Pros
You can have a flexible schedule and generally work as much or as little as you like.
Cons
You can see the cons on nearly every other review, warning you not to work at CEM. If you're in a bind and you can't be choosy about finding a good company, here are the things you need to know to make it work. 1. They do not pay by hour. Yes, they say all over the website that they do, and yes, management will insist that the pay per hour, no matter how long a project takes you, and urge you to report your hours honestly (the lady doth protest too much?). But the bottom line is: they do not pay per hour. They pay per word. My mistake was not catching on soon enough. Why the deception? I have no freaking idea. It would save the company AND employees a lot of time and trouble if they just openly paid per word. Most other companies do this, so CEM wouldn't be deviating from the norm. But for whatever legal reason, they have to say they pay per hour. How much will you actually get? You need to produce 1000 words per hour, which sound easy until you realize that involves all the research for a project as well. You'll have to work a few assignments an do the math to see what your hourly rate really is to decide whether or not the job is worth it to you. If you have a 5000 word assignment that takes you 7 hours, just report 5. Again, management will insist that you report your hours accurately... but trust me. Just report 1000 words per hour. It'll save you a headache. 2. You have to go about 20% over the supposed required word count. For my previous employers, word count was pretty strict, and more was not better. So I went only marginally over. I'd say roughly like 5%. This lead to some very confusing conversations, in which I was repeatedly told that my word count was low. I checked my submissions, and they were all slightly over (10-25 words). I even ran the projects through various online word counters, and found the same. A project manager finally sent me what she said was an accurate counter, and guess what? Even on that, the word count wasn't under. This became frustrating, because it's easier for me (if you couldn't tell from the length of this review) to write at length than it is to write concisely. So it was only because I was striving for accuracy that I stayed so close to the word count. Only when I explained that no fewer than 5 different counters (including the one provided by the company) came up accurate did they tell me that I needed to be doing about 20% more than the requirement. Why not just say so up front, or simply provide an accurate word count? I can only imagine it's because they think writers will be even more unhappy to learn they actually have to write 1200 words per hour. I know that's not logical, but it's all I can up with. Believe me when I say I read and watched all of the introductory and training information, and that little bit of information wasn't there. Ultimately, I was being driven crazy trying to figure out what the deal was, both with the hourly rate and the word count, and despite finally catching on, I was far too annoyed with the nonsensical nature of the company to stay. If I had known these two things from the beginning, I'd probably still be working there. Yeah, everything that everyone has said here is true. You won't be paid on time. You will be occasionally stiffed for work that meets all the requirements. But you'll also have flexible schedule with a set number of hours, which is pretty hard to find. If you feel like you've got to give this company a try, go ahead. But for heaven's sake, bill them for 1000 words per hour, and always go at least 20% over the word count.