Tobias Mayer: How to Write an Agile Job Ad
xkcd: “The solution doesn’t involve watering down my every little idea and creative impulse for the sake of someday easing my fit into a mold. It doesn’t involve tempering my life to better fit someone’s expectations. It doesn’t involve constantly holding back for fear of shaking things up. . . .” Click through to read the whole thing . . . Read more →
I got a job description via email from a recruiter named Nicholas Sparks. Like most jobs I get from recruiters, 1) it was unrelated to my actual experience; and 2) it was nowhere near where I live. I wrote back anyway to say, “I’ve never enjoyed you as a novelist and I’m glad to see you’ve gone into another line of work.” Read more →
The goal is not just to hire people who need a job; it’s to hire people who believe what you believe. I always say that, you know, if you hire people just because they can do a job, they’ll work for your money, but if you hire people who believe what you believe, they’ll work for you with blood and sweat and tears. — Simon Sinek Read more →
How inspiring is it that the 99 percent have $4 billion to spend on Call of Duty video games? #getajob
In the middle of an Occupy Chicago teach-in this week, traders at the Chicago Board of Trade dumped several sheets of paper on top of the heads of protesters below. Demonstrators were angered to find out they were showered with employment applications for McDonald’s. — Mediaite Read more →
As a society, we are not actually all that interested in happiness. If we were, people would stop relocating for jobs, people would stop eating french fries, and people would stop scheduling their kids for activities that happen close to dinnertime. If anything, I think people are focused on hiding the fact that they desperately want more money and more passion in their lives even though it’s not fashionable to admit it. — Penelope Trunk Read more →
If you cut the pay of an overpaid worker, he’ll generally scream bloody murder. After all, overpaid workers like to stay overpaid. But if you cut the pay of a non-overpaid worker, you haven’t really damaged him. He just quietly leaves and gets a job elsewhere. After all, the ability to find a comparable job elsewhere is pretty much the definition of not being overpaid. Now how are the Wisconsin public workers reacting to projected pay and/or benefit cuts? As if the rug’s been pulled out from under them, that’s how. Every time a worker says “These cuts will cause me severe pain,” that worker is saying, in effect, “I can’t get anyone else to pay me at the level I’m accustomed to,” or, in briefer words, “I am overpaid!” So yes, they’re overpaid. And the louder they get, the surer you can be. — Steven Landsburg Read more →
I got a call at the office this week . . . “Hi, Mr. Epps. This is Eric O’Neal. How are you doing today?” “I’m okay. Who are you?” “I’m with a company here in Newport Beach. My team specializes in placing highly competent technical personnel and . . .” “What company is that?” “I’m with Jobspring Partners and I understand that you’re looking to hire a C# ASP.NET contractor.” Let me interrupt for a second to mention that all of these slimeballs seem to have the same quirk of introducing themselves in three parts: 1) Name. 2) I work for a placement company. 3) The name of the company. It must be part of the training. No one ever says “This is Eric O’Neal with Jobspring Partners” all in one piece. Major red flag when a recruiter doesn’t want to tell you who he or she is working for.… Read more →
RT @capricecrane: “Spencer Pratt Writing Tell-All About Ex Heidi Montag.” Chapter One: She marries a douchebag. # RT @TheOnion: Obama To Create 17 New Jobs By Resigning And Finally Opening That Restaurant http://onion.com/a0V23H # Related articles Spencer Pratt to write tell-all book about ex Heidi Montag, as if we don’t already know everything (popwatch.ew.com) Read more →
I read this today on an actual résumé: Superior written and communication skills and detail to attention Don’t do that. Read more →
SUNNYVALE, Calif. — Jobless workers in Silicon Valley are giving up on the region’s dominant technology industry and trying to switch to other fields, as the area’s unemployment rate spikes above the national and state average. Silicon Valley’s unemployment rate — which was below California’s average and largely tracked the national average last year — has soared, surpassing the state average in May. By June, the area’s unadjusted unemployment rate was 11.8%, worse than California’s 11.6% and the national rate of 9.7%, according to the latest figures from California’s Employment Development Department. Many of the jobless techies are targeting new gigs in the clean-energy or health-care industries . . . Some are shifting even further afield, looking for jobs in teaching or financial consulting. People are leaving tech as “more tech companies are offshoring and some are shrinking, plus people are burned out and tired from having been there and… Read more →
When you’re reinventing yourself in a new career, first impressions are even more important because everyone secretly doubts that you have what it takes to be successful. Without waiting for you to explain why you’re qualified, people will make a snap judgment based on your appearance and demeanor. Do you look and sound like someone who does this job? — WSJ.com Read more →
From a reference letter: “Not only did he have the answer to any question, he would give you that answer right away.” # Read more →
I’d just finished reading another tiresome “why oh why aren’t there more women in IT?” article when I found a former colleague on LinkedIn . . . he lists his job title as “Analyst, Software Quality Assurnace.” Would you hire him as a QA guy? I wouldn’t, and that’s even before I saw how he misspelled “Assurance.” The IT “profession” is chock full of idiots like this. Why anyone thinks women are missing out on something if they don’t work in IT is a total mystery. If I had a daughter, I would tell her to be a meeting planner or a flight attendant . . . Thus spoke The Programmer. Read more →
After shooting some hoops, we stop at Extra Mile for hot dogs and sodas. Something catches my eye about the clerk’s name tag — underneath his name, it says “MIT.” “Did you go to school at MIT?” I ask him. “No,” he says. “That means ‘Manager In Training.’” “Oh, that makes sense.” Convenience store clerk seemed like kind of a low-level job for a MIT grad. Read more →
The house two doors down from us is for sale. The house across the street is empty and for sale. The woman behind us and the woman next door, who was recently laid off, have asked my wife if she knows anything about loan modification . . . Read more →
There was a troubled-looking guy in Petco this afternoon giving away packets of Natural Balance dog food. He looked like a meth addict or something. As I walked past him, he mumbled, without making eye contact, “Want some free dog food?” “My dog won’t eat that shit,” I said, which is not true, but it certainly took the wind out of his sails. Now you might say I wasn’t very charming but by verbally assaulting him in that way, I was motivating him to rehabilitate himself and get a real job. Tough love . . . Read more →
