The Lamest Of Excuses

CareerBuilder.com comes out with an annual list of Most Unusual Excuses and this year’s list does not disappoint.  Here it is from a press release (my personal favorites in bold): 1) Employee’s 12-year-old daughter stole his car and he had no other way to work. Employee didn’t want to report it to the police. 2) Employee said bats got in her hair. 3) Employee said a refrigerator fell on him. 4) Employee was in line at a coffee shop when a truck carrying flour backed up and dumped the flour into her convertible. 5) Employee said a deer bit him during hunting season. 6) Employee ate too much at a… Read More

Continue Reading

The Value Of An Updated Resume

I am stuck in an ongoing cycle of sourcing.  Just when I am about to be worn down, I come across a resume that lists the candidate’s technical skills.  The first thing listed: -MS Windows 98 Seriously…Win98?  My guess (hope) is that the candidate simply has overlooked that part of his resume for years.  That is about the only explanation because I certainly hope he isn’t touting his technical proficiency with an operating system from 13-14 years ago.

Continue Reading

Higher Education

Honestly read this under the "Education” section of a resume: Completed Kindergarten on through 12th grade I think that is rather funny.  I guess the old axiom that the longest journey starts with the first step is true.  Education starts with successfully completing kindergarten.

Continue Reading

Office Battles

Thanks to Sierra Miller for sharing some funny passive-aggressive office notes.  Check out the photos here. It reminds me of a previous position I had in a technology company.  One of the IT guys kept having a similar problem – someone would peruse his lunch in the refrigerator and help themselves to some of the food.  The IT guy was a bit high-strung which probably made him a more appealing target for these hijinks. Anyway, one day he does a page all over the entire building and goes off about someone eating his lunch.  This was a company with 175 employees – it wasn’t small.  He ranted to the entire… Read More

Continue Reading

Sourcing Stories

I have been swamped with sourcing activities over the past couple weeks as we work on multiple projects.  I am definitely seeing an upclick in hiring activities which is normally preceded by increases in our assessment work.  We have seen a tremendous increase in assessments so I take that as a good sign. So a quick sourcing story for you – I’m on the phone with a gentleman and we are deep into the phone interview.  He interrupts me to say he needs to step away as his 5 year-old son has gone to the bathroom and the candidate needs to go “wipe his butt.”  He proceeds to set the… Read More

Continue Reading

Horrid Business Jargon

Business has its own pet language, doesn’t it?  Much like sports, there are some favorite clichés that are common speak in most office buildings.  Yahoo does a good job of chronicling some of the worst.  A couple examples: Synergize Say what? This word has infiltrated nearly every cube and conference room in the country. The fault here can largely be placed on one seminal advice author. In Stephen Covey’s 7 Habits of Highly Successful People, the No. 6 habit is Synergize. Of the habit, Covey writes, "To put it simply, synergy means two heads are better than one." Covey readers might recall getting the same advice in simpler terms several… Read More

Continue Reading

Interview Question Psychosis

Let me be honest, I have sat in on some interviews that were borderline psychotic.  Questions from left field, overt anger and emotions, lying responses that were easily observed…and those were the good ones.  In all seriousness, interviewing is difficult and being a good interviewer is even more challenging.  Most managers do not spend their time honing their interview skills.  This fact often leads to bizarre questions.  It also leads to bizarre question patterns. Every year there seems to be a list of the oddest interview questions from the year – it is a guilty pleasure of mine to read them.  Perhaps you would enjoy the list also?  To whet… Read More

Continue Reading

A Great Headline

From Forbes.com: How To Handle Post-Recession Job Stress Post-Recession?  I think most people are still dealing with Recession Job Stress.  It gets worse: The worst of the waves of layoffs may be over, but countless American workers who still have their jobs are unhappy at them, overloaded with increased responsibilities, short of colleagues to share the burden, and unsure where they can turn to look for something better. Few people got raises last year–many took pay cuts–and it’s not looking like pay hikes will come anytime soon. Again, this viewpoint strikes me as seriously off target.  I equate this type of unhappiness to people who complain that their ice cream… Read More

Continue Reading