STA reader Maria recently forwarded me a link to “Annie’s Mailbox,” an online advice column. Annie’s column recently featured a letter from a reader with a very unusual workplace problem. It made me so angry (but, fortunately, Annie gave her very sound advice which helped me to feel less stabby) that I just had to post it verbatim:
Dear Annie: Last week I was told by our office manager that the director “doesn’t like your hairstyle and you need to do something with it.” Annie, my hair is growing back from chemo.
I was extremely upset by this and went home in tears.
Today I met with our director, who read from our employee manual: “If it is determined that an employee is inappropriately dressed or groomed, he or she will be instructed to make necessary changes.” She thought my hair looked unprofessional.
Annie, I could understand if my hair was green or in dreadlocks, but it’s not. Now I’m being told I may lose my job. What do you think? — Trying My Best
Dear Trying: We think your director may be in violation of the Americans With Disabilities Act since your hairstyle is a result of chemotherapy treatment. Check with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (eeoc.gov) at 1-800-669-4000. The director’s reaction to your hair seems peculiar and punitive. If she has a boss, we strongly urge you to take this to a higher authority.
Ugh, this is just horrible. I hope “Trying My Best” takes Annie’s advice – and that she kicks her boss’ butt.
There are a lot of ways that being laid off is awesome: you have free time to sleep late and watch Judge Judy reruns, for example. But there are a lot of ways that being laid off sucks, and one of them is figuring out how to find a new job and dance around explaining that you left your last job because you were laid off. Here are some tips for networking while you’re unemployed:
- Update your social networking pages – and your blog if you have one – to look professional or at least not embarrassing. Remove the lolcats and the pictures of you shotgunning beers with your friends. You want people who might Google you to find things that make them want to hire you.
- Remember that there is a world of difference between being laid off and being fired. Being laid off is not your fault – it’s a company’s financial decision and almost always has nothing to do with your job performance. Don’t forget that.
- Have a backup plan. When someone asks what you’re doing now, you should be honest and admit that you were laid off. However, you should also be able to say you’re working part time, volunteering somewhere, going back to school, finally writing your novel, or something else. You want to have something else to talk about besides your layoff, and you’ll show that you have lots of other things going on in your life besides working – or lying on the couch watching TV.
- Use your twitter, blog, or other public social networking site to talk about your skills and your job search. Be subtle about it – avoid talking about how much of an expert you are or how much companies are begging to work with you.
Continue reading ‘tips for networking while laid off’
British songstress Lily Allen is a bona fide celebrity, meaning she would seem to have an entourage, a nice pad, and expensive toys like cars and a private jet. But apparently not. She said in a recent interview that she’s broke. “I’ve been hit big time by the credit crunch,” she said. “Actually, I’ve just had to sell my car because I’m so broke. I bought a car last year and that was probably my biggest extravagance. Clothes, too. I’m always buying clothes. I’m completely skint.” She added that, although she just put out a new record and is out on tour right now, she won’t see profits from the album for awhile.
Have people learned nothing from TLC’s Behind the Music episode? God. What about the aftereffects of MC Hammer? If we do not study history we are doomed to repeat it, OK? Pop stars of the world obviously have not been brushing up on their stories of broke musicians past. Let me sum it up as best I can: DO NOT SPEND ALL YOUR FUCKING MONEY. Even if you are super rich and famous and people give you free shit all the time, you should probably hold on to some of your money just in case, oh, I don’t know, you stop being famous or develop a drug habit or there’s a world economic crisis or something. And if you do act like a bonehead and spend all your money, try not to give interviews encouraging people to feel sorry for you, because if they’re anything like me they will have just lost their jobs and are trying to figure out how to get by and will actually hate you instead of feel bad and send you pennies in the mail.
That advice will be a thousand dollars, please, Ms. Allen. Cash is fine.
No, your job definitely does not pay you enough. Especially when you take into account all the unpaid overtime and boss-babysitting you have to do. But if you’re low on cash, might I suggest asking for a raise? Whatever you decide to do, don’t end up like assistant Monica Leissner of Dartford, England. The personal assistant, who worked at a law firm in London, developed a major coke/crack habit and started stealing money from her employers in order to pay her dealer. The kicker? It turns out that the company hadn’t yet done a thorough enough accounting of their bills to notice that the money was missing. Instead, Leissner got busted when she had a leetle too much to drink at a company-sponsored party and told her boss everything, from the fact that an ex-boyfriend had gotten her hooked in the first place to the fact that she owed more than 25K on her credit cards.
Continue reading ‘tip of the week: don’t embezzle, and definitely don’t tell anyone if you do’
Calling in sick is a fine art. After all, you have to sound convincingly sick, but you can’t sound too sick. And, unlike Ferris Bueller, you probably don’t have voice-changing software lying around your room. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has some useful fake-a-sick-day tips. Some of my own are below:
- Always, always call. Never email. If you email, it a) looks fake, and b) might make your boss think you are well enough to do some work from home.
- Don’t be overly specific. You can say that you have a migraine or a cold or the flu or whatever, but you don’t need to bolster your lie by listing all of your symptoms.
- Spread out your fake sick days. You will definitely get busted if you only get ’sick’ on Fridays in the summer. Especially if you show up sunburned on Monday.
Continue reading ‘how not to call in sick’
Well, you sent out a million resumes, went on countless interviews, sent perfectly worded followup emails, and now you’ve finally landed yourself a job. So…now what?
The only thing harder than finding a job is having a job, especially if it’s your very first job. All of a sudden the things that made you a kickass college student suddenly don’t translate into making you a good worker. Turns out your new boss couldn’t care less that you got an A in Modern Latin American Civilizations, he just wants you to be good at making coffee.
Mediabistro has a really helpful article about surviving your first 30 days at a new job. While, obviously, the piece focuses on what it’s like to have a media job, the advice is broad enough that you can apply it to any kind of office situation. For example, what do you do when you have the inevitable “oh my god, I suck at this” moment? How do you make a good impression? Who in the office should you suck up to? What information about yourself should you reveal, and what should you keep quiet? Don’t freak out–just print this out and keep it in your notebook for a few days.
Procrascipline, as coined by Slacker Manager, is a term he got from combining the words “discipline” and “procrastination.” And, considering how much I love procrastinating, I was intrigued by the idea of having a method to my slacker madness.
Procrascipline: (v) pro-crAS-sip-lyn, the discipline of procrastination. As in: “Boy, I really procrasciplined my way through that project!” Or, “Wow, what a talented procrascipliner you are! Will you marry me?”
I’ve said it before, but it’s worth repeating: highly effective slackers are very good at doing what is important to them. But maybe not so good at doing what’s important to others. That makes for fertile ground for procrastination to bloom and flourish. This is the bane of all highly effective slackers.
The first rule of procrascipline is that you must not ignore the task. The second rule of procrascipline is to que it up in one of your lists that you actually look at. Don’t bury that task in your “List of things that must never be acknowledged.” The third rule of procrascipline is to communicate your progress.
I always thought napping was pretty straightforward: grab a pillow and blanket, curl up in a ball, close eyes.
However, this incredibly complex/thorough chart from Boston.com brings the science–and the art–to napping. You’ll now learn valuable information like how long a sleep cycle lasts and whether you’re a lark or an owl.
It seems like every two weeks a new study comes out that has some title along the lines of “OMG people don’t get enuff sleep!!1!” Meanwhile, those of us who crawl half-dead into our cubicles every morning are like, “yeah, we know.” So let’s read this article instead, as it offers nine somewhat tongue-in-cheek tips for sleeping at work, including:
- Passing out in the bathroom
- Hiding under your cube
- Looking like you’re just concentrating really hard
- Getting creative with eye makeup (Side note: does anyone else remember that Calvin and Hobbes strip where he cut a golf ball in half, painted pupils on each one, and glued them to a pair of glasses?)
You definitely know what it’s like to go on interviews. But odds aren’t as high you’ve ever had to interview someone. This blog post gives insight into what it’s like to sit on the other side of the desk. It may be aimed at bosses instead of assistants, but the highly practical tips should make both parties happy. (Note: I hate when people don’t let you know one way or the other if you got the job. Not knowing is the worst!)
Don’t forget: you represent your company. Once, I got an interview with a “marketing boutique.” I was kind of excited about it. It sounded trendy, fast-paced, and down right fun. Upping the cool quotient was the fact that the office was based out of the owner’s studio loft apartment in a trendy par of town. I arrived at the apartment at the agreed upon time and knocked. I was greeted by the owner, a woman in cotton shorts and a t-shirt, no makeup, and flip flops. Her apartment was a mess, including the unmade bed in plain sight. Meanwhile, I was in a suit with light makeup and jewelery. The woman was abrasive, blunt, and down right annoying. I suffered through the interview and went home. I never contacted her again. I understand the perks of working out of your house. But seriously? A previously scheduled interview with a potential co-worker and you don’t even change clothes or make your bed?
If you end up not hiring someone, have the decency to tell them. Not that long ago I interviewed for an office position with a real estate group. The first interview went well and I came back for a second interview. The agent seemed excited and said many times how much she would like to hire me. At the end of the second interview, she even said “I’ll be in touch. I think we’re getting close.” I waited the alloted amount of time and when I hadn’t heard from her, I called and left a message. A few days later I emailed her. Two days after that, I saw the job re-posted on craigslist with the phrase, “We are looking for the RIGHT candidate.” Ouch. My respect for this woman went way down. I can handle not being right for the job. But after two interviews and hints that I WAS right for the job, are you really so cowardly that you can’t tell me you won’t be hiring me?
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