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Why Does Julia Allison Do It?
Tweet Share on Facebook July 23, 2008 CommentA catchy Wired Magazine ad caught my Internet-scrolling eyes this morning, and I ended up reading the magazine's cover story on Internet celebrity Julia Allison.
It's a strange story for several reasons. Allison is a Web star—probably unrecognizable to most people that pass her on the street (at least outside Manhattan or San Francisco). But Wired reports that Allison, who works as a dating columnist for Time Out New York, has built her fame on little other than relentless self-promotion:
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Why You Should Be Grateful for $4 Gas
Tweet Share on Facebook July 22, 2008 Comment (5)I recently interviewed Jon Gordon, author of The No Complaining Rule: Positive Ways to Deal With Negativity at Work, while he was in the middle of a long drive with his family. Believe it or not, Gordon could actually bring himself to be grateful for the price he was paying at the pump. That kind of gratitude can pay off for us in the workplace, Gordon says. (Much more on this next week, especially on how older workers who can't afford to retire can avoid negativity and complaining.)
Gordon's thoughts on gratitude:
It's everything. I think it really is everything. And all the research on gratitude is so powerful. You see that you can't be stressed and thankful at the same time. It's the way our brains and bodies are wired. So you focus on gratitude and you won't be stressed. It's the best stress reducer....
OK, you're paying $4 a gallon for gas, and I'm as upset as anybody. But you can say: We're not paying $8 a gallon. And we live in a free country. We live with so many amenities. We live with so many free things that we can enjoy.... Instead of focusing on that complaint, you can now be grateful for what you have. And which emotion's going to uplift you? Gratitude. Which one's going to enhance your longevity? Gratitude. Which one will strengthen your immune system? Gratitude.
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Women Aren't Just Leaving the Workforce to Become Mothers
Tweet Share on Facebook July 22, 2008 CommentIn the second half of the 20th century, the employment rate for women grew fairly steadily, but growth has stalled since the late 1990s, according to a report from Congress's Joint Economic Committee (as reported by the New York Times).
Bureau of Labor Statistics data show that women were particularly hard hit and did not recover from their job losses in the 2001 recession, unlike previous recessions, and that "wives are no longer insulating families from economic hardship in times of higher unemployment and falling or stagnant real wages," the report's authors conclude.
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The Easiest Reason to Fire Someone
Tweet Share on Facebook July 21, 2008 CommentSome HR choices are hard. There just isn't much gray area in this firing decision:
An internal affairs report says a Daytona Beach police officer demanded free coffee and tea from a Starbucks and threatened employees with slower emergency response times if they refused.
Lt. Major Garvin, a 15-year veteran, was fired July 8. According to the Daytona Beach News-Journal, Chief Mike Chitwood says Garvin recently failed a polygraph test that he insisted on taking.
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Why Moscow Has Rock-Bottom Unemployment
Tweet Share on Facebook July 21, 2008 Comment (1)Despite sluggishness in Russia's overall labor market, Moscow's labor market is hot—boasting a 0.9 percent unemployment rate, writes Peter Cappelli at Human Resource Executive. There are lessons here for the United States. He explains why:
The intensity of Moscow's economy and the stagnation in the rest of the [Russian] economy are related. Despite having a population that is, by world standards, highly educated, the Russian economy is being held back by an apparent skill shortage....
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3 Lessons from My Broken AC
Tweet Share on Facebook July 21, 2008 CommentWashington is stuck in the middle of a heat wave (or is this just called "summer" here?) and my air conditioning stopped working more than two weeks ago. Even better news—my landlord is out of the country.
There are a few business lessons I'm learning as I work with the repair company:
1. Do not blame someone else when trying to fix a problem. Everyone I talk to seems to pass the baton to someone else—sometimes in a kind of intimate, news-sharing way. This does not, of course, convince me that it is less their problem, nor does it make me their confidante. I'm just convinced they're less likely to help me.
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Don't Lie to Your Boss or Coworkers. Ever
Tweet Share on Facebook July 18, 2008 Comment (2)This piece from 45 Things, which suggests 10 workplace rules that are "guaranteed" to reduce stress, definitely seems like a joke. But on the chance that not everyone will read it that way, I'm going to pretend that it's serious and tell you why some of these suggestions should really be avoided:
2. Claim you already gave to the latest charitable cause for which a colleague is collecting money. You're not a bad person, but if it comes down to saving the sea turtles or a latte, well...
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What You Should Know About the Social Security Earnings Test
Tweet Share on Facebook July 18, 2008 Comment (4)For Americans ages 62 to 65, who fear seeing their Social Security benefits pared because of earnings, Andrew Biggs at the American Enterprise Institute has some good news about working in retirement:
Readers of financial columns know that the Social Security earnings test reduces benefits for retirees aged sixty-two to sixty-six who continue to work. Most seniors view the earnings test as a 50 percent tax on top of their income and payroll taxes, which discourages them from working and receiving benefits at the same time.
But the conventional wisdom regarding the Social Security earnings test is wrong. At the full retirement age (sixty-six for those born in 1943-54), Social Security increases benefits for individuals who had been subject to the earnings test, which completely offsets benefits lost earlier. Most seniors do not know this, since government agencies and financial advisers rarely tell them. Until very recently, SSA's own publications on the earnings test did not provide details on the benefit adjustment that takes place at the full retirement age. As a result, many retirees work less at the very time when continued work could benefit them most.
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How to Build a Beautiful Résumé
Tweet Share on Facebook July 16, 2008 Comment (2)Résumés can be beautiful, says JobMob. Check out their gallery of lovely résumé designs "that really work."
Just don't forget that content is key. All the colors and images in the world won't make a sluggish short-timer shine.
Perhaps more useful is good writing advice, like this, from the late language expert Paul McHenry Roberts, quoted in the Dosh Dosh Blog:
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Accounting Is a Super-Hot Career Field!
Tweet Share on Facebook July 15, 2008 Comment (2)If you're looking for a sure thing in the labor market, consider accounting. This, according to a recent survey finding that 58 percent of finance and HR managers surveyed worldwide were concerned about losing their top performers. The Robert Half Global Financial Employment Monitor found 73 percent of U.S. respondents shared the concern—up from 46 percent last year.
While it's good news for those employers that more people are studying accounting now than in the past four decades or so, according to the American Institute of CPAs, most employers are scrambling for people with experience.
Would you make a good accountant? Here's a list of factors to consider before you jump into number crunching.
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