Venting HR Guy

Radio Silence for a Month - A Sad (but final) Goodbye

2009-12-21T06:42:00.000-05:00

Friends --

A few people have been wondering about my whereabouts. So here I am, to say good bye.

I started this blog to get loose and give my take on HR and DeltaHouse. And how I would relish a chance at a new job. Well friends, I'm happy to report I landed a new job that has literally everything I wanted: an HR department, a more professional group, leadership, and HR is revered there too!!!!!

I can't wait to start working at the new place! When I got the offer, I almost ran to the new place to start work. I almost grew wings and flew. I jumped for joy (literally)! I laughed my ass off!

And I realized this: I can't do this blog and work at the new job. It won't work. I'd have to assume that I would freaking hate the new place. And I don't want to hate it. I want to thrive. I want to out-work my co-workers.

So with that, I bid you all farewell. I loved every second of going undercover and doing this. I even made some friends (well, y'know... anonymously). I'll miss the posts, the tweets, and the feedback. But most of all the friends along the way.

To those who read this because you can relate to my plight I will say this: there is hope. Never lose sight of that. I did for a long time (hence, the blog). Never lose hope.

Best Wishes,
The Venting HR Guy

OK, need some help here...

2009-11-19T22:06:00.000-05:00

... I'm burned out on writing. So I'm going to let you, my loyal readers help me out.

I'm looking for guest writers.

Want to vent? Want to firebomb on your boss/company/life anonymously? Hit me up. Send me an email with your rant and I'll post it.

Just a character flaw

2009-11-18T21:10:00.002-05:00

I've been thinking about character flaws a lot lately. I have many (but the fact that I realize them is probably a good thing right? RIGHT?).

Some of mine:
I need praise/feedback - if I receive none, I get paranoid (hence today TheBoss asked me a question out of the blue and I freaked out, "TheBoss knows I'm alive! Uh oh, I don't have the answer to his question in front of me... THIS ISN'T GOOD!")

I also have a strong opinion about someone, or no opinion about someone. Meaning, I'm either completely biased, or not even a little biased in employee relations situations.

I take everything personally. I want you to like me even if I'm telling you that "we are freeing you up to look for better professional opportunities." I've gotten over that by a lot, but it's still there.

I get very annoyed when I'm working on something and someone interrupts with a question that doesn't involve life-or-death.

I get very annoyed when someone asks me a question that I feel that they should either know the answer to themselves because they asked me already, or could easily find out, but choose to be lazy.

The point is that I know what my flaws are. I try to deal with them as best as I can. A lot of HR is dealing with other people's intellectual and behavioral shortcomings and helping others to do so as well. (WOW! That sounded zen-like!) I know who isn't going to smile ever, who hates everyone, who isn't aware of how they look to other people, who's shy...

... who's shy. I get very annoyed with shy people.

TheBoss is shy. Someone told me this recently. And I never thought about that. But it's 100% true. That's why the DeltaHouse-saving leadership moment is never coming. TheBoss is too shy to give it. But he'll tell other people to have other people relay that message. And I was thinking about a lot of times where TheBoss being shy was the reason behind either A) really bizarre situations, or B) really bizarre behavior is deemed OK by TheBoss.

TheBoss cowers at the chance to make an address to the employees, or even write a quick note to the employee base (I do those). TheBoss doesn't walk around and ask people how they are doing (TheBoss asks me what I know about them). TheBoss doesn't tell people that they are doing good or bad work (he just asks me to can people who he's decided that doesn't like for zero discernable reason, fortunately I can stop that when it happens).

Here's why I get annoyed with shy people. Throughout my life as a child, I was shy (most children are, it's probably a natural defense mechanism). My parents refused to allow this. They taught me to shake hands with adults, look them in the eye, and greet them like a adult. And even engage them in brief conversation. This served me very well, and it helped shed shyness. But I've been constantly around people in my life that I never understood, then someone finally said, "They're shy! That's why they don't talk that much. You just have to get to know them."

HORSESH!T!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I have to work to get to know the shy person? Really? Why? Can't the shy person practice not being shy by stepping out of his shell and speaking to me? I'm pretty easy to talk to (I've checked). No one has to work to get to know me. Why do I need to work to get to know someone who'd rather be hidden in a hole somewhere rather than have to talk to other people.

DISCLAIMER: I have no point with this, I'm just venting. And I'm not talking about people with autism, or people with severe emotional disorders than prevent them from leaving the house. I'm talking about people who can work, but can't talk to co-workers.

Two More Characters at Work

2009-11-15T21:54:00.002-05:00

Every company has the same people as if the president went to Wal-Mart and picked up the religious zealot, the weekend warrior, the strict vegetarian, the problem drinker, the unimportant-important guy, the guy who no one knows what they're job is, and the HR person. Here are a few more...

"In my previous company." -- This person has a job at DeltaHouse. However, for reasons passing totally understanding, the company they came from did everything else better than DeltaHouse does. Which is fine in the cases where the new way is better. But I don't need to know when OldPlace had lunch, or how the offices were laid out, or that the receptionist was nicer, or that they had bagels on Fridays. If OldPlace was so f-ing great, why are you cursing us with your presence... you were fired, weren't you?

"Yeah, that's right guys." -- This person is the person who the one person who doesn't do the weekly report, or who leaves the coffeemaker on 24/7, or who leaves lights on all the time. Basically the one person in the group that hasn't figured out that they have to what everyone else is doing. So finally, the boss makes the speech to the entire group of employees saying that all weekly reports are due Wednesday at 10am. This person will look at the group like, "what's your problem?!?!" When we're talking about THEM!

Face-punchable offenses

2009-11-12T23:01:00.000-05:00

So I had an angry employee email me and copy TheBoss about an issue. Here's the sh!tty part, the person sending me the email never even came to me first in order to solve the problem. They just sent the email and copied TheBoss, forcing me to quickly solve the problem - dropping everything in the process.

This such crime should be punishable by a punch in the face. The person who the email is intended for such be able to either a) slam the sender's head into a doorframe, or b) ball up the fist and blow up the sender's face.

Other crimes that deserve a face-punch/head-slam...

* Re-copying TheBoss when I reply to just you to answer your question. I tried to act like an adult and emailed you back directly, and you opted to re-copy TheBoss in your email reply when this has nothing to do with him, you are just choosing to be an ass. This is more of a head-slam offense.

* The call-no-voice-mail-call-back-repeat. This person calls you. You have no time to pick up, or don't want to pick up. So you flush it to voice mail, you'll deal with it later. Instead the caller, calls you back five minutes later. Then four minutes later. Then three minutes later. Until you pick up. This happens to me once a week by a steady rotation of former employees who are calling me to see if we are hiring again yet. This is a face-punch offense.

* The a$$hole voice mail message. You've gotten this one, "VHRG, this is Whoever. Please call me back." Whoever won't tell you why they are calling, or even what it pertains to (are they a spy? do they need the antidote? are they in jail? were they abducted by aliens? did they lose their TV remote?). They just want a call back. And your curiousity forces you to call them back. And generally the topic is something that wasn't worth the mystery in the first place. Face-punch offense.

* The illogical timetable request. This is someone that wants you to find out something for then. However the person you need to work with is in another time zone, and odds are that person is still in the shower because they just woke up. Meanwhile, six minutes after the request is made, the follow up has already happened. The second follow up is ten minutes after that. The third is four minutes after that. The fourth is them plopping down in your office until their issue is solved. This requires a head-slam.

Got others?

I Hate Nepotism... er... Corporate Inbreeding

2009-11-10T21:41:00.003-05:00

I mentioned this in a tweet. I pure, straight, hate nepotism. I hate it for several reasons.

1) At VentingHRUncle's company, I'd dominate in HR there. I know the company well enough that I would have totally excelled there. But, they have a hard and fast anti-nepotism policy. And I really don't like the idea of hearing/over-hearing the idea of people bashing my family, and believing that this is a face-punching offense. Nor would I like to feel people go, "the VHRG is only here because VentingHRUncle is a VIP." It also has to cheapen the overall employment experience. You didn't get the job on your own laurels.

2) I have yet to see a case where this actually worked out well for all involved. At DeltaHouse, it happens a lot (though I've tried to stop it). At HRUtopia is happened a little bit (the biggest case was a person who went to the Vegas office a lot, however the Vegas office only had seven people and he really didn't need to go out there six times a year). The original employee feels like they are responsible for themself and the relative. If the relative doesn't work out, then the original employee is less engaged. And if the original employee has real nerve, they'll talk to the VHRG about the relative's performance.

3) The death of the original idea. If I hire nothing but friends and relatives, then I get nothing but the same damn ideas over and over again. I get the same attitudes, the same perspectives, and no clean slate. The relative has an opinion about the company courtesy of the orignal employee. And because of all of this zero new leadership or original ideas occur.

Why I Blog

2009-11-09T21:22:00.002-05:00

I tried to declare today Why Do You Blog Day. However, I was told it has already been done here and here. For me, at work, I have to pretend that I've never heard of blogging (even though I check out virtually all of my blog-amigos. Blamigos? I think I invented a word). So I missed Why Do I Blog day.

Originally, I blogged because exactly zero people at work cared about me. And I wanted to share these ridiculous stories (that I was convinced only happened to me, until Dan Johnson, Ben Eubanks, and several others told me that I am truly not alone). And... well... vent. (hence the name).

Now, I blog as a severe cautionary tale about the angst that your workforce might be experiencing. Because I'm generally someone with a good work attitude (and I fake it pretty well at work), who wants to out-work people, who can out-think the room, who knows the conversation before it happens, who thinks on his feet better than most people he knows, and who can get anyone want to join a company (even DeltaHouse).

But I'm also the result of zero mentoring (like for a his entire career), zero encouragement, absentee bosses, reversed decisions, irrational expectations, zero leadership, zero people getting my back, who doesn't get checked on (yet has to check on others - side note: BigCheese has been checking on me, kinda, but I don't trust being able to go, "I possess a strong desire to scream at so-and-so" without consequence), and who sees the ridiculousness of work and workers and bosses and wants to change it.

But my folks ain't fer fancified changes. Just ask the employee who asked if a doctor was covered in our insurance network. When I answered yes, I also included the link for being able to find physicians online (without asking me). Give a person a fish, you feed them for a day... However, the employee replied by informing my that it's my job to cheerfully find this information out. Teach a person to fish... and get yelled at.

I blog because I feel like I have to. It's therapeutic for me. Which also makes me wonder if I continue this blog when I exit DeltaHouse (what's getting weird is that several people I know via networking, etc. and they are following me as VHRG - high comedy/eerie). As important a thought, I have to warn you that your organizations have these managers and employees, and your job is to stop it.

OK, I'll ask...

2009-11-08T21:06:00.000-05:00

... why do companies have such elaborate systems for applying for jobs? I'm not going to remember the password that has to have letters, and special characters, and numbers. I mean, seriously, how many different ways can I spell, "ILoveBunnySlippers?" Which is my password for everything. I'M APPLYING FOR ONE DAMN JOB!!!!!

... Not to mention that I'm uploading my resume and then filling out little blanks for what's supposed to be on the resume throughout the process. Why is this extra step necessary?

... why are all Taco Bell room temperature's kept at thirty-three degrees? Do they not have refrigerators, and are just leaving the food out?

... if you get rejected for a job, for some reason, I feel like this forever damns you from being able to apply for another job again. Am I crazy for thinking that?

... has anyone ever posted a job "confidentially" on a job board and then had the person they were secretly trying to place apply for it? This has had to have happened, right?

... every job has to suck of some reason, right? Pro athlete: you can't eating dinner be yourself with a parade of fans bugging you. Comedian: perpetual requests to be funny. Author: constant criticism. Anonymous blogger: paranoia... no pay.

... does anyone actually eat the cinnamon raisin bagel? It's always the last bagel on the tray. Can we agree to stop having them added to the batch that gets brought to work?

... do those companies that offer professional help with resumes and applying to jobs work? They seem like a scam to me, be they advertise everywhere.

How long is too long?

2009-11-05T23:21:00.002-05:00

I play volleyball with someone who said that she spent too much time (11 years) at her first employer. She's been at her current employer for four years. And she said that 11 years was too long to stay at the first job. And I agree with that (that did sound a little over forever for a first job). But I'm wondering what that number is?

What's the threshold for being at an employer too long?

And what are the signs that the job you are in is the job that you should stay with for a while?

4 things I'm stunned people would rather have than money

2009-11-03T22:52:00.000-05:00

When you buy something, what you are essentially saying is this: "I would rather have the item/service that I'm about to buy than money." Now, of course, some things are necessities: food, shelter, clothes, electricity, etc. But there are other things that I've seen people purchase/own that just befuddle me: you would rather have this than money? Really?

Here are four...

Cell phone rings that are music - as someone who does recruiting, I can't tell you how many times I'll call someone and here those nine little words, "please enjoy the music while your party is reached..." and then I'm treated to "Free Bird" or "Boom Boom Pow" or "Paralyzer" while my opinion of the general intelligence and professionalism of the candidate is being shaped. And I can't help but to think, "Instead of $2 per month (or whatever this costs) this person wants me to have Safety Dance blaring in my ear?" Perfect example, ex-employee, CokeMachine came by to pick up papers from me. Before he comes by, I call him to clarify something... and... "FREE BIRD!!!!!!" In chatting with CokeMachine, I discover that times are tough, he can't find work, and he's using my info to get state assistance. I felt like saying, "Hey, I can give you $24 per year and make you more marketable at the same time!"

Vanity license plates - Pigeon was a former co-worker of mine who I just didn't get along with. She hated working and life in general, and I wanted to see her get stuck in an elevator full of pigeons (her phobia) for several hours. Anyway, she told me time and again about the sums of money I wasted going out to lunch every day. I tried to ignore it as much as possible (though I'm pretty sure she got of a tell-off or ninety-seven courtesy of me). Then one day she came in talking about her great new car. Our group went to see it. The car was covered with sh!t, including, but not limited to: several bumper stickers, fuzzy dice, a bead back-rest thingy, a steering wheel cover, and a vanity license plate that served as a double entendre for her love of weed. Yet, I was wasting money feeding myself.

Tattoos - I have an employee who wants to discuss two things: his low-pay and overall lack of having money, and his next tattoo. This guy has one sleeve tattoo, and an outline of something involving a dragon, a centaur, and a bikini clad woman who couldn't physiologically exist on his leg. But on the flip side, money's tight.

Top of the line cell phone - now I love gadgets, but I don't need to have a combo MP3 Player/Phone/Camera/Weapon that costs $700. Lumberjack has something that I don't think airport security would let onto a plane. On the flip side, Lumberjack has had his back account cleaned out... twice (according to him, "the bank totally f*cked me over"), and has had three bank judgments levied against him that I get stuck taking out of his paycheck.

5 Networking Rules

2009-11-02T21:36:00.000-05:00

I had a networking-connection-generated interview totally backfire on me. I had a phone interview and killed it. The interviewer loved me. I felt great. They had scheduled 30 minutes, the phone interview ended at 50 minutes. Great signs all around...

... until ...

... the question, "How much do you want to make?" was asked. Now, my networking contact gave me a range he believed they'd be willing to pay. Which is what I was looking to make. So I confidentally pitch out the number. Thank you... and... good niiiiiiiiii...

... WHAT?!?!?!?!

... What the hell just happened?

... What's that gasp on your end of the conversation for?

... Why do you suddenly sound tense?

... F*CK! The number was to damn high. I just freaking embarrassed myself. This isn't my fault. NETWORKING CONTAAAAAAAAACT!

As I sat there realizing what happened, I was stunned. How did this go so wrong so quickly? Basically a massive WTF happened as I realized I was going to have to go back to DeltaHouse in the morning sans hope... again.

But it also got me thinking about networking. There are no rules to networking. There's etiquette, but no real actual rules. So I'm going to take a shot at some rules to networking. Here's five that I came up with...

DISCLAIMER: PLEASE feel free to agree, disagree, add, update, or delete these rules. Maybe this could be THE preeminent networking list of rules.

By networking with a person, I signify that I understand the following...

1) ... unless we've been friends for a while, that any contact from you will be related to growing your business, job contacts, or promoting something for your business.

2) ... The Godfather Rule applies. In the movie The Godfather a man (Enzo? The baker? Was that has name?) asks Don Corleone for a favor (no, not Johnny Fontaine, the first guy). Don Corleone agrees to the request and in return he says that there could be a day - but this day may never come - where the Don asks for a favor in return, and the favor must be granted immediately. This rule applies to networking, if I ask you to do me a favor. And later on (years from then, even) if you ask me to do a favor, I'm honor-bound to do such a favor. And vice versa.

3) ... If something goes bad (interview, business deal, etc.), and I messed it up, I owe you an explanation and an apology. You put your neck out there for me, and I messed it up. Let's be professional here. The same is true in reverse. I'd love my networking contact to explain to me WTF happened with the phone interview, but no dice. He's been in hiding. I'd rather just hear what happened. I'm not mad, I just want closure.

4) ... If the networking contact produce something for you (a job, a business deal, a new connection, a new friend, etc.) you owe them a thanks. It could be a thank you note. If it's a job or a business deal, I'd hope it'd be more. If the networking contact's job interview hook-up had paid off, I was prepared to send a few bottles of wine over to him at his office as a thanks. And if any job comes through a networking contact, I'll gladly get somebody some wine courtesy of the VHRG!

Ways you could be losing your employees

2009-11-01T21:15:00.000-05:00

I was at a networking event recently, and in the chaos that these events tend to be, I found a group of people that I generally liked, and to a person each of us said something to the effect of, "as soon as the economy picks up, I'm gone." Turns out there's a mini-nation of VHRG's out there looking to do the same thing as this VHRG (third person... BOOM!). Reasons for the desire to move ran the gamut: money, fresh start, tired of the company, tired of the people, never any good news, beat down, etc.

But along these lines, the topic turned to what could be (or could have been, if they were as far gone as me - trust me, met a few, even at companies that I think wouldn't be too bad to work for) to save these orators, poets, and statesmen of HR. Here's some of the stuff that we came us with...

1) Spending money - GASP! Times are tough, VHRG! There is no money! True. But I'm not talking about raises or bonuses. I'm talking about a party. I'm talking about a social gathering where people remember that we are- first and foremost - people. I have two friends in the hotel industry, they are convinced that the year-end party is a dinosaur at this point. Find a place and get a deal and spend a little to have a good time. If employee say, "I'd rather just have a raise." The response is, "It's this party or nothing. What do you choose?"

2) Not checking on your employees - This is to the end of not verbally pumping up employees. Many companies think that a review equals a raise. Incorrect. A review (especially a positive one) even without a raise could make employees feel at least as if the work they are doing counts for something and is being noticed.

3) Not updating the employees - What is the company doing to try to get new business? What suggestions do you have for business success? How is the company doing? Let get everything out on the table. Have ideas of how to grow business? Bring it on!

4) Reminding them that the job market and economy sucks - Tell them that they are lucky to even still miraculously be employed while you're at it (Punk Rock HR, nailed this last week). Then kick their dog. That'll drum up loyalty real quick.

5) Not having fun - Create your own fun. Contests. Games. Parties. Come up with something, anything that you could do to make the current work situation suck less. Your goal needs to be to return the smiles to the company (even if it's for 30 minutes).

Halloween: Work Style!

2009-10-29T19:14:00.002-04:00

I decided on a vampire for Halloween. And no, the VHRG (went third person on you again... BOOM!) isn't talking about the Twilight vampires. I'm talking old school black cape, pasty skin, fangs, slicked back hair, and blood trailing down the chin.

OK, I want to have the list! Give it to me. I want to know what Halloween costumes you've seen at work. What was awesome? What crossed the line? What revealed too much about a person?

I want to know what costumes you've had to send people home because it showed a little too much.

I want to know about people who weren't at all aware of their body type.

I want to know if someone dressed like another employee, and how that went.

I'll post the best comments as their own posting. I think this could be a lot of fun.

More weird stuff that happened to me at work...

2009-10-28T22:33:00.000-04:00

... I quit a job to work for another company, in the same building. So I basically just dropped down a few floors in an office building. However, for six months after I stopped working at the first company, the HR Manager there would tell me she had a project for me to work on, and would ask if I could see her that afternoon. I always said, "No problem."

... I had a boss that would buy anything a vendor tried to sell her, so long as they took her to dinner (and drinks... lots and lots of drinks). We had two HRIS systems because of this.

... I had someone ask my marital status in a job interview. Thank goodness I got the job. I think my first thought would have been to sue if I didn't.

... I worked with someone who sneezed so loud, I could hear her on the other end of the office.

... I had a manager who had a meeting with us. After she left, we closed the door and met ourselves to figure out responsibilities for the project she assigned. Realizing that we had a closed door, the manager came back in to clarify something, then left with the door to the room open. We closed it again. She then came back to say something else, then left leaving the door open. We closed it again. She then just opened the door and left. Clearly we weren't allowed to have a closed-door meeting.

... I was doing a phone interview, StoneCold knocked on the door. I motion through the tiny window that I was on the phone. StoneCold nodded in understanding, and then stood there staring at me until I was done with the phone interview. The critically urgent matter: He wanted to hand me a doctor's note for yesterday's absence. The company paid him $5.90 to do that, I did the math.

What's really going to spark the job market...

2009-10-25T22:13:00.002-04:00

... OK, so I used to think that about a year from now, you are going to see a massive game of musical chair where throngs of people would go from job to job in a six month period because of...

a) The natural order of things. People just leave jobs. Think back five years ago, how many people are still at those companies. At SoulCrush, there are two in my group of eight that are still there.

b) People are blaming the messenger. Even if their company wasn't responsible for the crappy condition the company is in (economic conditions/bad luck/poor management), it doesn't matter, they're pissed, and they need a fresh start. They blame the company for pay-cut/no raises, increased workloads, decreased friends at work, decreased happiness at work, etc.

c) The natural throngs of re-hiring that companies would do when the economy bounced back. The ides was that if you had one person doing the job of three, then you would expect the company to add at least one more person to help.

I no longer think that these things are going to be what pulls the job market back up to where it ought to be.

I think two things are going to shepherd the job market back to proposerity...

1) The increase in green technologies. No one cared nearly as much five years ago, even two years ago as they do now on the being green. There will be green jobs created that will start a bit of light shifting in the job market that might free some opportunities up in the job market.

2) And more importantly: the stock market. The stock market was at 14,000 points at it's height before the badness that occurred. Then the, "My 401-k is now a 201-K" jokes started flying. But if the stock market can scratch 14,000 again, my thought is that the Baby Boomers - many of whom were thinking of calling it a career at some point between 2008 and 2014 - will start re-considering retirement as a possibility when the stock market is back up to the level that is was when they were in that frame of mind. Now that they don't have to work anymore... they won't. And they'll leave. And then those jobs will get created.

HOWEVER, this doesn't necessarily mean that all Baby Boomers that thought of retiring will be able to do so. Many of them will have to work past the 14,000 re-climb because they've gotten stuck having to empty their 401-k's in order to make ends meet.

Just a thought, feel free to ridicule.

When Life and Work Collide...

2009-10-21T21:20:00.003-04:00

There's been talk about work/life balance a lot lately. HR Happy Hour even discussed "work/life blend" a few podcasts ago. I think this is 100% correct. People that get offended about the idea of "work/life blend" still think that work looks like when Ward would come home on Leave it to Beaver, talk breifly about getting the Peterson Account and you would never hear anything more because Eddie Haskel just complemented Ms. Cleaver's rack.. of lamb.

If you don't understand the above reference it is because it came from a TV show from the 1950's when people were expected to leave work at work and home at home and that was that.

Now you are thinking about work at home and home at work. Everyone has an office phone, cell phone, three email accounts, Facebook, Twitter, and the ability to check any one of these things at any time all the time.

Enter the work/life blend.

The bad side of the work/life blend is this story from DeltaHouse...

NotReadyForLife was overwhelmed by work. She had just entered the working world, and the need to meet deadlines, and the requirement of showing up to work got in the way of her social life in a big way. Not to mention that her family was simply happy that she was employed (and occasionally called me in case FireHydrant was a meanie to her).

I think the main reason I blog is because I've been in enough companies where this sort of stuff just doesn't happen, and would NEVER happen, and could never happen. Because I know that a good company (even a mediocre one) runs much, much, MUCH better than DeltaHouse does. Because I know that half of the long-term employees at DeltaHouse would get killed in a job interview because of their personality issue that I "just have to understand" that so-and-so is crazy/racist/sexist/angry/on his meds/off her meds/lonely/horny/cranky/caffeinated/a jackass/dumb/makes poor life decisions/mean/quiet and I have to be flexible around that and just deal with it.

Anyway, I'm walking through the office to talk to LikeableQuietGirl, and I notice that NotReadyForLife is stoically puffy-eyed-and-crying. And being that I've already had to hear about how PrettyFatGirl is mean to her, I really don't want to know what she's crying over. This is sad, I know. This is also the part where you accuse me of being a sh!tty HR person.

But she didn't come to me, she's just sitting there crying. LikeableQuietGirl walks with me back to my office and says that NoyReadyForLife is crying because her parents called her fifteen minutes ago and told her they had to put her dog to sleep!!!!!!!! It is 2:30 in the afternoon. This couldn't wait until she got home? This is critical information that she needed at that moment? This ruined her work for a solid week. It made half of DeltaHouse way uncomfortable, and for what? A piece of non-urgent-yet-important piece of information that could have waited.

Cheers to Ben Eubanks

2009-10-21T20:46:00.002-04:00

So my guy Ben Eubanks took a few minutes to talk about the VHRG. (I just went third-person on you... BOOM!) And he had questioned the leadership at DelatHouse and TheBoss, as the primary reason for my disenchantment at DeltaHouse. And he hit the nail on the head for me. Allow me to explain using an example from this week.

MiddlePart needs a new person. A good person. The right person. I know MiddlePart needs this person. I like MiddlePart (other than a middle part that would make Dwight Schrute jealous) so this is going to be fun for me. Find someone good... I love finding someone good. For some reason, no one at DeltaHouse has a budget that they can spend. Basically, you have you ask your boss (in my case, TheBoss) for clearance to spend money. Typically the decision is made based on how serious he perceives the needs to be and if there is money. I inform MiddlePart of this and cringe as I do it because I know what TheBoss is going to say at the suggestion of spending money on a job posting... "Can't you post on Craig's List for free?"

Which is exactly what his email said two hours later when he responded. TheBoss doesn't get the VHRG's back, the VHRG tried to hire without getting enough candidates, MiddlePart makes a hire he's not too excited about, the hire has a higher probability of failing because the process that TheBoss wanted to do was cheap and sucked, MiddlePart has a bad feeling about the hire and if the hire falters, he'll be out. Crappy leadership.

Moral of the story: If you have a good leader and a good culture, hold on to it with both hands, and never let go.

4 Types of People that Will Ruin Lunch

2009-10-20T22:47:00.000-04:00

First thing's first, I'm going to be on the HR Happy Hour podcast on Thursday (live), or Friday (podcasted). Check it out. I'm going to tell some stories I wrote about already. And some new ones too. Back to the article.

The group lunch, the most ridiculous social experiment in the history of work. You and people that you kinda like are about to go out to lunch together. Here are the people that are going to go with you for lunch...

No Veggie Guy
This guy doesn't want any vegetables... ever. If it's green and he's eating it, it's cookie icing. His hamburger has only cheese, meat, and maybe ketchup on it. If you ask him why he has made such a lifestyle choice, he reacts like a vegetarian.

No Ethnic Food Guy
(by the way, "guy" is just easier to write. Feel free to assume I mean both genders). This person is afraid of any kind of ethnic food. And no, I don't mean the questionable Indian food buffet down the street. No Ethnic Food Guy doesn't want spaghetti or tacos, or any of that other "foreign food."

The Vegetarian
This person is scary. They go to lunch, sip diet soda, and ask for a side of rice. Then blather on about how this was the only option available to them to eat. Before lunch they "didn't care" about where you were going to go. Now that the group picked, you are treated to stories about how the cows that went into the burger you are currently eating... nevermind. You didn't want to know the first time.

The Creature of Habit
This person only wants to go the place you've been going every day for the past past seven years and order the same sandwich/salad/dish that they've always ordered. They get the shakes when you suggest going to a new place, because that new place isn't the same place you've been going to forever. And if you get lunch at the new place, that means you're not going to the same place you've been going to forever.

Weird Question...

2009-10-19T21:09:00.001-04:00

... How frequently should one look online for a job? Daily? Weekly? Does anyone know of a site that I might not be thinking about?

Halloween Costume Ideas? Anybody?

2009-10-19T20:45:00.002-04:00

For some reason, DeltaHouse feels the need to have people dress up for Halloween. For even strangers reason last year, we fired a girl on Halloween. Imagine someone dressed and made up exactly like The Joker from The Dark Knight letting you go... it happened. That's the last time I call in sick on Halloween. So anyway, I need an idea for Halloween. And I figure that being that I'm the perceived black hole of all that is good and pure at DeltaHouse I ought to dress the part. Any ideas? I was thinking devil or vampire.

My (semi) irrational hatred of Subway

2009-10-18T22:18:00.002-04:00

Subway... eat fresh!

Taste nothing!

I can't stand Subway. It's a lunch option that I pass every single day. Any time I think it's a good idea to eat there and I go, I immediately regret it.

Subway is horrible.

First, the gap between the pictures of the food and the food you actually get is insane. The commercials make the food look delicious. What you actually get looks like it could give you diphtheria.

Second, zero taste. Only at Subway could you get a meatball sub and be stuck in a debate with yourself heading back to work as to whether or not you actually consumed food during your lunch. I believe this is because of the "meat" that is available at subway. If you got these "meats" from your favorite deli, it wouldn't be your favorite deli anymore. It has no flavor. Don't believe me? Get a 6-inch sub with your favorite roast beef/turkey/ham, with whatever you get on it, and then get a veggie sub with the same ingredients and tell me if you notice the difference.

Third, yes, it healthy, but the healthy subs are the same ones that taste the worst. But this isn't going to be a riff about health. Heaven knows that more fast food places should strive to offer better choices. This is about the options that you have to make the food taste better. To keep the sandwich healthy, you can put mustard, spices, or... mustard on the sandwich. The other option is toast the sub the the oven. For 20 seconds of overheating, your sandwich will come out semi-hot and smelling like someone lit a dumpster on fire.

Finally, the staff that typically is employed at these places tend to look like they are waiting for a call from the governor to stop the execution. I understand that when we were kids exactly zero of us said, "I want to make below mediocre sandwiches at a chain restaurant." But could you at least lie to me and fake like you actually want to be there. The rest of the working has to do it. Subway should be an exception.

By the way, with the chips, the drink, and the antidote, that'll be $8.59.

Three Work Products/Services That Are Truly Needed

2009-10-13T22:24:00.000-04:00

OK, I really wish there were certain things that you could have or do at work, that you just can't. Because of laws... but, mainly etiquette... and propriety.

1) Pimp my Cubicle - Ever since Pimp my Ride came out (it isn't still out, is it? That show was like Celebrity Deathmatch, cool, but eventually we got the point), but picture a service that could put what ever you want in your office/cube. Wall-sized computer monitors. Trap doors. Couches. Wall safes instead of locking file cabinets.

2) De-Pimp their Cubicle - Do you have co-worker who still has the same picture of her kids or cats from six years ago? Venting HR Parents still have my high school picture in their offices. But still, let's make the point that you are looking at their workspace too. It's not just about them. You have to look at the cat-len-dar, and their oriental rug that is inexplicably in their space. Next day, they come in to: neon lights and a disco ball!

3) Anonymous Hate Mail - Have an employee that is driving you nuts about a specific thing? Here's where you get to have your say while making them think that the conspiracy is that much more. Send them anonymous hate mail. HarleyGuy can come to work with an email saying, "Hey HarleyGuy, exactly zero people care about the time you and your other geriatric friends went to a biker bar 40 miles away. You are holding people hostage with your conversations." Solves a problem. Go to collegehumor.com and read Roomate Confession for your on free ideas.

Random Ramblings of HR Blog Post

2009-10-11T21:33:00.002-04:00

I have nothing great to post with tonight. No long story of anything. I have a few that I'm sitting on, but I don't have it in me to write them tonight. But I have a few rambling thoughts. Mostly HR/employment realted.

In case you haven't figure it out by now, I am really bad at opening paragraphs. Like brutally, painfully bad. Like remedial English class bad.

I think that people act like the job that they are in now is the job and they are going to have forever. I believe that's a survival tactic. But think about it, if you you decided that this isn't where you were going to be forever, would you try to make friends? Would you care about long term assignments? Nope.

I forgot to add to Friday's post of weird stuff that happened to me at work (see below), that I once once involved in a bizarre, yet heated, lunchroom table turf war with a group of secretaries that averaged 300 pounds and a pack of cigarettes per day. My strategy was to out-live them.

Similar thought to the one above: I actually watched an entire season of The Simpsons on DVD at work during a day when the VIP's were at a golf outing and I was one of the remaining four people NOT cool enough to go on the golf outing.

I've recently read articles about how the economy is causing more and more depression. Lesson: be a psychiatrist. Just kidding (man, that was just a terrible joke.). But I can see it at DeltaHouse, it's sad. We used to joke, and have fun together. Well, not "me" in the "we", but still. I think people at DeltaHouse notice this, but don't notice it.

If you have a good boss, keep them (as much as possible)! I have yet to have a good boss (the best I had was "average" as told to me by UtopiaSavior), and I've been working since Bill Clinton was president. Good bosses care about you, teach you, and want the best for you - in exchange, you break your ass for them, and work to make them look good.

Weird Stuff That Has Happened to Me at Work

2009-10-08T21:19:00.003-04:00

Lots of people have had strange things that have happened to them at work. Here are some of mine...

I once had a manager take her team out to dinner to a fancy steak and sushi place. We ordered drinks and then I notice that there were no menus be given out. Instead massive trays of sushi were brought out. VHRG's lifetime sushi experience up to that point: zero.

I had a boss who would quarterly host parties at her house. No music. No TV. Just drinking and her awful cooking. Why not say you had plans? Because she kept track of your vacation days and knew if you were really skipping town. You have someone coming in town to visit? Bring them along. SLOW DEATH.

I had a boss literally stand over my shoulder and watch me work. Her record: 93 minutes. Previous record: 81 minutes. Times I debated conjuring gas to pass during both records: 6.

The president of a company I worked at kept calling me, "Vince." My name isn't Vince, by the way, it isn't even close. But he's the president, so...

The same president would take time during Christmas (right before raise time) to inform us that the company didn't do that well this year. Totally unrelated, he would be driving a brand new car in February.

For that president, we had a Christmas gift collection that we were "strongly encouraged" to donate money toward (so the guy who doesn't need money has money collected for him for a gift). We would go present him with the gift. And in return, he would give us war stories from Vietnam for an hour. I'll take this time to mention that our IT guy was from Vietnam.

I don't know why I'm on the polite kick, but...

2009-10-07T22:05:00.002-04:00

At a previous job, a boss I had would stand at my cube opening/non-wall (directly behind me) and wait for me to notice he was there. Usually, that took about a minute. Any longer than that and the boss started breathing hard through his nose (with a nose whistle, did I mention he has a long mustache that fluttered when he breathed? It's more ridiculous that way, but still true, and funny. Let just move on.) to let me know he was there. I finally took this as an insult that this person couldn’t take the time to figure out my name, or have the human decency to do the fake-knock, or say, "Hey VHRG." So the next time it happened, I let the boss stand there breathing hard.

Why?

Because the guy couldn’t call bring himself to call me by name. Anyway, I wanted to let him stand there and see breathe hard waiting for me to notice. Ten minutes later, I finally turned around. The guy looked like he was about the hyperventilate.

Why can't we...?

2009-10-06T21:13:00.001-04:00

Going off of yesterday's post I kept thinking about this idea of being more honest and less nice. Why can't we? Why can't we as HR people be truthful?

When I was in college, my friends used to take every decline letter that I received (and I literally covered one wall in my apartment with decline letters) and "interpret them" for me. So if a letter said, "We truly enjoyed meeting you. However, at this time we have made the decision to pursue other candidates." My friends would write, "We truly enjoyed meeting you (we needed a candidate to laugh at to break up a day of monotony). However, at the times we have made the decision to (find people who don't suck at life. Please work anywhere else. Preferably a place that involves you not working near our employees that might get dumber from being near you.)."

Believe it or not, if I got a decline letter like that, I'd be psyched. HONESTY! Thank you for telling me that I didn't meet your standard. Thank you for telling me what I lacked in a candidate that you were wanting.

Why can't we do this with our candidates or employees?

I have an employee, Angry, that calls me three times a week to yell at me about insurance. Why do I not say to him, "Angry, I'm going to hang out the phone, feel free to call me back when you are calm and want to have a respectful, calm conversation like a mature adult with decency?" Why shouldn't I do that? Why should I take the yelling from this guy?

Why can't I say to the employee, "the reason you didn't get the promotion is because we tested you, and the test said you weren't smart enough to handle the work necessary for the position?" Or "your reputation as a lazy employee prohibited you from getting this job?"

Why can't you to the candidate, "the reason I'm not going to select you for the interview is because every day at 10:20am you call to ask me if I've received your resume. And frankly, I think meeting you would be obnoxious and irritating?"

Why is lying necessary? Or being less than 100% honest? Why provide false hope? Why not just say it?

Yes, you'll insult people. But is it insulting if it is honest?

The Work Version of He's Just Not That Into You

2009-10-05T21:09:00.000-04:00

I've had a few people quit DeltaHouse lately. And we have had to replace that talent with other people. And believe me, we look at the throngs of people that we have RIF'd to see if they can fill the need. But there are some employees that we are never bringing back.

EVER.

HotSauce is one of these employees. He used to make widgets... slowly. He missed work for crappy reasons. And he was the first employee that we thought, "Yeah, he's got to go."

After SlimShady and Barrel quit, HotSauce calls me. He's been off work from us for almost a year. He tells me that he's heard that we were looking for people. And that he's (shockingly) available.

I hem and haw, and dance around the issue. And somehow get him off the phone. But I don't insult him. I wonder if I should have.

What would have the harm been if I told the guy, "HotSauce, you just weren't that good when you were here. That's why we won't bring you back?"

PROS: It's honest. It's direct. It gets the point across. It eliminates hope that he might have that he'll work at DeltaHouse again. He'll never call me again.

CONS: He could call TheBoss and tell him what a meanie I was to him; followed by the subsequent visit from TheBoss explaining that I was a meanie and the speech that says that I shouldn't be mean. Kicking a man who's been unemployed for a year while he's down isn't exactly going to the list of Top Ten Best Moment of Being a Human Being in my life. He might come down and shoot me.

How do my HR people handle this situation?

The Double Life of a Job Seeker

2009-10-04T22:02:00.000-04:00

It is hard to be actively looking for a job while still keeping your current position. You have to make sure that nothing slips at work. You still must make sure you do everything that you normally do in a day. And do it cheerfully, happily, quickly, and with the same amount of quality as you normally do. That is what you do by day.

But by night, you are pounding job websites, looking for companies to see if they have anything posted. And if they do you are squeezing your LinkedIn, Facebook, and other social connection to see if they know somebody, who knows somebody, who knows somebody that can put your resume front-and-center to the right person.

By day, you don't answer your cell phone. You let the unknown callers leave you a message. You schedule phone interviews during lunch breaks. You take get to a location with a lot of cars and people, and minimal chance that someone from your company can actually see you. You secretly scavenge for emails looking for any news.

But as soon as someone comes in to your office, you have you quickly re-focus your energy into where you are now. Not where you want to be.

It's a secret you keep only to yourself. It gives you a little bit of power (at least perceived power) over your situation.

NOTE: I've applied to about 50 jobs online in the past 6 months, and have had about 5 phone interviews. So it isn't like this is happening every week.

NOTE #2: I'm not leaving DeltaHouse without a job that is a marked upgrade in the following areas: (1) pay - I've got to do better in this regard, otherwise what's the point? (2) type of work - a phone interview I had said I wouldn't be doing 95% of the stuff that I hate that I do at DeltaHouse (example: I frequently get yelled at by employees about insurance things that are out of my hands and have no control over, the company has a department for those question/getting yelled at!). This sounds like Heaven on a biscuit to me, (3) type of company - I don't care about our widgets, or who buys them, or what they do with them; gimme a company I can get on board with.

NOTE #3: I am well-aware that I should feel lucky to even have a job. I do. But I'm not apologizing for wanting more or wanting a better situation. I shouldn't have to. When employers are asking me what I want to make, I've decided that the answer, "I'm sure you will pay to the responsibility of the position," is total horsesh!t. I'm telling recruiter what I want. I'm not for wasting everyone's time.

NOTE #4: Exactly every unhappy employee is tired of hearing how lucky they are to be working a job that they are unhappy with.

Some of my lunch options...

2009-09-28T22:19:00.002-04:00

OK, as I debate whether or not I'm keeping the blog (twitter is much more fun), here is what I'm debating for lunch options today...

1) The Chinese Buffet

Pros: Chinese Food (even decent Chinese food). Eat all you want and then a little bit more.

Cons: Two hours after the Chinese buffet. Not to mention the typical people that you'll find in the Chinese buffet. Average weight: 250 pounds.

2) The fast food place

Pros: Fast, food.

Cons: Odds that the meal will be incorrect: 82%. Freezing AC temperature. Slippery floors. The food NEVER looks like the picture. It isn't even close to the picture.

3) The Mexican place

Pros: Chips and salsa. Decent enough food.

Cons: By the time you actually get your food, you have already gotten full on chips and salsa, so you typically eat the food anyway and feel horrible. Until the fifth bathroom trip.

What would you have done?

2009-09-16T23:38:00.000-04:00

I was in a situation today that I can't figure out what the right way to handle it was.

SomeGuy came in to DeltaHouse and demanded to speak to me PainInTheAss was manning the receptionist desk and saw that SomeGuy was serious. So she emergency paged me to the lobby. And there was SomeGuy, angry, out-of-work, desperate, and needed to get off on somebody. VHRG happened to be somebody. He complained that he applied (three times) for a job I posted that he wasn't qualified for. He didn't read the job description, he just fired a resume. But he wanted to know why he wasn't hired, etc. I look at PainInTheAss, and she's focused on something else. I wind my way out of the coversation, I didn't know what to tell the guy to make him happily leave DeltaHouse. He finally left, PainInTheAss didn't look up from her work, and I really wanted to say, "don't you ever f*cking do that to me again!" But she'd have gone to TheBoss, and say I was mean, and TheBoss (who always sides with PainInTheAss, hence making her a pain in the ass) would have told me that I should be nicer.

Upon reflecting on this I was thinking about this story for the points of view of everyone...

VHRG - Trying to find the best person for the fit at DeltaHouse. Trying to end a conversation with an unqualified candidate who didn't read the job description. And not writing decline letters/emails because, frankly I don't have the time, and I don't want to spend the $43.56 of DeltaHouse's money on declining people.

PainInTheAss - Hates VHRG'S guts, in a way that would only accurately manifest itself in a fireworks show that she'd sponsor after I got fired. Wants to get SomeGuy out of the lobby. Wants to move on with her day and SomeGuy has B.O. F the VHRG, I'm making this his problem.

SomeGuy - Doesn't hear back from companies (they don't want to spend the $0.44 to decline him either). Hasn't worked in over a year. His unemployment benefits are starting to run out. Doesn't understand why he isn't getting called back by anyone (hint: resume is terrible, didn't read the job description before applying for the job). Is having his calls ignored. Is going to take it out someone. VHRG is going to hear about this. Somebody needs to.

Giving Career Advice

2009-09-15T23:27:00.001-04:00

The Venting Sister-In-Law is having good things happening to her career, but needs some help making decisions as to what to do. I jumped in and gave her my take. She asked for my opinion, I feel that only in three circumstance should you give your opinion: 1) when asked, 2) when talking about sports, 3) when the person is on fire.

It was a good experience. I felt like I was being positive, and not lecturing about anything. And that was great. It was great to focus on positive aspects of HR for a change.

Nobody asked me, but...

2009-09-15T20:55:00.000-04:00

... NewGuy and FutureStar are slipping toward the dark side. A place that I am currently residing at DeltaHouse (not publicly, or course, but still). I've had three separate people ask my to talk to FutureStar to see how she's doing, and she's not talking. But then I asked what she's working on, and a lot of it is her equivalent of mixing together oil and water. NewGuy asks me questions about certain things, and I'm truthful with him about it, and the new-guy-gleam is starting to wear off, I can tell.

... I'm slightly enjoying the previous point. Just a little. I feel like they're on my side (kinda).

... Knob (the IT guy) is either a tragic hero to be sympathized with, Sisyphus, or totally incompetent. I can't decide which.

... I just finished reading a book that is straight-up ironic, considering my blog. Check out Jeremy Blachman on amazon.com to see what I mean.

... My exit interview will be posted on this blog. Being that the actual exit interview will never actually happen if I do leave.

... Employees that have personality issues that I have to cater for fall into one of two catergories: eccentric genius or moron.

... If you ride a motorcycle to work, and talk about your motorcycle incessantly, you are proclaiming, "There is nothing else interesting about me!"

... HR is the only occupation that varies as much as it does from company to company. Some companies see it as filling out forms, others see it as a key strategic postion within the organization. No other position in a company is as varied.

... I tweeted that I had a phone interview. Here's how it went in baseball terms: two down, bottom of the ninth, score tied... I crush a home run... and shatter my ankle in five places twelve feet before home plate. The question: "How much do you want to make?"

A Brief Philosophical Question

2009-09-11T21:57:00.000-04:00

HR folks, lend me your brains.

I have several (largely, male) employees who don't understand our health insurance (and they don't want to understand them either). This is just as many blue-collar types as white-collar types, so this won't be a rant on that stuff.

Instead of the (largely, male) employees asking questions to me, they have their wives call me to make sense of everything.

The (largely, male) employees don't have a problem with this. Almost like they would just assume tell me, "I'm too dumb or lazy to understand this. Here, talk to her." And if I made them sign a statement with that exact statement, they would.

However, we, as HR folk, are NOT supposed to talk to company outsiders (generally). So how do you handle this?

I've sucked it up, and decided that (as in many previous blogs), yes some of my employees are too stupid to understand insurance coverage and I'm willing to talk to wives. Even though, I know I should.

What do you do?

Proving the point

2009-09-09T22:28:00.003-04:00

So here is the post that started the past few arguments of me not being as nice as a should and my dislike of stupid employees that make poor life choices. After all of this NewGuy and BigCheese informed me that I need to be more available to the employees and help them out more.

So, military style, I followed the directive. I apologized to Oldsmobile and said that I want to be able to help him. He smiled (missing four teeth) and said, "Thanks VHRG!"

Apparently news of my changed ways rocketed through the manufacturing wing of DeltaHouse as I got rained upon with pay advance requests. Concrete needed to take his kids back to school shopping. EightKids took his kids back to school shopping and was light that week. Frankenstein needed a car (his got repo'd when his girlfriend got a hold of his credit card). And following the directive, I cheerfully, happily - nay, merrily - gave my hard-working employees in these trying economic times cash that they desperately needed to help make ends meet. However, being that I'm so merry, I won't point out that they'll be lighter in the next pay repaying the advances, and functionally they're Ponzi scheming themselves.

Then Oldsmobile smiled into my office.

Oldsmobile: "VHRG, got a minute?"
VHRG: (smiling, and happy to see that Oldsmobile would like to see me) "Yes, Oldsmobile, what can I help you with?"
Oldsmobile (smiling the four-missing-teeth-smile) "I need another advance. I couldn't make rent last month."
VHRG: "No problem! How much do you need?"

Two hours later NewGuy comes in...

NewGuy: "Oldsmobile needs another f*cking loan? What the f*ck is going on?"
VHRG: "NewGuy, I'm simply being more available to meet the need of our employees. Remember? Like you said."
NewGuy (utterly unimpressed): "Seriously, what's this guy's problem?"
VHRG: "It doesn't matter what Oldsmobile's problem is, at DeltaHouse, we hug our special employees and help them whenever we can."
NewGuy: "Cut the bit!"
VHRG: "I'm simply abiding by what was directed to me by you and BigCheese."
NewGuy (groans, and leaves, but while he's halfway out the door.)
VHRG: "By the way, I told you so."

Two More Characters at Work

2009-09-08T22:02:00.002-04:00

At work there are many different types of people. Here are a few more people that you either may be, may know, or may have heard of.

The Not-That-Hot Girl

She's cute, but not that cute. But she knows she's really cute. Downright hot even. And she tries to use her self-granted hotness to her advantage. Unfortunately, their are two big problems. 1) She's a total b!tch. She not nearly as nice as she thinks she is, would never return a favor, and thinks that she's too hot for bad things to happen to her.

Later in career becomes: The office slut.

Line you'll hear her say: "I need some help closing out the book for last month (slowly leans on desk), know of anyone nice gentlemen who can help poor little me?"

Line you'll say back: No.

The Guy Who Can't Make Eye Contact

This guy is hilarious. He'll talk to you. He'll even look at you. But he'll focus on a spot on your body that isn't your face. He's not ogling you, he just can't bring himself to actually make eye contact. He'll still have hand motions, and facial expressions of someone that has self-esteem and self-respect, but the fact that he thinks looking into your eyes will turn him to stone show you that he doesn't think very highly of himself.

Later in career becomes: The guy who's most likely to shoot up an office.

Line you'll hear him say: Anything really, just don't expect him to look at your face when he says it.

Line you'll say back: "Are you looking at my crotch?"

What matters when looking for a job

2009-09-07T21:52:00.001-04:00

So Ben Eubanks (who is quickly about to join Dan Johnson in My Guy status) gave me something to think about when it comes to looking for a job. I realize the HR is my passion for work. I get a charge out of doing the tougher stuff. I just wish I did more of it than I do. More problem-solving and people-issues than the nuts and bolts that I do would be awesome.

So I'm looking for a new gig (duh!), and I'm thinking about what I'm looking for in a job. Here's what it'd take...

I have to appreciate what the company does - this is different than liking it. I'm sure that if I worked as an HR rep at a bank, and the bank repo'd cars and foreclosed on homes, I'd feel badly about that. But I'd apprecaite that they give other people a chance at owning a home or business or car that they might not otherwise be able to afford. It's not loving the bank, but appreciating the bank. I could give a sh!t about the widgets at DeltaHouse.
I have to have a mentor - I don't care if I just have one HR person that I report to, I need someone that can help me take my career to the next level.
I have to have good problems to solve - Yes, I know that, "benefits suck," or "the guy next to me smells awful" is a part of the job. But the more complex problems, the tougher issues is what I'm looking for.
Straight cash, homie! I mean c'mon, aren't we all?

Quickie Post Tonight

2009-09-02T22:45:00.002-04:00

I was reading a book that made the point about people who want to have a career that sounds good or interesting or different (i.e. artist, writer, chef, athlete, etc.). And how there are a finite amount of people in the world that actually make a living off of such a craft. Heck, I'm a writer - an above-average writer, not really a good writer - and I don't make anything off the blog. Although I'm open to ideas.

I guess my point is that no kid ever says, "I want to be an HR person when I grow up!" Things kids probably say that they want to be when they get older: police officer, firefighter, pro athlete, artist, journalist, President of the US, doctor, judge, lawyer (that could be a reach), chef. Things kids don't say: HR person, accounting work, computer programmer, purchasing, office manager, call center manager/rep, etc.

The Truth About Job Descriptions

2009-08-31T22:10:00.002-04:00

While looking for jobs, I come across a lot of the same language in job descriptions. For instance, "self-starter" means this, "as your boss, I full intend on hiring you and forgetting about you shortly after you first day of work. It took me three weeks to figure out the last guy quit."

"self-motivated" means this, "I don't give out complements, so if I don't tell you to F off, consider that my way of saying that you are doing a good job."

"dynamic personality" means, "when you aren't doing your job, you'll be washing my car, sweeping floors, and selling our stuff."

"self-directed" means, "I don't now what your job should be, so you should just do it."

"strong communication skills" means, "Don't grunt like a caveman, or write in crayon."

"must be able to work independently" means, "I'm sticking you in the basement with three people: the guy smells like he hasn't heard of a shower, that idiot my daughter married, and the girl who cried at work for three straight days, and creeped out the whole office."

"performs other duties as assigned," means, "Listen, I have no clue as to what to write for the rest of this job description. If I need other stuff at some point, so I'll let you know what those will be. This may or may not include being my chauffeur, swearing things under oath in a court of law, fighting a bear, or lending my your urine to pass a test that I might be randomly selected for."

"special projects," means, "there will be a day when I decide to give you a project that has zero to do with your actual job. Don't kid yourself, it's not a special project, unless 'special' means, insulting your intelligence, or not important at all."

Cover Letters... and... stuff.

2009-08-30T23:23:00.002-04:00

Do you really read them? I don't. Why? I typical get a few thousand resumes for a job post.

I'm applying for me own gigs now, and I'm not writing cover letters for them, because I'm wondering what's the use. Why should I take the time if I'm 90% sure that the reader isn't even going to look at it?

Can you talk me into the virtues of a cover letter? HR people, do you remember a kick-ass cover letter?

While you're thinking about the, here are some fun links...

The 6 Most Horrific Bosses of All Time

17 Terrible Jobs We'll In The Future

Responding to two comments...

2009-08-27T22:35:00.003-04:00

Two comments from yesterday's post, I feel that I should respond to both.

Anonymous said...

I just realized that my husband should start writing a blog so he can vent...he could be the Venting IT Guy... and I believe many of his stories could compare in ways to yours! Does it help? Or after blogging do you still hate your job and the idiots you have to deal with so much you want to punch someone in the throat??

August 27, 2009 2:24 PM

Michelle said...

VHRG - I often read your posts with a sense of nostalgia. I've been where you are. As a younger HR pro I was often frustrated by many of the things that seem to drive you crazy. Over the years I have changed companies (and that helped) and grown up a lot. I now find I am much more tolerant and empathetic than I was in my youth. It seems like you are in a bad place right now, but I hope you someday realize it isn't all because of Delta House and the characters you have there. The reality is even in the best organizations you will experience these types of people. Over time I really do hope you learn how to effectively manage how you respond to incompetence because no matter where you go or what you do, their will be incompetent people. Your job is to help them and help your company. Good luck.

August 27, 2009 4:47 PM

To the anonymous poster, yes it helps. It helps make light of the situations. It helps you exercise your creativity. It helps you complain, poke fun, mock, question, and vent about things that you have no control/ability/chance to do otherwise. I have no one to complain to at work. I have no one that I can use as a sounding board. Hence, the blog. If I had a department of people (or even one or two) that I could just say, "Hey, Kooky gave me his daily health update today. Turns out it's gout." And they would laugh, or sigh, or commiserate with me, I wouldn't feel the need to do this.

To Michelle, here's hoping. I had an interview today with a company, and I thought it went well. However, after learning about the job, I decided that I don't want it. It'd be more of the same, just a little different. And I need a mentor and/or an HR friend/co-worker in my next job (hopefully both). I'll do manufacturing, but I've got to feel like I have support.

I've heard what you've said many times. Venting HR Mom and Venting HR Dad (who aren't really in HR, but still... go with me here on the name thing), said the empathy line to me a few times too. I say that my employees are too dumb to function. They say, "Now VHRG, you are supposed to help them." I say that the help they want is because of dumb life choices that they made. They say, "VHRG, do you really think they either knew better or had options?" I walk around silently hating my employees because I'm so frustrated that this is the best they can do. Really? This is the best person you can be? This is the best you can give to the company?

My hope, Michelle is something that Venting HR Dad said that makes sense when you take it in context. He said he was an angry young man clear until he was 35 or 38 (Hell, I remember that phase well, not really fondly). And I think I'm going through that right now. I look at employees and see their shortcomings (life and professionally) and I don't understand how they can be OK with it. Don't they want more for themselves? Don't they want better?

I want more. I want better for myself. Is it possible that I don't like people who lack drive?

It could be.

I have a friend, Stepford, who is the definition of "driven." He always wants better for himself, the next promotion/raise/assignment... gimme, gimme, gimme. I want to just be in a situation where I can out-work someone for something. Instead, I'm working at a place where I get yelled at because obese employees are angry that our insurance premiums are high, and they don't get it. And I don't know how to say, "Our insurance rates are high because I can think of ten people at DeltaHouse who are over 300 pounds. And one of them is stealing oxygen from me right now," in a way that will make a point that they understand, and sound kind and tactful.

And before you say, "then HR isn't for you." It is. I love the technical problems. I love the people issues. I love the large-scale stuff. I love the laws. I love planning. I love being sought out for answers. I hate, "is payroll here yet?" I hate conversational turds. I hate people acting overly nice to me when they are about to ask something that's going to make me cringe. I hate being handed paper and being told the phrase, "Got this in the mail, don't know what it is."

(wait, I'm rambling... back to Stepford)

Stepford has drive. I have drive (not quite even anywhere near close to anything like Stepford). I have friends (who I won't give fun nicknames to so as my friends who DO know who I am, and read might go, "HEY!") who don't have that drive. Who would be fine working where they are for the next thirty years doing the same stuff. They don't want more. Sometimes I'm jealous for the simplicity of the life they are choosing for themselves. Sometimes I want to grab them and shake them and yell, "THIS IS ALL YOU CAN DO?!?!?! You are too smart, too talented, too good of a person to be happy where you are!!!! BE MORE!!!!!!!!!! WANT MORE!!!!!!!!! WANT BETTER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

I guess from what I read of your comment, I truly, sincerely hope and look forward to the day that comes where I look at the less-than-intelligent, or incompetent, or the employee who only has a job by grace of TheBoss, and see them for what they are and empathize. But for right now, I just want slam their head into a wall.

If you haven't figured it out yet...

2009-08-26T22:59:00.003-04:00

... I'm a bit arrogant. Not in every set of circumstance, but I am at work. I know I'm smarter than 90% of my employee base (I think I'm an "education-ist". Is that possible? I know I treat more educated employees better than not-as-much. I think that's because the problems that the educated employees have are logical problems that they've tried to work for themselves first before seeing me. Un-educated employees I treat the way they treat me: hostile, angry, and like I deserve to have my a$$ kicked). I worked hard to get into HR and do what I do. And I've figured out a lot of things about my employees. No, not all employees. But most of them.

Most of my employees...

... if given the choice between doing something new, doing something they've always done, or do nothing, will out for one of the last two.

... if fired, don't rebound well. A fast-food restaurant couldn't put up with one former employee's BS. I found this fascinating and vindicating for when we bounced him.

... would punch our head of operations in the face if given the option.

... still find ways to keep in touch and irritate me even long after they've gone.

... don't see the future, and that saddens me. They don't think about the next day, or week, or month, or year, or what they want to be later in life. They don't work toward anything. I've never had a single employee ask me what they could do to advance at DeltaHouse. Meanwhile, I'm looking for any way to get out the door.

... will see me as a disloyal a$$hole for leaving DeltaHouse.

... think that a computer is still new technology and something to be feared.

... probably haven't even heard of a blog, let alone figure out I'm writing one.

Help me understand this

2009-08-25T21:48:00.002-04:00

Oldsmobile needs a pay advance... AGAIN! This is his eighth of the year, and twenty-five (I'm not lying) in the four years he's been at DeltaHouse. And I'm finally putting my foot down. I'm not giving it to him.

I can't.

This won't change anything.

It doesn't solve Oldsmobile's problem: living ahead of his means.

If I give him an advance, he doesn't learn.

But do I let him starve (as he claims)? Do I let him not be able to get to work because he can't gas up the 1983 Olds that he rolls in?

Why should I give this fool money?

And the sad part is that I know that PlantGuy and TheBoss will tell me to do it, because they'll feel bad for him. I'm refusing this time. I'm flat refusing.

Today I snapped at him and asked, "When does this get better? When do you no longer need money?"

Why is this OK? Why it is OK for him to get a pay advance like he's asking for a glass of water? No one else asks for these more than maybe once a year (so it isn't the pay for the widget-making). EIGHT?!?!?! Eight's OK?

I'm telling him no, but I want someone to tell me why it's OK for DeltaHouse to keep bailing this fool out? If they can explain it to me, I'll give him the advance.

New Term: Conversational Turd

2009-08-24T21:44:00.003-04:00

A conversational turd is a question that somebody asks, but instead of asking a question., they make a statement. This violates every possible rule of conversation. Basically the person is saying something to you and hoping you react or ask a follow up question to start an actual conversation. They are semi-incapable of doing this because they left a conversational turd out there.

The only acceptable statement-question is an "I need" question. "I need insurance paperwork." "I need turnover figures." Fine. Simple request, simple answer.

"I've been here two years today," means nothing to me. I don't know if you want a raise, a hug, a burrito, me to dance, or a shot of whiskey.

Stuff that your office needs

2009-08-23T18:07:00.001-04:00

Thinkgeek.com is going to owe me. I'm a huge fan of the stuff that they sell on their website. Any chance that you have to make office life fun (or at least semi-fun), you need to jump on it. Check out some of the cool/goofy/weird stuff that your office/cubicle needs. If I was given a few hundred buck to pimp my cubicle you can bet, I'd spend it on...

Office Warfare

It's 4:35pm on a Friday. TheBoss has already gone to his house in Catalina for the weekend. And you and the one person in the office who wouldn't file a complaint need to kill 25 minutes. So... kill each other! If someone purchased a USB Rocket Launcher for me, I don't think I'd stop using it.

Playfully Insulting a Co-Worker

Check out a crayon executive pen. I'd use that!

Keeping a Beverage Cool

A USB mini-fridge for one drink. Now, whether that drink has alcohol content in it or not is up to you.

Have a retort for that Seven Habits of Highly Effective a$$hole at work

Check these fake-motivational posters out! I'd like to have a poster with a picture of a urinal that says, "ANGER: It's far better to get pissed off, than pissed on."

Three Types of Micromanagers

2009-08-16T21:09:00.002-04:00

They're shifty, they're sh!tty, they don't seem to have enough going on for themselves at work. They are micromanagers. Bosses would seem to tally exactly when you arrive, and how many bathrooms breaks you take. It's almost as if they are preparing for you parole hearing (for keeping you in the clink, of course).

Here's are three versions of micromanagers (feel free to chime in with others)...

The Checker

With a minimal idea of the distance between the time a request is made and the time it takes to complete, The Checker is there with a smile, asking, "Hey, did you call Boise to get the latest sales info?" Two problems with this request. First, it's eight in the morning Central Time, and the Boise office hasn't opened yet. Second, you just left the damn meeting with your boss where they asked you the call freaking Boise.

But they're smiling as if it is an easy and reasonable request. Heaven help you if you called Boise and left a message. Now the game is out of your hands, and The Checker will ask every 37 seconds if Boise's called back yet.

You have to wonder what else they are working on if the have the time to check every 37 seconds to see if you heard back from the folks in Boise.

The Watcher

This person just heard from somebody that they are waiting on a critical report/project/program/phone call from you. And instead of treating the situation with human decency and respect, your boss came to you and said that not only did somebody ask them. But as a bonus, after they finish telling you, they decide to now watch you for 10 to 90 minutes do the work that they requested of you.

How dare they make you work at work! But still... if you ever wanted to feel like an animal at the zoo, find a boss that doubles as The Watcher.

The Counter

This person might be your boss, might not. But they love to count. They love to count how many minutes late you are to work. They love to count how many bathroom/smoke/vending machine/blinking breaks that you take in a day. They love to see if you took an hour for lunch or if it was really one hour and two minutes.

The Counter as a boss uses the average amount of breaks, lunches, and lates to work against your raise during a performance review. The Counter as a co-worker uses the counting just to make themselves feel superior for little reasons such as the ability to track frivolity.

Missing my fastball tonight

2009-08-13T22:24:00.002-04:00

Hey Gang -- I don't have much tonight, so I'll just post some random HR/work thoughts.

* How long can I go without a raise, praise, or somebody checking just to see how I'm doing?

* Seriously, when you're the lonely only HR person, no one really cares how you're doing (or when they ask, do they actually mean it).

* I had lunch today with someone at an impressive company. He was talking about what the company was doing to develop him, etc. I almost cried with jealousy.

* I once went an entire week at work without speaking. This was about eight years ago. Exactly zero people noticed.

* That same week, I watched every DVD I owned while at work.

* It's amazing what people would rather have than money: tattoos, more cars than they need, vanity plates. Functionally by purchasing these items (unless they are a necessity), what you are telling the world is this: "instead of money, I'd rather have this."

* I think if you are the lonely only HR person you should be required to be given the perk of a monthly occupation counselor, just to speak to. You don't have to go, but it's nice to know the option exists.

* If I had a slogan for this blog, it might be, "destroying my career, one blog post at a time."

* If I get a new job, I might quit this blog.

* If I get a new job, goal #1 is going to be outwork everyone at that job.

* Right now, at DeltaHouse, goal #1 is "try not to punch 90% of your co-workers in the head."

* I apply to one job every day, sometimes two.

* I once sat in a meeting room for 90 minutes waiting on a boss to show up for the meeting. She came in... finally smelling of cigarettes and carrying a Starbucks.

* Never once has a boss told me what they want me to do and what I need to do to get to where they want me to be. I've had a ten-year career so far.

* I've considered trying to fire someone just to see if any work actually gets missed

* That previous point might prove that I'm a sociopath.

* One of my taglines at work is, "This conversation isn't going to end in a way that's going to make you happy." It come out after ten minutes where the conversation with an angry employee isn't going anywhere.

* The next good boss I get will be my first. I've had seven so far.

* I once got a pure, genuine complement at work and came close to tears of joy.

How much are you helping yourself?

2009-08-12T21:55:00.002-04:00

One employee that DeltaHouse had to let go asked me for job search advice. I was more than happy to oblige. I told him about church support groups that help with job search and interview prep. I told him about LinkedIn and that I have a ton of contacts (in HR) all over the place, and in a few other job functions. And I'd be for than happy to pass along his resume to the right person hiring for the job in my network and tell them that he's a rock star that was unlucky. I told him about networking groups that meet every month and where and when and how to get on the email lists for them. I offered my help him in any way possible: resume review, interview questions to be prepared for, interview ettiquette, etc.

And what has he done? NOTHING! Not a damn thing.

I went to two of the networking things (hoping to find my own way out of DeltaHouse), and did I see him there? NO!

He did ask to Facebook friend me. I'm letting it sit for now. But I clicked on his page. He's friends with a lot of former and current Deltas and all the former Deltas do on Facebook is A) Hate on DeltaHouse, B) Commiserate about being out of work, C) Openly wonder why they were laid off/RIF'd/whatever the new term for this is, and D) Openly wonder why they haven't found a new gig yet, because they are too awesome to be without employment.

Hey, ya wanna know why? I'll tell you why. You haven't worked hard enough to find a new gig yet. Keep bitching DeltaHouse out on Facebook, let's see where that gets you.

If you want a new job, you have to work for it. Just applying online to jobs (especially when you are sans employment), doesn't constitute, "working for it."

A Day in The Life of VHRG

2009-08-11T21:45:00.000-04:00

In a recent employee survey, I read this... "We don't have money like the VHRG does, he doesn't understand what our lives are like."

This appalled me for two reasons... 1) Screw you, I went to school, and worked hard to get where I am. 2) HR doesn't pay as well as you think.

But after further reflection, I decided to figure out what the average Delta thinks the VHRG's life is like. Here's what I've got...

6:45am - Wake up in my 8 bedroom, 9 bathroom mansion/commuter-home. Look at the picture of the 15 bedroom, 20 bathroom plantation palatial estate that I really live in and sigh as I miss the place, and relish living in my commuter sh!thole.

7:00am - After collecting the phone numbers of the dozens of models/actresses off the floor that fell out of my pocket, I decide to shower.

7:10am - In the shower, I decide which employee hasn't felt the wrath of the VHRG, and deem that employee as the one to smote.

7:20am - Jeeves, my alternate butler - Simmons has the day off - meets me with a towel and gives me an old-fashioned shave with a straight razor.

7:30am - After getting dressed in Italian silk, I run downstairs to have breakfast: a smoothie made from the dreams of former employees and the tears of orphans.

8am - Finish watching Punky Brewster. I never miss a re-run. Then I get into my Aston Martin and drive to work.

8:30am - Arrive at work where Natasha, the massage therapist/model gives me a backrub.

10am - I throw a dart at the employee roster, and land on the name of the employees that's going to have a hard life today.

10:30am - Change into my Darth Vader outfit and meet with the doomed employee.

10:45am - After making the employee pee himself, and cry. I evilly laugh and call for lightning to hit the employee.

12-noon - I poison every employee's lunch.

1pm - I drink a Dr. Pepper.

2pm - And employee comes to me with a problem. I activate the trap door in my office and he lands ten miles away in an alligator-ridden swamp.

3pm - I cut everyone's pay and funnel in into my own account.

4pm - I cut out early, but not before I gleefully slash every employee's tires on the way to my car.

5pm - Dinner at the HR Persons Country Club where we freely exchange ideas on how to ruin other people's lives because, we are HR, that's what we do.

7pm - Go clubbing while driving my nighttime Bentley, the daytime Bentley is on deck for tomorrow.

1am - After collecting phone numbers of models/actresses for six hours, I get bored and go to White Castle. Then I call it a day.

2am - Check my account balance, to make sure that my paycheck of $266,532.19 made it in to my account. Go to sleep.

Insurance Assumptions

2009-08-10T21:39:00.002-04:00

We just completed our insurance renewal, or what I like to refer to as, "the reason I think about having a bottle of Courvoisier at work." DeltaHouse's employees are unhealthy. They drink, they smoke, they have diseases, they have surgeries, and they make poor health decisions in general. I'm no angel either, but I try to do something about it. Most Deltas see minimal connection with the two-and-a-half packs of Marlboro Lights that the smoke in a day and the emphysema that's waiting for them in a few years.

After giving the employees a survey I've established the following things...

If our insurance rates go up, it's my fault, not their fault for hitting the deductible for the years in six weeks.
Insurance is there to be used... a lot.
Insurance is there to not be used at all... unless your bleeding all over the place.
Insurance should be free to the employee, have no copays, no deductibles, and include massages once per week.
The deductible is a goal to be reached to let the insurance pick up the tab.

Three More Characters at Work

2009-08-09T21:19:00.002-04:00

There are people at work that seem to fit into categories of workers. They exist at every company, and you know them, but you never put a name to them. Well have no fear, the VHRG is here to identify three more...

Career in Neutral

This person has a job that is semi-important and 100% easy. But the job itself sucks. Everyone at your company knows it sucks. And the person doesn't seem to either realize it or care. It's easy, so they're happy. In fact, you could leave your company, and come back fifteen years later, and the person is still sitting at the same desk, doing the same job. They have no idea that their job sucks, and is going no where. And they might not care.

Something they'd say
I've been dealing with problems like that for 15 years. Don't worry, the new paper clips will be here tomorrow.

Unimportant-Important Guy
They're job isn't important. No, not for the purposes of the post, it's just not important in general. But don't tell this employee that. To them it's crucial to the survival of the company... NAY... THE HUMAN RACE! This is why they are so mad that you moved the meeting with the accounting team from the third floor to the fourth floor without telling them. Even though they weren't invited to the meeting. This person also hangs out with as many managers as possible, important types hang out with important types, you know.

Something They'd Say
Why wasn't I notified that the meeting is being moved until tomorrow?!?!?! What I'm I going to do with all of the coffee I brewed for it? It doesn't drink itself!

Pop-Culture Princess
To be clear, she has no life of her own. She tapes award shows and red carpet things to see what people are wearing. She watches entertainment news shows like men what SportsCenter. She cried when Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston broke up. And she refers to Angelina Jolie as "hussey."
Something They'd Say
Who did you vote for? O-who-ma? No, no! On American Idol!!!

Lazy Friday

2009-08-06T22:19:00.002-04:00

Hi Everyone!!! Thanks for the follows on Twitter. I'm close to cracking 100 followers, that's awesome stuff. I really hope to do that soon. I'm flatter that a fledgling anonymous HR blog can generate the following that is has. You keep reading, and I'll keep writing... just not today.

I don't have it today. So I won't post. Sorry.

But far be it from me to not give you SOMETHING to kill a few of the trailing minutes of a Friday. So I present to you some of my favorite YouTube clips...

Here's Jean Claude Van Damme as an extra in a movie, dancing. High Comedy.

Will it blend... glow sticks? Awesome.

And Chad Vader singing Chocolate Rain.

Why paying for a job post sucks

2009-08-04T20:35:00.002-04:00

I was reading Laurie Ruettimann's Punk Rock HR (which is daily for me) article/post/list of places where one could look for a job (I even gave it a shot myself - fingers and toes crossed that anything comes back). I don't believe any of the sites on this list were sites that had pay-per-post searching (i.e. CareerBuilder and Monster).

I remember hearing that there are company's hiring out there, they just aren't making a big deal out of it. But the idea is that smart companies are looking at the talent they have, identifying positions that they wish had better results, and finding people that can do the job better than the incumbent. I think this is brilliant. Smart companies do this. And that's why they are smart, and that's why they will be ahead of the curve after the economy turns.

I really believe that the lesser-known sites (that Laurie pointed out) might be the wave of the future in the job posting world. For a few reasons.

1) People looking for a job, that are REALLY looking, will find the right posting. What happens from there is that you find people that really know the industry, the job, the area, etc. It makes sense that smarter people - people in the know - will find the right postings.

2) CareerBuilder and Monster are an avalanche waiting to happen. Let's appreciate the ads that they post for a second. But still here's what every HR person experiences when they post a job on CareerBuilder or Monster...

Day 1 - The job post goes up, everything's spelled correctly, the job description is accurate (even though you neglected to mention that they have to sit next to the loud guy in the office), and you are excited to see what the job search market has to offer.
Day 2 - You enter work to see that 133 people applied for the job in a matter of 16 hours. At least you'll find a winner in this group.
Day 3 - You enter work to see that 389 more people applied for the job in a matter of 16 hours.
Day 3.5 - You've told 15 staffing companies/head-hunters to f*ck off. You're not paying them 15-50% of the first year salary to find a freaking office admin type.
Day 4 - Now that you are up to 1423 resumes, you'll start looking through these bad boys to get the ten best candidates in from of the hiring manager.
Day 4.5 - 10 employees have given you resumes of their friends, because the friends saw the job posting and TheBoss want you to at least courtesy interview each one. And the person giving you the resume will not leave your office until you say that (A) The candidate is gold-plated awesomeness, and (B) the employee referal program will give them $5000 if the person gets hired and doesn't show up to work naked for at least six months.
Day 5 - You've gone through 588 resumes. But 253 have come in, so you've only realy made about a 335 resume dent in the virtual pile of resumes.
Day 5.5 - You have 27 voicemails from people who "want to schedule a one-on-one meeting with you to discuss the position that is available." You are thinking about bringing vodka to work.
Day 6 - You've lost faith in humanity. Of the now 2109 resumes that you have 5% didn't actually attached a resume, they just what CareerMonster to email them that they applied for a job so Workers' Comp or Unemployment keeps paying them. 50% didn't actually read the job description and/or have done no work in relation to the job. 10% are beyond ridiculously overqualified for the job. 25% might be able to do the job, but the last job that they did in relation to this job was six years ago, and since then they've been out-of-work, done-time, or been a bartender. Leaving you the good 10%, just 210 of the candidates that have given you a resume.
Day 6.5 - You've just held your pee for as long as you possibly can because two people are in the lobby that refuse to leave until you talk to them, and the brillant architects that designed the building put the restrooms in a place where you HAVE to walk through the lobby to pee.
Day 7 - You want to delete the posting. Over the weekend, another 1100 resumes came in including the seventh and eighth submission from Marty T. Jacobs, Jr., PE, CEBS, PHR, MBA, CPM, MCSE, CIC, CLU, Esq. Clearly, if the first application didn't work, the ninth that just came in will.
Day 7.5 - Twenty-two production employees all saw the office job and think that sitting at a desk all day in climate-control isn't work have asked what goes into have a job. You just bruised your head by banging it into your desk.
Day 8 - You eliminate the candidated who came from a company either too big or too small.
Day 8.5 - You check you're office mailbox and find 37 faxed resumes, who the f*ck FAXES resumes any more? Marty T. Jacobs, Jr., PE, CEBS, PHR, MBA, CPM, MCSE, CIC, CLU, Esq. submitted a resume via fax.
Day 9 - You meet with the hiring manager who picks the best five of the, now 4123 resumes that you've received.
Day 9.5 - Marty T. Jacobs, Jr., PE, CEBS, PHR, MBA, CPM, MCSE, CIC, CLU, Esq. is waiting in the lobby to personally hand you his resume.
Day 10 - The head accountant asks if you've made a hire yet, you say no, but you've just set phone interviews. Then the head accountant (glad he gets to tell someone bad news, isn't of the situation being reversed - as usual), smiles and says that the money for that position in the budget just got cut. But you should do the phone interviews anyway, just in case there is a slim chance that the budget money re-appears. In a totally, unrelated story, TheBoss is taking the office babe to a conference in Las Vegas for a week, flying first class, and staying at The Wynn.

Who's Failing Who?

2009-08-02T22:54:00.002-04:00

OK, I'll admit it. My employee engagement and commitment to DeltaHouse has been... waning... (waning, we'll go with that... waning... good word) lately. I don't have to do too much things HR-ish lately, mainly because the employee count is below what it was when I was hired years and years ago at DeltaHouse (45% off the high, I've done the math). I've been given special projects to do - and I do them well, better than those who have given them to me expected, both spped and the quality of the product - but I'm mentally done.

I'm burned out. I'm cripsy. Stick a monster-sized fork in my and call it a day.

I didn't sign up to what I'm doing now. I didn't sign up to have markedly less employees than were at DeltaHouse when I first started. I didn't sign up for being where I am. I didn't sign up to hear that raises won't happen this year... or next year either.

What do you do to cure burn out? And who's failing who here?

The cure to burn out is... is... well, I have no idea. But eventually there will be a few things that will come across the way that I'm sure will pique my interest at least for a little while. And cure the burn.

But who's job is it to engage the guy who's in charge of engagement. There is training that I don't want to do (both training I should go to, and give). I feel like exactly zero people care/check on me at DeltaHouse to see how I'm doing, and when they do it feels forced or insincere. And I dread going to work every day.

Hell, I can't even fake neutrality anymore. "Vending machine's broke." Is met with a sigh, an eye-roll, and an "OK, is this really going to ruin your life?"

Have I failed DeltaHouse? Or has DeltaHouse failed me?

I don't care anymore, because I feel like no one cares about me. I don't get excited about training at work, because the employee base isn't going to take it to make work better. TheBoss doesn't makes speeches or explain what the company is doing (even an email), it's just loose talk where the problem is hinted at, no solutions, no plan, no leadership (though it is desperately needed). Just finger-crossing and week-to-week. I feel like I've been abandoned because the crisis is so bad everyone is retracting into themselves to solve the problem. It's gotten to the point where I've been bringing in articles to read on my own at work for psuedo development (biographies of historical figures, sports, humor, so long as it fits in my copy of SHRM Magazine no one will ask). I do everything I'm asked quickly and correctly, but I doubt it will be used for anything productive. I'm burned out.

On the flip side. I probably should keep my internet usage below seven hours a day. I probably should stop bringing in the articles. I should probably talk with the managers and see how things are going with them. I should probably fake interest in the problems of the employees. I should probably do as much of my job as possible. I should be more self-motivated. I used to be (OH! how I used to be. I used to get a charge out of the littlest HR-ish thing.).

So who's failing who? Am I not failing the company because I've put a massive postage stamp on Summer 2009, and mailed it in? Is the company not failing me because they've done nothing to inspire engagement or interest or even... hope?

Signs that you are going to be a sh!tty employee...

2009-07-29T21:04:00.003-04:00

Feel free to add more in the comments section...

You live with your parents.
You do not possess a car or a license, and rely on other co-workers for rides to work.
You do not have a phone in your house.
You ask about vacation/sick time when you have only worked for three weeks.
You don't ask questions, you just make statements and then wait for a response. Today's was, "vending machine's busted again."
You are high.
You ask for FMLA within your first four weeks of work.
You graffiti your own locker (this actually happened, within two weeks).
Mysterious stuff happens to you every week that never seems to happen to anyone else.
You can't handle money.
You are related to another employee who helped you get the job (has happen 15 times at DeltaHouse, 15 strikeouts).
You live on instant messenger.

Excuse me while I rant...

2009-07-28T18:42:00.002-04:00

I found out today that an employee doesn't have a home phone (or cell phone). I was infuriated by this. This is someone that calls in all the time, and he doesn't have a phone number. Should you be able to reasonable expect that one possess a phone? Could I fire someone for that? Part of me also thinks this though, "Man, that's the best you do, hunh?"

At what point do you stop helping people who are screwing up life? I have a guy that always needs a loan. He's not a junkie (I can tell at this point), he just doesn't do money well. Do I yell at him? Do I not allow a pay advance and tell him that he's F'd up his life and this is the consequence? Would that make a difference? NO! Does giving the pay advance make a difference? NO!

I once went a week without uttering a word at a previous job. Seriously, I tried really hard. No one approached me. No one ever approached me to see how I was doing, or what I was doing. This should be a crime. I'm darn close to seeing if this would work at DeltaHouse.

In my career the time I spent at companies that took any time to try to teach me and develop takes up exactly 7.4% of my working career. This should be a crime too. This is actually why I'm looking right now.

A Lesson Learned

2009-07-26T22:24:00.002-04:00

Our accounting company suggested that we get a sign-off of the plan design of our 401-K from all of our employees. This seemed like an easy enough task... for someone who doesn't have an illogical employee base. I sent a letter and the form to all of our employees asking them to read the form, sign it and return it as DeltaHouse needed to have these form in order to do our audit. Needless to say, I had about 85% of the employee sign this without a problem... and the other 15% treated it like a government conspiracy to read every DeltaHouse employees' thoughts.

It took me about three weeks of begging, pleading and grovelling to get the last few stragglers.

A few weeks later, I was at a party and met a college professor of organizational communications. I told her about the my issue of the lack of 401-K sign-offs. She told me that the employees didn't accept it or understand because I (i.e. the internal source of the communication) was not credible because I tell the employee base things all the time. And that I might have had better success if I had someone from our accounting company or the 401-K company say the exact same thing that I did.

Taking this knowledge in, it made a lot of sense. I'm using this in the future. And I wanted to pass this on to my loyal readers.

Friday Wrap-Up

2009-07-23T21:00:00.002-04:00

I might make this a weekly thing as I'm getting more Twitter posts and comments. To cover the cool links, epitaphs, comments, etc. I'm going to do a quick hit post.

Comments

First to MJBlogger and to Wyoksgal who commented on my post from yesterday, I agree with what you are saying about a teachable moment. I've had a very cool conversation with a college professor about something relating to this, and it needs to be it's own post. It will be a post next week.

Second to Wyoksgal and my guy Dan Johnson who commented on my post from Wednesday, I have been looking (for about a year). Before the economy tanked, I had a boatload of interviews. I turned down seconds (wrong fit for me), and got turned down. I also flamed out historical with two companies on the first question each.

One question was, "How did you prepare for this interview?" NOTE: this was a phone interview and cop was following me as a drove. My tough-guy side came out for a split-second, as I almost said, "What the f*ck kind of a question is that?" Instead I gave a BS answer that the guy hated.

The other question was, "How did you go from HR coordinator to VHRG in only one step?" My answer was, "Uh......... er........... hmmmmmmmmmm.......... duh........ well.........." And the rest of the interview was a smoldering train wreck from there.

Four Fun Links

Happy Friday... I have five perfect links for those looking to kill that hour between 4pm and 5pm. They are even slightly business/HR related!

100 Vanishing Things - Items that people who are 30 or older definitely remember. Sadly these items are going away. Very generational.

Positives of a Down Economy - from Cracked.com

Office Supplies Too Awesome to Exist - from Cracked.com

Seven (sadly) True Airline Stories - from Cracked.com (read this if you read no other link!)

Something I Had to Answer in a Post

Laurie Ruettimann (Punk Rock HR) asked the question if you sniffed out that you were getting canned what would you do. Here were the only two options, that I could come up with.

Option A

Meekly pack up my stuff so I don't have to come back after the deed has been done.
Prepare resume
Do way too much LinkedIn connecting. I have over 200 contacts.
Make sure that I have job recommendation letters from the VIP's of DeltaHouse.
SEARCH! SEARCH! SEARCH!

Option B

Take an Imodium A-D pill and go on a diet of cheese and bananas and potatoes for two days.
Get a late lunch at the nearby buffet and consume Indian food... lots and lots of Indian food... and drink pungent tea.
Wait until everyone leaves for the day. Take a massive poop in the floor of the office of the person who is going to fire me.
Still do Option A.

Not Using All Of The Weapons In The Arsenal. Why? Because I Can't

2009-07-22T22:41:00.003-04:00

I tweeted yesterday, this: "I feel like I'm fighting with my right arm tied behing my back. And I'm right handed."

Here's what that means.

Yesterday Blob chastised me for the fact that DeltaHouse's health insurance sucks. And it is terrible. It's so bad that I'm going without an eye exam until the renewal, in the hopes that one of the options will contain a plan with a freebie eye exam. I'm pretty sure I need glasses.

But it was the way that Blob said it. "You's just 'onna pick a sh!t plan any-damn-way. We's all 'onna get screwed by (finger point at the VHRG) you again! You can't find us a good plan!"

I held back pummeling the fool with fists, logic, or just embarassing him publicly. Why? Because I didn't want to get arrested or fired or have a stern talking to from TheBoss about being nicer (which is the only knock I have on my reviews, really. Technically, knowledge-wise - Awesome. The fact that I don't smile when I give bad news - Less than awesome).

But I wanted to. OH! How I wanted to... Here's what I really wanted to say...

"Hey fat@$$! You want to know why our health insurance sucks? It's because you are 400 pounds. And your wife is 400 pounds too. And OldGuy is fat, diabetic, and smokes. And Cigarette's blood-type is Marlboro. Mouse has a wife that blows through the deductible after the first two weeks of the new plan year. Every employee that's left is on our COBRA plan and they blow through our deductible in a matter of weeks too. And if you point to any person at DeltaHouse, I'll tell you who specifically in their family has a health condition that is jacked up and driving up our insurance premiums. But picking a crappy plan is my problem?!?!?!?! Yeah, right. Go suck down some more Mountain Dew and another Big Mac, I know it's been ten whole minutes since you've done that!"

Now I'm not exactly in the best physcial shape myself. But I do exercise and try to watch what I eat (sometimes I manage to even do this in a correct manner, other times I watch myself eat wings, pizza, burger, fries, and beers).

But I'm not allowed to say what I wanted. I'm not allowed to yell and scream at an employee that doesn't get it. I'm not allowed to make my case without insulting every single employee at DeltaHouse.

It's like being in a fight with your dominate hand tied behind your back.

Sign of the Times - A Theory

2009-07-21T22:28:00.002-04:00

I have a theory.

Here's a theory that I have about who's looking for a job. It isn't just the 10% unemployed part of the population, it's another 10% that are scrambling for anything better, plus another 5% of people who are underemployed and looking for something better, and another 10% of people who are afraid right now that their company is going to go down.

For the record, I'm in the scrambling group, and the company is going down group.

But I received an email today that was sent to me by accident. LoyalAssistant was let go (which was a very sad, sad day for me... I had to let someone I considering a true friend. And now I have exactly zero people keeping me company at DeltaHouse. But I don't want to ramble any more than I already am.), and I had all email sent to her to forward to me. This was done just in case someone sent something to her, would get answers.

Then I saw an email from LadyAwesome (five-plus year employee of the company, bullet-proof, award-winning, awesome human being and person), that basically said that while she was looking for jobs, she came across one that looked good for LoyalAssistant.

Instead of sending it to LoyalAssistant's social email, by reflex, she sent it to her DeltaHouse email... and I read it.

I was stunned. LadyAwesome was going to retire from DeltaHouse. If she left, I actually think it'd rip DeltaHouse in two. Doing her exit interview would be something that every employee would asking me about the results. And afterwards, a fight would break out between the management committee at DeltaHouse. I know this.

Which is why I'm sitting on it.

But that's a sign of the times to me. I think 50% of the workforce population is actively looking for a job right now. And you might not know who, but it's happening now.

Which is also why my theory on the world's biggest game of musical chairs is going to come true as well.

Feeling Lazy Today

2009-07-20T22:03:00.001-04:00

To my Twitter followers, thanks for picking me up so far. To those who aren't on Twitter following me, please do so. I'm loving texting to my Twitter page. You can find it here.

Ok, I'm lazy today, so I'm just going to post some links...

Blog I read a lot of...
Laurie Ruettimann (Punk Rock HR) - Hilarious, timely, well-thought out, and not preachy at all. You are doing yourself a disservice by not reading it. I wish to one day be one of the blogs that she loves!

Links I use to de-stress...
Odd Todd - Started as a cartoon about a dude who got laid off, and now has morphed into a consistently high-comedy website.
Will It Blend - YouTube's sensation on the BlendTec blender. There's something about watch a man blend cigarette lighters, magnets, and glow sticks (the link is for the glow sticks).
Chad Vader - Darth Vader's younger brother is a manager of a grocery store. Season One is great. Season Two... not so much
Boxhead - I can't find the game right now, but if you want a never-ending army of zombies to shoot up, look no further.

Three Ridiculously Awkward Handshakes That You'll Probably Experience This Week

2009-07-19T21:22:00.007-04:00

A handshake tells you a lot about a person. Their personality, whether or not they washed their hands, their level of desperation - even their health - can all be felt with the handshake. Here's are three strange handshakes that you'll probably experience this week...

The Dead Fish

What it is - This is being held out solely to meet the responsibility of shaking hands. Zero commitment to actually shaking the hand. No pressure. No grip. Just a hand.

What it says about you - I have zero personality. I don't want to be here. And I'm just doing this so you'll go away... preferably faster than if I did actually give a sh!t about the handshake.

What you're thinking when you get this handshake - Is this guy dead? Maybe he's dead? The guy just touched my hand. He didn't shake it, he touched it. What happens when someone else that has a handshake like that, shakes this guy's hand? Do they just stand there and touch hands? This is information I now need.

The Multi-pump

What it is - This person is not just shaking your hand, they are shaking you have over-and-over-and-over again. They may never let go. And they're shaking you so much, that you've spilled your coffee. And now you have to pee.

What it says about you - I haven't made a sale since George W. Bush was president. I'm three months behind in my mortgage payments. And I've been ducking the re-po guy by parking my car in different spots for the past six weeks. But I'm not letting that show, and I'm eager to make a sale.

What you're thinking when you get this handshake - The mint coming from this guy's breath is going to blind me. And I'm pretty sure that this guy isn't going leave my back pocket until I say, "OK, I'll buy from you."

The Hand-crush

What it is - This handshake might require reconstructive surgery. It leaves you checking to see if your hand is still there.

What it says about you - One of two things. 1) I hate that I'm meeting with you right now. And punching you in the face is out of the question, so this is my only recourse the physically harm you and express displeasure that way. 2) I just worked out.

What you're thinking when you get this handshake - Call 911! I think this guy broke three bones in my hand... FOUR!

** - I've executed the hand-crush after a sales rep sat in DeltaHouse's lobby FOR THREE HOURS. And wouldn't leave until I, personally, spoke to him. He tried to go multi-pump on me. The hand-crush stopped that.

** - I'm a firm-grip-one-pump-good-eye-contact guy.

How an Eleven-Day Employee Became a Total Pain in my Ass.

2009-07-16T22:04:00.000-04:00

JoeDirt and being employed for eleven days

JoeDirt started working at DeltaHouse and stopped working less than two weeks later. We fired him.

Here’s my story. SuperHippie came in every other day for eleven days and went, “Where the hell is JoeDirt?” I’d check my voice mail and he had the following excuses in the eleven days…

• His father had a heart attack.
• His basement flooded.
• His wife got fired from her job.
• His father went back to the hospital.
• He had a court date.

SuperHippie, PlantGuy, and I decided that there was no way that a new employee could be this unlucky. This was going to be a trend. So we decided that eleven days of a guy who made it to four of the first nine days that he was supposed to work was plenty for us. He is becoming a lot more trouble than he’s worth. Not to mention that he made about half of the widgets that he said he could.

Thank you and good night.

Or for Wipeout fans (the ultimate stress-reliever show), good night, and big balls.

We canned him.

His side of the story. His dad had a heart attack. We’re bastards. And we knew about the court date. He can’t help if his basement flooded and if his wife got fired. But these are things that needed his attention.

Now, how much thought did I give to an employee that lasted about the length of a spring break road trip? Zero.

Then it was a month later.

I saw the letter on PainInTheAss’s desk, addressed to “Prezdent of DelltaHaus” from JoeDirt.

Here’s the exchange I had in my head…

MoralVHRG: “Let it go to TheBoss, he’ll read it, and toss it.”
EvilVHRG: “Let’s think self-preservation, he’s going to read it, and bug you about it. And might even give you sh!t about the way it went down.”
MoralVHRG: “The guy worked here for eleven days, who cares?”
EvilVHRG: “He will. Watch! Take the envelope and shred it, no one will know.”
MoralVHRG: “That’s illegal. You can’t do that.”
EvilVHRG: “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

TheBoss showed me the letter about three hours later.

JoeDirt explained his side of the story. I explained that he worked here for eleven days, and was covered under no laws.

JoeDirt invited TheBoss for lunch to discuss a position in the office that he saw was available. I openly wonder who’d pay for that lunch.

He points out that he felt that like we didn’t give him a fair shake. I point out that in nine working days, he couldn’t make it to five of them, and walked out on the job on one day (which was the one we decided would be his last day).

He points out that he thought the job was higher up on the chain. I point out that with the amount of grammatical errors he has in this letter you’ll never be able to understand an email he wrote if we gave him a supervisor job.

JoeDirt spelled my name way wrong in the letter and called me “PRHG”. I wondered why he didn’t just write this in crayon to TheBoss.

TheBoss wanted a full report, in an email, of what his employment entailed.

I delivered it. TheBoss read it and accepted it. I need the support of PlantGuy and SuperHippie in order to get it.

What frustrated me was TheBoss doubting me in favor of an employee who called me “PRHG” in the letter and worked at “DelltaHaus” for eleven days.

Then a few months later, the same letter showed up. Complete with being addressed to “Prezdent of DelltaHaus” from JoeDirt.

I shredded it.

Why FutureStar is going to leave

2009-07-15T21:20:00.004-04:00

FutureStar and I were talking about her work. FutureStar works with Beak. Beak has been at DeltaHouse for a long time, and she's finally exiting to let FutureStar (who is destroying Beak's output), do the job her way. FutureStar can't wait to be able to do her job without Beak's beak-ness interfering.

Beak's greatest hits include: giving her opinion when it isn't asked (and having it count), asking for a company event to be done (and not showing up to it), and disagreeing with what you say if it sounds wrong (even if it is correct). FutureStar was fired up to be to do the job her way.

Until...

TheBoss informed FutureStar that Beak is going to be used as a consultant. The look on FutureStar's face said everything... I'M SO QUITTING WHEN THE ECONOMY TURNS.

That's the sad thing.

Yes, we should all be happy to even have a job, the economy sucks, and people are losing jobs left and right. But guess what, when the economy turns better and job markets get better, the employees that you are dumping extra work that they didn't sign up for , not giving raises to, not developing, didn't recognize for their effort, and assumed were happy with how things are going are going. Are going to go. Out the door to another job.

And it's moments like this that they'll point to when you ask, "Why would you leave?"

Things that the workforce is tired of hearing...

The economy isn't the greatest right now.
We need you to do HR, PR, AR, QA, AP, sales calls, customer services, and plunge the toilet. Because we laid off everyone that does those things.
You are lucky to have a job.
We can't give you a raise, a review, training, or any help.

The funny part about me, is that I'm playing my hand like I'm totally committed to the extra work and the company. But as soon as I can, I'm done.

Ghosts haunting DeltaHouse

2009-07-14T23:14:00.003-04:00

Here's a look at what DeltaHouse is like now. We are at about 50% of the amount of employees that we were when we were rocking and rolling. We've been steadily letting people go. But when it happened nobody was super-shocked.

Until the last time. We finally cut muscle and bone. The cuts were shocking to most Deltas. And I supposed I'd be shocked too, if I did help plan it. My favorite is that one of the employees that was cut started their own blog. And every day they talk about how much they are shocked that they were cut. And how people are calling them to ask for guidance. And they even dropped my favorite line, "frankly, I don't know how DeltaHouse is going to survive without me." We are doing just fine.

But for others, they were cut, and they won't go away...

They pop-in just to visit. To get lunch with an old co-worker friend. To see how things are going.

I really don't get it. But so far this week at DeltaHouse there have been not one, not two, not three, but FOUR ghosts.

Ghosts, to my new readers, are people who have been fired, have quit, or have been laid off.

Now, if (please, oh please, WHEN) the day comes that I leave DeltaHouse, and move to the status of ghost, you can bet your last dollar that I'm NEVER returning the DeltaHouse. Ever. I don't care if I left something gold-plated, they can keep it.

But our ghosts were in the past few days. Just to hang out and see how things were going, visiting friends, and catching up.

I think they are looking for any new faces so they can be mad that we didn't hire them back.

But I can't kick them out (I mean yes, I could, but still). That would put me just short of Darth Vader on the bad guy list.

And I guess they are looking for the community or work that they work sorely missing since they were laid off (that's what many of them were). But I just can't see the logic.

An open letter to Mordac

2009-07-13T22:54:00.003-04:00

Hi Mordac --

I call you Mordac because I've named you after the Dilbert character who serves as the preventer of information services. This only scratches the surface to describe what you do to our company.

First things first, I'm 95% sure that I know more about computers than you do. The HR guy at a company should be at your mercy, but I only manage to involve you when I can smell smoke coming from my computer because you might have a fire extinguisher.

Here is what the IT guy at a company is supposed to do.

Make sure that computers at DeltaHouse take less than 35 minutes to boot up in the morning (FAIL, mine takes 42, which is why I never shut it down).
Answer questions that the other people in the office in a nice and courteous manner (FAIL, which is why they ask me instead).
Make sure that my computer gets backed up (CHECK, but doing this during a time when I might not be in the middle of a critical project would help).
Not look constipated and confused all the time (FAIL, you look like you are either looking some bizarre genre of adult movie, or that you are trying to read the Korean instructions on how to assemble furniture).
Get the management team computers flipped out every few years (FAIL, mine's three years old).

Here are things that you tend to do, and my suggestions of how to deal with it...

Belittle anyone who has a computer problem who isn't TheBoss (pretend everyone is the boss).
Offer business advice when not asked for it (you wouldn't be working at DeltaHouse if half the sh!t you spewed worked; shutting the f*ck up, would be my suggestion).
Keep DeltaHouse at Windows 2000 and Office 2003 software (this is in addition to continue planning, but never actually launching the new intranet. How about getting the company out of the dark ages... and perhaps... even training for it).
Call me out for doing my job (do me a favor and when you have a problem with the VHRG, ask me first instead of copying TheBoss and half the office because you misread something the handbook.)

By the way, all of us know that you spy on all the stuff that we send via email and look at online. And don't think I'm not going to mess with you over that one day. One well-placed, well-written email, and I know I can give you a heart attack.

Sincerely,
VHRG

I'm on Twitter now!

2009-07-12T21:42:00.001-04:00

Hey Readers! Check out my tweets on twitter.com/VHRG. I'm post stuff that too short for a blog post, my all-time favorite links, and random thoughts. I hope you'll enjoy it.

Yes, I'll still post here, but I'll take a pass tonight.

Four Lawsuits from the Future

2009-07-07T22:55:00.000-04:00

Any HR person goes to enough legal update seminars to hear about lawsuits that have happened within the past year. And the shocking results prove that stupid people can continue to be stupid and remain employed.

So I’m trying to break out the crystal ball and see what the future of lawsuits look like. Here’s four that I’m waiting for…

A single (legally unmarried), healthy employee with no kids sues because she/he feels like - or has been ordered to - stay late at work while less-than-healthy, married, and employees that are parents get to leave work at 5pm.

A non-smoking employee sues their employer because the smoking employee gets paid the same, yet gets to take six ten-minute smoke breaks per day while the non-smoker works. Damages: 250 hours of pay (per year this has gone on), plus interest.

An employee getting fired sues for damages because – while not eligible for FMLA – would have been within three months, and they get fired.

A salaried, healthy employee sues for back wages because an FMLA co-workers misses an average of 10 hours of work per week, and the healthy-salaried employee has been having to make up for it. No raise. No promotion. Just more work. More hours.

Taunting the WidgetKing

2009-07-06T23:05:00.000-04:00

The WidgetKing and I are as decent friends as an HR person can allow himself to be with someone. We have Clerks-movie-esque conversations pretty regularly where there is minimal room for breaks in conversation between my comment and his response.

WidgetKind needed to fire TheFace. TheFace has this face he makes when he works that looks like extreme concentration (or something else… we’ll just go with concentration and move on). Anyway, a few chat about TheFace’s performance – with no results, WidgetKing came to me saying it was time for TheFace to go.

I asked him if he wanted me there when he did it.

WidgetKing: “No.”
VHRG: “No?”
WidgetKing: “It’s not necessary.”
VHRG: “It’s not necessary?”
WidgetKing: “I can handle it myself.”
VHRG: “You can handle it yourself?”
WidgetKing: “CUT IT OUT!”
VHRG: “Fine, you sure?”
WidgetKing: “Yes.”
VHRG: “My boy’s all grows up! When are you doing it?”
WidgetKing: “Five o’clock.”
VHRG: “OK, I’ll hang behind and get a report of the aftermath. Let’s practice.”
WidgetKing: “Practice what?”
VHRG: “Practice what you are going to say.”
WidgetKing (uber-serious): “TheFace, we’ve talked about your performance in the past couple of months. I’m not seeing improvement, and I think it is best for all involved if today is your last day.”
VHRG: “Perfect! Go forth, and do battle.”

(at 5:15pm WidgetKing resurfaces)

VHRG: “How did it go?”
WidgetKing: “I didn’t do it.”
VHRG: “What?!?!?!”
WidgetKing: “I couldn’t.”
VHRG: “Why?!?!?!?!”
WidgetKing: “He said he was really working on something, and he thought he was making progress.”
VHRG: “YOU WIMP!”
WidgetKing: “What?”
VHRG: “If he hadn’t figured it out after two disciplinary talks, do you really think this is magically going to turn around?”
WidgetKing: “Uh…”
VHRG: “Let me ask you this, do you think he’s going to make it?”
WidgetKing: (after a pause) “Well…”
VHRG: “That’s a ‘no’!”
WidgetKing: “Maybe he will turn it around.”
VHRG: “And maybe I will go to The Olympics for curling. You wimp! You should have canned him. Now you gave him false hope.”
WidgetKing: “What?”
VHRG: “He thinks you two are cool now! You should have kicked him in the nuts, and it would have ended better. You sent him mixed signals. If you can him soon… like… tomorrow, or the end this week, he’s going to be really pissed.”
WidgetKing: “I’ll fire him next week.”
VHRG: “Is that your code for giving him a neck rub?”
WidgetKing: (groans)
Up until TheFace got fired, I pretty much waited for every meeting with WidgetKing’s closed doors, and stood in the door window, and made TheFace’s face.

WidgetKing got that deer-in-headlights look the first few times I did that. Then he became great at discreetly flipping me the bird.

TheFace must’ve taken the hints from WidgetKing, he wound up leaving about two weeks later.

Six Work Pranks You Can Pull Right Now

2009-07-05T23:01:00.000-04:00

Even though I'm an HR guy, I love a good office prank. I really only have one rule: they have to be fairly easily reversible.

Yeah, the opposite of this.

So here are a few that you can do right now, for fun, with minimal planning...

Mouse Mischief
I'm a huge fan of either A) removing the trackball from the mouse (which means you'll turn the plastic circle holding the trackball in remove it, and pull the ball out. Replace the circle, and hide the ball in the office, and play the "hot/cold" game. Or B) taping over the red light at the bottom of the mouse, rendering it useless. This is a little easier to undo (remove the tape). But it is funny.

The Phony Email
This is cruel and funny. When the person is away from their desk (and doesn't look their computer), you can jump on the email and fire something off. My favorites...

1) An insult to the boss.
2) A love letter to a co-worker.
3) Nonsense to the entire office (something like this: I would like everyone to know that I used to be a vampire, but I got cured of that with Wild Turkey.)
4) Set the out-of-office assistant to respond to every email with something like, "Hey, did you know today is my birthday?" This works whether or not it is actually somebody's birthday.

They used to be a what?!?!?!

Outlook/Part II
After you have decided to email the entire office that you've official given yourself a new nickname of "Anakin Dorktalker," you'll need revenge. And that is in the form of shutting your opponent's email. In Outlook go to the bottom right corner of the screen where it says, "Connected," then switch to "Work Offline." This causes the email to still look like it's working, but no emails are coming in or going out.

Startup Menu Madness
Go to the person's StartUp folder (usually C:\documents & settings\their username\Start Menu\Programs\StartUp) and start copying program icons and pasting them into the folder. This will create a short-cut to launch that program that you've pasted into the menu EVERY TIME THEY START THEIR COMPUTER. If you can load up their computer with every program you can think of (or every document you can find), they'll have an headache booting up their computer.

Re-route their printer
This is fun to do when you have someone that prints out a lot of personal stuff. Instead of the printer right next to their cube, send their printing to the printer across the office. Suddenly everyone will read their screenplay, find the recipe, or directions to the job interview.

Flip the Screen
I mentioned this in a previous post. But it's a fun one to do. Hold down CTRL+ALT+the down arrow, and your screen will turn upside down. CTRL+ALT and either right or left arrows flip the screen sideways. CTRL+ALT+the up arrow makes everything all better.

Enjoy!

Ignorance of the Law

2009-06-29T22:37:00.002-04:00

Old School post tonight for my readers that like hearing me complain about work.

Frankenstein is a widget maker that just kind of misses the concept of real life. He hears terms like Workers Comp or FMLA and decides that all of them apply to him.

So I get a voicemail from him saying this... "Uh... VHRG... this is Frankenstein. My (something inaudible, sounded like "mom") had to go to the hospital and I had to take her. Put this on my FMLA."

Something you should know... Frankenstein has no FMLA. It expired six months ago for a temporary condition.

I gave him the FMLA paperwork and said he's got two weeks to get it back to me. Two weeks... nothing. Three weeks... nothing. I tell SuperHippie I'm firing him, he told me to wait and let him have a pass at Frankenstein.

The next morning, Frankstein came into my office...

Frankstein: "Fire... BURN!"

(sorry, that isn't what he said, I just wanted to see what it looks like in print)

Frankstein: "Hey, you got that FMLA papers?"
VHRG: "What happened to the paperwork that I gave you the last time?"
(instead of answering the question, Frankstein opted to stare at me while breathing through his mouth)
VHRG: (after printing out the papers) "Listen, this isn't me being an a$$hole. This is me doing my due diligence to make sure that you are allowed to take the leave."
Frankenstein: "K"

I hand him the paperwork.

Ten days later, I get it back and read halfway down the page, "Relationship of family member to employee: girlfriend."

Girlfriend.

GIRLFRIEND.

Not wife, mom, child, niece, nephew (en loco parentes). GIRL-F*CKING-FRIEND!!!!

Now, checking with our attendance policy, I noticed that I could fire him. Checking with our attorney, I was told that he could plead moron and win his old job back.

Ignorance of the law is now excuse for outside of work. Inside of work, you can be a complete idiot, moron sh!thead, and nothing bad happens to you?

F*ck it! I'm firing him tomorrow.

Five People Playing on Your Company's Co-Ed Softball Team

2009-06-28T22:05:00.000-04:00

To my readers outside of the US/Canada (and I have quite a few), I apologize for making a more North American centric post today.

Ah, the company softball team. Nothing says "creepy American work dynamic", than your company's softball team. This is a place where the best ten players don't necessarily play. Where the person with the highest rank can play whatever position they want (regardless of their ability). And virtually every ten-player team has the follow five players.

The Stud

Looks Like: He could pull a telephone pole out of the ground one-handed.

Works In: Well, let's just say that it's not a department involving a lot of math.

Game line: 3-4, 3 HR*, 7 RBI, 3 Runs scored, climbed the wall to rob two home runs.
* - hit a fourth over-the-wall, but the league limited home runs to three per team per game.

Who are they? They played college baseball, maybe even minor league baseball for a little while. And he probably got hired by someone in the company to expressly play for the softball team, just to beat those jerks across town. Somewhere deep-down he knows this, but hey, it'll at least keep him employed through the summer.

Softball Guy
Looks Like: A professional baseball player. Has every softball related gadget. A man possessed.

Awesome pants, man! Even striking out, you look good.

Works In: Any position that doesn't have anyone reporting to him. But if he doesn't do his job, the company will surely crumble. Yells at people on the phone for not understanding his to-go order.

Game line: 1-2*, Single, Walk, one run scored.
* - Ejected in the fifth inning for arguing balls and strike with the ump that is out to get him.

Who are they? He thinks that he's just as good as The Stud. He's the captain of the team. He yells at everyone about team intensity. He demands to have a seven-step handshake with The Stud and talks to him with phrases like, "You and I are gonna take the bastards out today." He yells at co-workers for missing plays (even though only about two of them know who is his). He's also the guy who keeps statistics and applies them to game-time strategies.

The Babe

Looks Like: (VHRG NOTE: any attempt at finding a picture that I wasn't totally embarrassed to put on this site failed miserably. You should know what she looks like anyway.)

Works In: Anywhere in your company where a hot chick works.

Game line: 0-4, 4 strikeouts. In her first at-bat, she held the bat at the wrong end.

Who are they? Hot... just, hot. And someone on the team convince her to play solely to see her in shorts. They enjoy being the pretty one at work. And they are going to try softball, and their new short shorts. If she plays well, great, but she's just hoping to have someone buy her a free beer.

The Boss

Looks Like: A fish out of water. Wears a polo shirt to play (y'know, casual wear).

Let's play softball! Y'know I'm a regular Stan Musial! You know Stan the Man, right? He showed the Milwaukee Braves who's boss. The Braves are still in Milwaukee right?

Works In: The corner office, and he fits in. He knows you. Your Joe, right?

Game line: 0-3, 1 strikeout, 1 ground ball back to the pitcher, one trip and fall running out a single. LAUGH AND YOU'RE FIRED!!!!!!!!

Who Are They? This is his way of getting to know the players on the team. This is his first game of the year (even though your team is 2-3 already). He's wondering if the counter at the softball park can make him a Tom Collins. Frequently discusses having his Mercedes in the shop (and how frustrating it can be to have to downgrade to his wife's Infiniti). Just smile and laugh and schedule another business trip for him for next week... and the week after.

The Out-of-Shape Player

Looks Like: The last time they tired anything athletic, Barry Bonds was a skinny kid playing for the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Works In: The office next the exit for the smoke break/Starbucks escape. They have a standing two Big Mac order at McDonald's.

Game line: 1-1, single, run scored (well, crawled across home plate counts, right?), sat the rest of the game to catch their breath.

Who are they? They are the person that thinks that they are going to get laid off every single day. They also want to do the social thing and play, but they forgot that the physical act of waddling around the bases might cause a heart attack.

How I Spent My Week

2009-06-27T22:24:00.000-04:00

Reality Show Idea - Tell Me You're NOT Watching This

2009-06-24T21:29:00.001-04:00

I work in a manufacturing company like most loyal readers are more than aware. And not a week goes by that I am not accused of not doing work by the production workers. To them, hard labor is work, and sitting behind a desk not only doesn't qualify for work, it would be nothing short of their idea of heaven. And if not for dumb luck, the roles would be reversed.

Let's reserve them.

Picture it! We'd call it, "Try to Do My Job." You take the ten most senior people in manufacturing and switch them out for the supervisors, production manager, HR, accounting, sales, marketing, the CFO, the CEO, and engineering. The people in those positions would have to work in the production environment. The selection of who's doing what job should be decided among the teams, and that should be an episode in and of itself.

Yes, the wages would also flip.

Who's not watching the new supervisors, production managers, and HR people violate laws and set rules that destroy the company. Who's not watching people who generally do NOT get there hands dirty get their hands dirty. Who's not watching the random raises given, the firings, the promotions, the dirty hands, the sweating and the toil of white-collar people earning blue collar wages.

This would happen for a month. If a decision is truly damning (like closing or selling a company), then the CEO would intervene. If someone was fired, then they still get paid for the duration of the show (but they can't perform work), and the company is forced to live without someone in that position. Hiring people can only be undone after the month too.

Other fun things that would happen: the re-hiring of well-liked-but-useless employees. The firing of the guy that the production workers uniformly hate. The moment the production guys realize they are in over their head (specifically when they get sued for firing the HR person). The moment the CEO collapses of exhaustion. The moment one of the office people decided, "F*ck it!", and outworks the average employee 2-to-1.

What changes would the company make afterwards?

Who's NOT watching this show?

Special Note to HRU

2009-06-23T22:25:00.001-04:00

I will be out-of-town coming soon, but I set up a few posts for the coming week (in an attempt to not leave my loyal readers hanging). And one of them is a proposal for a reality show.

Tell you're NOT watching my idea.

VHRG

Reality TV and Work

2009-06-21T23:22:00.000-04:00

So I was watching The Bachelorette last Monday night (purely for unintentional comedy - I love how seriously the contestants take themselves and the show, even though they are about a 7% succes rate at this point.). Anyway, Ed had decided to leave the show. Why? According to Ed, his boss functionally said that he didn't care if he was falling in love, he needed him back at work. So IN THIS ECONOMY Ed chose employment over about a 10% chance to date a Canadian girl for six to nine weeks.

Smart move on Ed's part.

This is something that I've always wondered about with reality shows. The turnaround on the shows themselves are fast...ish. But I've always wondered how one maintains employment and particpate on the show. I'm picturing that Ed's conversation with his boss went something like this...

ED: Hey Boss, y'know how I'm good-looking, have a job that isn't bus driver or garbage man, am reasonably successful, and reasonably good looking?
BOSS: Uh... whatever. Why?
ED: Well I got accepted to be on The Bachelorette.
BOSS: Hunh?!?!
ED: Yeah, it's a show where a bunch of dudes get picked over by a reasonably hot girl and then one person winds up with her.
BOSS: OK...
ED: So I need one to eight weeks off, to be on the show.
(Let's take a minute to go LIVE inside the head of Ed's boss: There is no possible way this fool is going to woo this bachelor-girl - or whatever it's called - successfully. He'll be back in a week. Remember when he hit on that one girl at the client. Man, did he blow that. There's no way this girl)
BOSS: Sure, go for it.

Then I'm pretty sure that Ed watched the first episode, and was stunned that his employee survived past the first week, and called Ed and said, "Uh... yeah... I need you back."

When someone goes on a reality show, they either must be self-employed, have a really great boss, or needed a good excuse to say, "F*CK IT! I'm out!"

Characters at Your Work - Part II

2009-06-16T21:36:00.002-04:00

We've all had those characters at work that exist regardless of the environment you work in. You work with these people...

Employee That You Don't Know What Their Job Is

“Blaspheme”, you say (hey, I spelled that right the first time, go me), “An HR professional should know what EVERY employee does in your company.” True. But still, every company has this one person that you don’t really know what they do. The employee is perpetually in a hustle, and looks really busy – or they sit in the office and only seem to convert oxygen into carbon dioxide, it’s either one of the other. But still, you don’t know what they do.

The Forever Employee

You know this person. They spend their days at work walking around, not doing much. They look for someone, anymore, to talk to and tell the stories that they have told umpteen billion times before. “Did I tell you about the time that we…” Yes, they did – forty times before. But that is what they are doing right now. AGAIN! Meanwhile, you had a project due to the boss by the end of the day. This is what I think Chris Berman has to be like at ESPN.

Did I ever tell you about the time the Rams gave me a jersey? Oh, I did? Well, the Rams invited me to practice, and they have a jersey...

The Guy with a Lousy Home Life

This is person that works late hours (make that unnecessary late hours) for no good reason other than they don’t want to go home. They go to every happy hour. They go to every event. They volunteer to stay late. They come in early. They never seem to leave. Why?

Yeah, they need me at the office.

The person who is itching to find your mistakes

This person probably thinks that they could do virtually any job in the company if given the chance. They’ve probably gotten screwed out of a job that they wanted, or they think that they are the official watchdog for the company – usually both. And they read every email, policy, set of instructions and announcement as if they must find every flawed spelling, grammatical error, and piece of logic and tell you about it. And as a kicker, they’ll copy your boss too. Y’know, just so someone else knows about it. They are perfect, by the way. When you try to nail them on something, they respond with a nuclear grade of venom.

If Job Descriptions Were Truthful... RECEPTIONIST

2009-06-15T21:01:00.003-04:00

Job Title: Receptionist
Notice I didn't say brain cancer medication developer!

Job Description
As the receptionist of DeltaHouse, you will be responsible for cheerfully greeting people when they enter the workplace. However, if you don't tell them to go f*ck themselves, we suppose that's OK too. You will also be asked to answer the phones. Seriously, this isn't that difficult. But for some reason the last receptionist we had made this seem like we were locking her in a cage with dozen of vipers. Finally, on occasion you with have to mail documents and hand job applicant applications. This requires the handling of paper. Please don't treat it like we are trying to kill you.

Requirements

The ability to files nails
The ability to gossip
The ability to roll eyes
Hotness: a plus, we'll take not disgusting
Being responsible for everything listed in the above without acting like it isn't your job.

An Open Letter to The Guy in The Office that Wears Way Too Much Cologne

2009-06-14T21:33:00.002-04:00

Dear Cologne Guy --

I have a three theories about you that I would like to try out. One, is that you do not live in a dwelling that has a shower. Yet, for reasons defying total logic, you seem to have an unlimited supply of cologne. And to make up for the fact that you do not possess a shower (and that you frequently run for miles and miles in manure as a bizarre training ritual to compete in the Triathlon of Feces), you cover yourself in $1.99 per gallon cologne. Two, you lost the ability to smell in a tragically stupid accident where you were trying to gain superhero powers. Desperate to smell anything, you coat yourself in gallons of cologne just to get a faint whiff of anything in your nostrils. Three, you have a suicidal wish to light yourself on fire, and you can't find a match.

Either way, you are killing me. Scratch that. You are killing us (your co-workers). Plants wilt when you walk by. I can smell when you've been down a hallway forty-five minutes after you've been there. In meetings, there is a reason that the other ten people in the conference room collect at one end of the table. It's because the bucket of cologne you dump on your head makes everyone gag and makes our eyes water.

So please do the following two steps: 1) switch to a different cologne, preferably one that isn't for sales in a five-gallon bucket; 2) shower regularly.

Sincerely,
The other 99.9% of the people you work with

The Inner Monologue of Somebody Standing in Front of the Vending Machines in the Company Lunch Room

2009-06-11T22:44:00.003-04:00

First a favor I'll ask of my dear readers. Pick you favorite post, get the link, and post it on Facebook or Twitter or MySpace or wherever you can. Many, many thanks!

Even if you don't, fake it, and lie to me and say you did!

At 8:45am
OH C'MON!!! I get here a little late and all of the plain bagels are gone. SONOFABITCH!!! Now what am I having for breakfast? I could go with cereal. But that's two purchases: milk and a box of cereal. The only other option is the cinnamon raisin bagel. I hate cinnamon raisin bagels and clearly everyone else in the known world does too.

Then why are the cinnamon raisin bagels even they in the first place? Can't the vending guy see that nobody eats these damn things?!?!?!?!

Exactly zero people eat these.

What if I snuck over to the Starbucks across the street? Would anyone notice? I could just go downstairs, across the street, order a decent cup of coffee and a scone and get back to my cube. Scones are good. At least Starbucks scones are good. Scones are typically British. I wonder how authentic scones are. If I knew anyone British, I could ask. But I don't.

Ugh! In the amount of time it took me to be angry about the bagel situation, I could have been to Starbucks, gotten my latte and scone, and gotten back to my desk.

But what would the boss think? Or the nose whistler? Wait! Did they have a meeting this morning? THEY DID! Starbucks it is!

At 3:30pm
Am I really hungry? Or just freaking bored? Tough call. I'm glad I'm up and away from the nose whistler. Seriously, does that guy not notice that he has a kazoo growing out of the front of his face?

What am I getting? Sweet or salty? What are the salty options? Pretzels? Healthy but BORING. Combos? Good... but... what is that cheese stuff made of anyway. Not to mention that I'm not risky what happen the last time I went with C7 as my selection. I had to buy two bags of Tater Skins. I didn't even really want Tater Skins, I was just shocked that they still existed. Maybe they were from a very old box from years and years ago that some warehouse guy decided to just give to us...

Do these even still exist?

How do they even pick what goes in here, anyway? Do we just have that Pork Rind look as a company? I have never seen anyone actually eat a bag of these things around here (or anywhere really). Seriously, does the guy who eats pork rinds also eat cinnamon raisin bagels? This is starting to bother me...

Heh heh... FUN-YUNS!

OK, maybe it's a sweet snack then. Candy bars just LOOK weird to eat. They kind of look like poop and you look semi-uncivilized when you eat them. Wasn't that the point of a Seinfeld episode? I feel like it was. Seinfeld! That was a funny show, but the re-runs on TV right now are starting to look a bit dated. Was Elaine cute? She looks much cuter now than she did back then. Didn't I hear somewhere that she has money? Like a lot of money...

Speaking of a lot of money, am I really contemplating the purchase of the flavored sugary wax better known as Twizzlers for 85-damn-cents? I could go to the grocery store and buy ten of these for four bucks. I should do that. Not with Twizzlers though. F*ck Twizzlers! But with something.

OK, OK, OK... To hell with it. Peanut M&M's is it. Solid choice... some protein. I'm feeling good about this. And slot D9 never let me down. F*ck C7.

Four Workplace Zombies

2009-06-10T19:45:00.002-04:00

Zombies, the walking undead at work. They are the people that are going through something major in life right now, and they are just... not... that... into... work. You are asking about a project or a piece of work that is going on, and they respond with a nonsensical compilation of words.

Y'know the type...

Vacation Zombie
Signs - They are burnt out. They are tired of working. They are tired of their TPS reports. And the only thing keeping them for throwing you out the window right now, is that they are looking forward to a week in California and putting you out the window would result in criminal charges that would prevent the trip.

Estimated Total Uselessness - three weeks. The week before the trip. The week of the trip. And the week after the trip where the traipse (traipse - good word) about the office showing you pictures of them being pasty on a beach, in the ocean, in "the best restaurant", of a singer at a crappy tropical-themed bar, in the place they're staying, on the golf course, on the tennis court, and at the world's third-biggest ball of twine.

How to deal with them - Avoid them at all costs, if you can. If you can't, start playing a little Jimmy Buffett near them to perk them back up before the trip. BUT BE ADVISED: Playing Buffett after the trip will get them depressed in a hurry.

New Baby Zombie
Signs - They are unshaven/unkempt. They are happy... ish. They have new pictures on the cube wall. They show up to work fifteen minutes late every day. They just had a new baby. Getting used to the new tyke's sleeping routine is killing everyone.

Oh, and they'll be caught doing this on occasion.

Estimated Total Uselessness - depending on colic, three to eighteen months. But I have a theory that these folks become the people at work that discover coffee and drink it fifteen times a day.

How to deal with them - Ask a question about their new kid, pretend to listen to their answer. This should perk them back up to get a coherent answer out of them. Failing that, offer them another cup of coffee... even if they already have a fresh cup.

Engaged Zombie
Signs - Typically female, the engaged zombie occur is there stages... 1) HE POPPED THE QUESTION (complete the the necessary jumping up and down and shiny ring dangling). 2) Planning the wedding (and avoiding work at all costs to make sure that bitch at the flower store knows what stargazer lilies are). 3) The post-honeymoon time when you get regaled with stories about a place you'll probably never go. Each stage involves, muttering to themselves, yelling at someone on a phone, ignoring non-wedding activities, ignoring fiances, crying, and talking to co-workers about wedding stuff until the co-workers head explodes.

I don't give a shit about the new project, I care about which of you pinheads are sitting with Crazy Uncle Larry!

Estimated Total Uselessness - The length of the engagement until the first married fight. (DAMMIT, HE'S GOING TO SWITCH TO TIDE DETERGENT IF I HAVE TO START SLIPPING IT INTO HIS FOOD! F*CK CHEER!). Then she'll return to work until they enter New Baby Zombie Mode or Divorce Zombie Mode.

What returns the Engaged Zombie back to a co-worker.

How to deal with them - Uh...... You can't. You just can't.

The Divorce Zombie
Signs - They walk around angry, confused, and muttering to themselves. They will find a way to turn a work conversation into a three-hour soon-to-be-ex bitching session. And you start trying to find a way to walk to the restroom without going by their office. This means that you climb through the ceiling to the roof, repell down the side of the building, re-enter through the front door, and get to the restroom (returning to the cube through the duct system in the restroom).

So you agree that my wife should not have taken the casserole dishes? Great! Let me tell you about her taking the waffle iron!
Ah! Sticking your pen in your temple. My soon-to-be-ex wife makes me want to do that too. The Bitch!

Estimated Total Uselessness - the length of the divorce proceedings (regardless of length). Or until he picks up the office whoo-ore and they start humping in the office supply closet. Here's hoping you're stocked up on pens.

How to deal with them - Until they invent invisible iPod headphones, you are screwed... very... very screwed. And if they know where your cube is located, you might as well install a trap door.

Feeling Lazy Today

2009-06-09T22:35:00.001-04:00

Sorry for the lazy post today. But I'm not feeling it today. I think I have couple of good ideas, but nothing's grabbing me right now. I'm sorry.

To make it up to you, I post 22 Awesome Ways to Quit Your Job by Cracked.com's readers.

These are good, but I'm still a fan of...

* sending in a singing telegram to sing the boss your notice.

* having the resignation waiting in your back pocket for the next time the boss bitches you out (knew a guy that did it, AWESOME!).

* quit on your honeymoon (knew a guy that did that too).

* touchdown dance.

* graffiti the boss's car/office.

* have a pizza delivered and have the pepperoni read, "I quit!"

* billboard!

ANY OTHERS?!?!?! I'm up for a comment battle. I'll post the top ten/five/three next week, and I've give you the next post free.

More Characters from Work

2009-06-08T21:25:00.003-04:00

Thanks to HR Underling (Good blog, by the way) for giving me a new character at work... I Need Your Advice Guy/Gal.

I Need Your Advice Guy/Gal - This person speak in loose generalities about a situation with a co-worker who they refuse to name that they need your advice on. But really they want to either gossip or tattle. They'll just say that there is someone on the fourth-floor in accounting who has a cubicle near the copier who happens to be using the printer across the hall from there cubicle to print personal stuff out. And how you, as the HR person (they make it a point to throw that in there), would handle this situation.

How would you handle a situation involving someone I hate doing something I find annoying, who may-or-may-not be wearing a green shirt over my left shoulder?

You: "Ya mean, so-and-so."
INYAG: (acting coolly) "I'm not saying who it is. Just know that they drive a blue SUV and have fuzzy dice hanging on the mirror."

The Police - This person is the person that has somehow memorized every policy/rule/posting/email/saying/phrase/TLA/and random conversation that has ever happened at work. They don't work in HR, but they are happy to point out that in 2006 the company said that mega-casual wear was acceptable on Fridays during the summer provided you aren't meeting with a client, and they changed their minds in 2007. But they are thinking about bringing in 2009, but until then, you wearing capri pants shouldn't be acceptable. You didn't ask this to The Police, you simply selected clothing and wore it.

The Police are particularly sensitive during the holidays where word is going around the department of who wants to take time off. When you jump into the fray with what you would like to take off, The Police will quickly point out that your department requires that 50% of the people in that department are at work every day, and that vacation days are given based on date of request and seniority.

The Police also wonders why he/she never gets asked to go to lunch with a group of people. And also wonders who just hit CTRL+ALT+down arrow to turn their screen upside down again (they've forgotten how to fix the problem).

(BTW, that seriously works! I discovered it by accident, awesome workplace practical joke. CTRL+ALT+up arrow undoes it. Right and left arrow really mess with you head!).

The Auctioneer - HR people know this person well. This is the person who recently received some sort of discipline (write-up, suspension, termination, stern talking to, being locked in a closet for three days without light, food, water, or toilet). And they decided that the need to talk to HR about what happened.

What generally happens next, if the employee feels as though they were the innocent victim of circumstance - or just an idiot - is that The Auctioneer will visit his friendly HR rep. He'll sit down, smile, temporarily be impressed with himself that he is sitting in an office with the HR person, and then start talking... and talking... and talking... and talking. The hope for The Auctioneer is that he will somehow put together the exact right combination of words that will make the HR person go, "OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!! Well then, not only should you not have had a brief conversation with your boss about your quality of work, but he's now fired, and his boss is now fired, you are promoted and I'm combining you salary with theirs and paying that to you."

Free Pass -- Free Pass is the person who - for zero discernible reason, other than being liked at work, by everyone (well, everyone important,) - has dumb bad luck, and nothing bad seems to happen to them.

Example, FreePass goes on vacation to a remote location that has one flight a week from where you live. FreePass's flight gets cancelled coming back, so they get to stay on vacation for another week and come back to work. They smile, tell their story. And they don't get docked vacation days, or pay. Because, that's something that just happens to Free Pass, and we all like Free Pass

But you have a flight rain out, and are forced to stay an extra day in the airport hotel the smells like cigarettes, sadness, and shame, and TheBoss rolls his eyes when you return and docks you the day.

Predicting This Week For You....

2009-06-07T22:53:00.004-04:00

Here are some predictions of things that are going to happen to you this week at work. I'm personally guaranteeing that seven of these ten things will happen to you, or your money back on this column.

1) Some vendor will have some sort of precognition of when it would be a terrible time to call you... and then call you.

2) Someone will make a statement that social obligation forces you to ask a follow up question. Something like this....

They: "Guess you're part of the tomato committee."

Now, you are either going to ignore the comment (and appear rude), say, "OK." (and appear crazy), or - as social obligation dictates - say "What do you mean?" And find out that you, the fat guy, and the potential serial killer of the office all wore red shirts that day.

3) The smell from the restroom will temporarily make you question whether or not you are visiting a zoo.

4) You will be in a very important, strategic, intelligent conversation with a co-worker when a pain in the ass co-worker comes into your office to ask you a question that kills your mojo. You're talking about reorganizing a department, and they want to know about benefits.

5) You will have your boss unnecessarily copied on a email sent to you to make you look bad.

6) Someone will bring in baked goods... they'll probably suck. OR you'll raid a meeting room that served baked good, and eat the scraps.

7) An unimportant employee will make their job sound like it is crucial to the survival of mankind.

8) The most boring person you know at work will tell you a story that would have you debate just walking away in the middle of one of their sentences. And you'll think hard about doing it. But you won't. This could be a great social experiment.

They: "So then I said to my cat -"
You: (walk away quickly)
They: - "uh...? OK! See ya later."

I have no idea if this is what they'd say... this needs to be attempted.

9) An extremely obese co-worker will wear something that will never make you want to eat food again.

10) Someone will use a phrase similar to this, "Especially, in this economy." However, there is about a 35% chance that the phrase won't be used correctly.

The New Rules

2009-06-04T23:12:00.003-04:00

I've been thinking of new rules that should apply at work...

NEW RULE - If someone copies your boss on an email unnecessarily (y'know just to make sure that they know that you screwed something up, or to get something extra-fast), you get to poop on their desk on Friday after they leave for the weekend.

NEW RULE - If someone has an emergency due to their own poor planning that forced you to do work, you are allowed to respond to their emergency email in Wingdings font, and in another language.

NEW RULE - If you are not a morning person, you should be allowed a "grace hour" before any non-building-is-on-fire human interaction.

NEW RULE - If you are not funny nor interesting, you should never Facebook or Twitter more than once per day. This will be decided by a committee of your best friend, a person that hates you, and someone you used to date.

NEW RULE - You are allowed one and only one unnecessary rev on a motorcycle after work. Any more unnecessary revs after one is publicly admitting that the motorcycle is the only interesting thing about you.

NEW RULE - If you drink more than three cups of coffee per day at work, the next three cups have to be out of a mug that reads, "I apologize for the stench."

NEW RULE - If you start a conversation about a TV show that I don't watch and am not interested in, I get to tell you about a TV show that doesn't exist. Because the experiences are the same.

NEW RULE - If you take smoke breaks at work, you have to make up that time at the end of the day, or get your pay cut by the amount of time you waste while smoking, or give every non-smoking employee $1 for working while you did something useless.

NEW RULE - Any meeting that lasts more than an hour comes with a written apology from the meeting organizer and five-dollar-bill.

Characters at Your Work

2009-06-03T20:19:00.002-04:00

We've all had those characters at work that exist regardless of the environment you work in. You work with these people...

Lunch Destroyer

Going to lunch? She’s coming with! And she’ll go anywhere you want, so long as it has kosher, vegan, organic, Polynesian cuisine, and diet cherry coke. Oh, and they have to take gold as payment. And they have a booth available. And the forks are made of plastic. And they have white tablecloths. But she's not particular about which place it is.

Subject Matter Expert

This is the person the know everything. They know about the differences between Buddhism and Taoism. They know about the political situation in Paraguay. They know what the latest interest rate moves mean. They know the history of Middle Earth and the Middle East. They can throw a curveball, and hit a curveball. And they can’t wait to tell you all about it, should it every comes up it conversation.

But their help on a report that the two of you were assigned? NAHHHHHHHHHHH.......... he's too busy embroiled in a debate over which Saved by the Bell alumni achieved the most career success.

The Legend

He’s not the big boss, or the big VP, or the big anything, yet. He’s the guy who landed The Peterson Account! THE PETERSON ACCOUNT!!!!!! And Buffalo? Forget it! He killed in Buffalo. They love him in Buffalo. And everyone knows what happened in Buffalo. (you don’t, “Buffalo” happened five years before you even heard of your company). According to what you can find out, he either knocked the presentation of a lifetime out of the park while wasted and delivering a baby, or he simply took an order from Old Man Peterson who was looking to contact you company anyway.

He’s been doing the really important stuff around the office, but no one really knows what it is, or how he got where he is. But when you hear his name, you’re expected to genuflect, to drop everything, and make sure you pay homage.

Hi! I know it's Friday at 4:50pm. But do you have anything going on? I need help with The Peterson Account for the next six hours.

He can get you to do work for him too. But he won't ask you directly (he doesn't talk to your type), unless it is 4:50pm or later on a Friday. Then your his plan, his buddy. Otherwise, he'll ask the cohorts who they know that is available to help him with a "pet project" he's working on. Somehow your name comes up (that's the last time you fart in the elevator with that asshole from purchasing), and your are working on revamping The Peterson Account, all weekend.

Keeper of “The Babe”

She’s hot. Well, hot for work (which is a low level of hot (just above average restaurant waitresses but below fitness coaches at the gym), because you tend to see that same person everyday and their are a few day where they've got it going on, and other days where they look like a truck hit them. But after working with/near them for so long, it tends to wear off. Y'know what I'm getting at, here? Maybe I'm rambling. Just a little? Rambling? Sorry, back to the blog.)

She might even be in a relationship. The relationship might even be serious. She might even be engaged, or married. But she’s one of, if not the, babe of your work. And then there’s the guy that hangs out with her WAY too much. He’s always around, and he’s there just to make sure that you know he’s around. He’s her friend, but he doesn’t want her to have any other friends at work. He might even be in a serious relationship himself, not with her. But he’s declared himself, Sir Nosey – Keeper of The Babe! And his job is to know how The Babe is doing, and protect her from a jammed copier, staplers, and those other men that might need to talk to her. And if a man manages to talk to The Babe, he MUST know what the conversation was about.

Quick Post Tonight

2009-06-02T18:52:00.000-04:00

Sorry for the short post tonight. I'll get better tomorrow.

Enjoy this funny job interview story to tide you over until tomorrow.

Something we've all thought about doing.

2009-06-01T21:35:00.003-04:00

It's Monday, you've just finished a weekend filled with friends, hangovers, fuzzy memories, and good times all around... and you... are... dragging... ass!

As you mope into work still trying to be used to the idea of being awake you look over at The Coffee Clique. They are the people that congregate around the coffee machine and suck down cup-after-cup of liquid pick-me-up. But they do it all day.

8am... time for a cup... 9:30am... fill 'er up... 11am... pre-lunch cup... 12:45pm... post-lunch cup... 2pm... afternoon cup... 4pm... just to get you out the door. They smell of coffee. Their blood-type is Starbucks. And without it, they aren't the sharp, they don't produce, they aren't the perky/caffeinated people that they always are.

So I've consider it multiple times. Flipping the office to decaf. What the hell, right? One day, no regular coffee.

I did it today. I made the coffee. No one was looking, so I set up the three pots... all decaf.

As a point of reference, even the decaf pot is regular, this is a rule in the office everyone knows this.

I pulled this off three times today. Just to see what would happen. The chipper, bubbly, perky, happy people morphed into the orcs from Lord of the Rings... but uglier... and a lot less friendly.

"Hi! Thanks for calling DeltaHouse. Can I eat your flesh?"

I swear I heard snoring from down the hall. Fun stuff. I'm doing that again about six months from now.

If Staffing Agency Conversations Were 100% Honest (on both ends)

2009-05-31T22:09:00.001-04:00

Again, I was motivated/slap-happy and thought about what a 100% honest conversation between a staffing agency rep/headhunter/people broker/crappy, unemployable worker monger/flesh peddler/pimp and a HR professional that gets stuck with them on the phone.

If BOTH sides were 100% honest, I think that the conversation would sound like this...

VHRG: WHAT?!?!?! I've got six things I'm working on right now, and you happen to call. Do you have a camera hidden in my office.
StaffingRep: Hi this is Pimp from FleshPeddlers employing the unemployable since 1989.
VHRG: (groan) How long to I have to talk to you before you hang up the phone and give up?
StaffingRep: Shortly after I tell you about the unemployable rejects that I have. Want to just suck it up and deal with it?
VHRG: Sure.
StaffingRep: I have two guys out on work release, one guy that I'm stunned passed his piss test - but he did, a former trapeeze artist who recently developed vertigo, a guy that has been chased out of his last three employers two to eight weeks after he got hired full-time as if he forgot how to do the work - once by a supervisor with a bat, and a hot girl.
VHRG: How hot is the hot girl?
StaffingRep: A solid "10".
VHRG: Intrguing! She got any skills?
StaffingRep: Only if you call texting, flirting, surfing the net for modelling gigs, IM'ing, chewing gum, and filing nails, 'skills'. If you ask her to do something work-related she'll make a sexual harassment complaint. If you ask her to lunch, and you're buying, she'll gladly go.
VHRG: Hmmmmmm....... I guess we'll pass on her.
StaffingRep: That's good. At her last three jobs jobs, she broke up a marriage, an engagment, and turned the rececptionist into a lesbian.
VHRG: Yeah... passing.

Short post tonight, great link though!

2009-05-28T22:31:00.002-04:00

Worked late tonight, no chance at banging out a quality blog.

By the way, if you comment on my site, I'll add your blog to my kingdom of awesomeness (name subject to change to something much better when my creative juices are flowing faster than frozen syrup - as they are today). Leave the name of your blog and the link to it, and I'll figure out the rest.

And if you have a cool name for my honor roll, let me know.

But, my dear readers, I did not intend to leave you empty-handed for coming to visit me today. I bring you College Humor's article on What a Business School Graduate Thinks His First Day of Work Will Be Like.

Two words: High Comedy.

Warning: Crazy, Politically Incorrect, Bathroom-Humor-Filled Post coming*

2009-05-27T21:40:00.003-04:00

* - don't read this post if you offend easily.

I don't even know what to title this other than what I did. I was super slap-happy today. It was triggered from getting three calls in an hour from three different staffing agencies. And all three conversation went exactly the same way...

VHRG: Hello?!
StaffingRep: Hi VHRG, this is StaffingRep from StaffingAgency, how are you?
VHRG: (sigh, eye-roll, barely audible groan) Fine, you?
StaffingRep: Fantastic thank you. Hey listen, I remembered that you were talking about adding a person somewhere in your facility. Do you know if you (getting more hopeful) really need one yet?
VHRG: Not really.
StaffingRep: (Letdown) Oh... well... y'know StaffingAgency is a full-service organization and if you are in need of admin staff or skilled labor we have the best candidates.
VHRG: Great, thanks!
StaffingRep: (as if I never added the verbal filler) Our rates are blah percent for temp-to-hire and blah percent for payrolling.
VHRG: (sounding totally disinterested) Gotcha.
StaffingRep: (extra chipper finish) Can I call you next week to check in on any other needs?
VHRG: (pause, what am I supposed to say, "F*ck you, NO?") I guess.
StaffingRep: Super! Looking forward to talking to you next week.
VHRG: Great, bye! (CLICK)

Now, I get that staffing agency reps are forced to make a certain amount of calls per day, take notes, and log their calls, with the notes, so they can prove to their bosses that they did work that day. But it has also occured to me that I didn't need to say anything in the conversation, and it probably would have gone the same way....

VHRG: Hello?!
StaffingRep: Hi VHRG, this is StaffingRep from StaffingAgency, how are you?
StaffingRep: Fantastic thank you. Hey listen, I remembered that you were talking about adding a person somewhere in your facility. Do you know if you (getting more hopeful) really need one yet?
StaffingRep: (Letdown) Oh... well... y'know StaffingAgency is a full-service organization and if you are in need of admin staff or skilled labor we have the best candidates.
StaffingRep: Our rates are blah percent for temp-to-hire and blah percent for payrolling.
StaffingRep: (extra chipper finish) Can I call you next week to check in on any other needs?
StaffingRep: Super! Looking forward to talking to you next week.
(CLICK)

See, nothing different.

Then I thought about what if I came up with the craziest, most sociopathic things I could think of to say. I'm pretty sure that their end wouldn't change as they would still have to say their shpiel in order to plunk in the notes in the computer system to please the boss. Just once I want to torture a staffing rep and just start saying these things...

VHRG: Hello?!
StaffingRep: Hi VHRG, this is StaffingRep from StaffingAgency, how are you?
VHRG: Much better after burying my face in a small mountain of cocaine.
StaffingRep: Fantastic thank you. Hey listen, I remembered that you were talking about adding a person somewhere in your facility. Do you know if you (getting more hopeful) really need one yet?
VHRG: Got any midgets strippers that can poop gold? Otherwise, no.
StaffingRep: (Letdown) Oh... well... y'know StaffingAgency is a full-service organization and if you are in need of admin staff or skilled labor we have the best candidates.
VHRG: I'm a huge American Psycho Patrick Bateman fan, so much so that I have a human head in my freezer. Want a picture of it? What's your email?
StaffingRep: (as if I never added the verbal filler) Our rates are blah percent for temp-to-hire and blah percent for payrolling.
VHRG: I never wash my hands after I pee when I know you are coming in. This means you've touched - and perhaps consumed - my urine.
StaffingRep: (extra chipper finish) Can I call you next week to check in on any other needs?
VHRG: Generally you have been calling during the time of day where I poop. Yesterday I set off the smoke alarms with the fumes that I produced. Today I'm going to try to crack the bowl.
StaffingRep: Super! Looking forward to talking to you next week.
VHRG: Great, bye! (CLICK)

Ready for the storm in August 2010?

2009-05-17T22:43:00.002-04:00

OK, a few things...

I did not get canned. And while thinking about the proposition, I decided that I'd probably blog more frequently if I did get canned. Not to mention there are several stories that I'm sitting on, that I'd probably fire out there anyway.

The thought of me interviewing. Nothing but pure comedy would ensue. I've been on a few interviews when the economy went left-of-center. And was asked question that made me freeze. Well... not FREEZE... but more answer like this, "well... uh.... um.... er... UH... WELL!" I'd rat out every interviewer ever and every pitch.

It's good to be back. First post back is going to be a serious one. And something that I'm sure HR folks have considered in the back of their heads, but might not be at the forefront.

FACTS...

1) The economy is terrible. DUH! Let's not bang on this point too much because it's in our face every day.

2) The average turnover seems to be about 10-20% based on industry and company, in an average year.

3) People are sitting in jobs with no prospect of a raise, or being forced to taking a paycut, or hating life at work.

4) The economy will recover. And 6-8 months after the recovery is in full swing, the jobs will start returning.

We are 12-15 months away from the world's largest game of musical chairs. People are going to leave, and it's going to be large brutal, and six months long. You are going to see people flying out the door like where they are is on fire. Everyone who hates their job (and yes, you should be lucky to have one), is GONZO. The employable people who are without employment are finding new gigs. People are going to be flipping and flopping jobs for six months. I truly feel bad for comapnies that have let go, are letting go, or will let go their HR people. When the mass exodus happens, that company will be suddenly left holding a bagful of openings.

You watch, it's happening.

Thoughts that are occuring to me while I'm watching Diner.

2009-05-15T22:16:00.002-04:00

Never saw the movie Diner. Heard is was good, TiVo'd it, watching it. Very good flick so far. Future all-star cast too.

1) I miss the blog. A lot. I miss having the friends/fans that I had. A lot.

2) Nothing good could come from the blog. If I get figure out (which I doubt anymore) I could get canned.

3) The world's most insane stories have happened to me since I stopped writing. I could literally write a book. Or a blog...

4) I've had people quit, I've had to do layoffs, I've had to hire in secret, I've had to talk to dead people, I've had to fire people that never saw it coming, I've had to fire people that saw it coming (but were shocked nonetheless), I have ghosts lurking around the corner, I think I'm being used as a conduit to money laundering, and I've heard about every other backward-ass medical thing from way too many people.

Why am I telling you this? I'm telling you this because I need help. Should I keep it up? Would you read it?

Drop me a line.