Marion
(Joined 2003)

Background and experience: I have 13 years experience as a business researcher, having trained as an Information Scientist (MSc.) and worked for a number of corporations, including Morgan Stanley and Merrill Lynch. The main responsibilities included providing research to support the company's investment bankers and equity research teams, to work on specific projects where needed and initially to look after a physical library of annual reports, broker research and press.

What matters to me: Work-Life balance has become even more important to me since I had children.

Why I joined: I had been made redundant and found it hard to find a job for 3 or 4 days a week (as I had been doing since coming back from maternity leave) and I didn't want to go back to working full time as my son was still quite young at that time. ClickNwork provided a good balance between having more time with my son but still earning a living.

How ClickNwork works for me: Although I enjoyed the work for ClickNwork I did miss having contact with co-workers, so after 6 months I managed to find a part-time job at an information unit of one of the investment bank's. I combined that with working for ClickNwork as that gave me the opportunity to earn some more money at times/days of my choice.

Input: I started off by doing a job most days of the week and once I combined it with my part-time job I did one or two requests a week.

Benefits: The rates received were fine and quite close to my other earnings.

Room for improvement?: Ideally, I would have like a little more notice when work comes in, so that I have a better chance to fit it in to my schedule. But I know that's not always possible and they have always given me the opportunity to try and fit it around childcare.

What's Next?: I have moved abroad and am now working full time whilst my partner looks after our children so for the foreseeable future I won't be able to do any work for ClickNwork but I will always bear them in mind if my situation changes.