leaving the website’s functionality impaired. When you raise the issue with the agency you’re working with, one of several scenarios is likely; almost all of which involve delay and some level of dispute. Think about it: logic clearly suggests that those in the habit of one sort of unethical business practice will find all manner of ethical practices unpalatable and easily dispensed with in favor of expediency or other justifications.
At the least, you’re probably in for an unpleasant scenario. However, in the likely event you discover that a company you’ve not spoken with or met actually did the deficient work, unpleasantness turns to anger. Suddenly responsibility, contractual and otherwise, becomes a hot potato. The most likely scenario then is that everyone has to begin carefully examining contract language. Exchanges of legalese and talk of financial responsibility are not far behind. Otherwise simple matters become complicated while agreements and understanding get…well, blown all to hell.
Sir Walter Scott perhaps said it best when he observed, “Oh! what a tangled web we weave When first we practise to deceive!” The clichéd lesson is that when you’ve modeled your business after a house of cards, even the gentlest breeze can bring it all crashing down upon you. Ethics, morals, standards: they’re not just for smugness. They’re indispensable components of successful professional practice. Always relevant, always required.
Conclusion
If signing with your agency means that your clients are unknowingly making other similar choices…but without any real choice in the matter; your brand actually represents something quite different than what you may think it represents. Such a scenario bodes well for no one involved.
As one who might serve as a subcontractor, the only ethical form of practice involves your insistence that you are represented fully to the client and your responsibilities outlined clearly in the contracts. If you are invited into a shadier or ill-defined situation, ethics and professionalism demand that you work with the contracting party to amend the issue or you pass on the project.
I’m no unblemished saint and I have in my past made poor choices on this score; 4 times. Each time I acted as the subcontractor working as a ghost designer behind the contracted agency. At that time my understanding of these issues was not fully formed and I chose not to look deeply into the matter. I was wrong to gloss over the relevant issues and I am not proud of those choices. I have long resolved not to repeat these same mistakes and I urge you to do the same.
When presented with a choice between reputation and profit, have the moral fortitude to choose reputation every time. For if your reputation is built upon lies, deception, and ethical failings it’s not the sort of reputation you’ll want to claim.