‘We are an international headhunter company, your profile attracted me,’ began the remarkable message I received on LinkedIn. My newfound interlocutor, ‘Mr Zha’, explained in broken English that, ‘one of our partner in China looking for a freelancer researcher, helping them write some papers they will pay 1500-3000 USD for 6-10 pages. Contact me if you are interested. I can send you the [job description].’
To many such an approach might seem inconspicuous and hardly worth mentioning. After all, isn’t this precisely the sort of engagement that LinkedIn is designed for? But when you work for a foreign policy think tank, business offers like these are highly unusual: our work is corporate and side-contracts are rare; the pay was three times the market rate; and the poor English was atypical – to say the least – of any reputable approach.
So unusual was this message, that I immediately remarked on it to a colleague, only to hear that he too had received the same message.
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