An Open Letter to Employment Recruiters: Please Suck Less

Dear Employment Recruiters,

As much as I can appreciate how hard it must be to try and match jobs with the thousands of people in the job market, I believe the way in which many of you conduct your business could be be doing a much better job. That is why I am putting out this request to all employment recruiters on the Internet (should they be reading this): Please suck less.

You know who you are: You cold-call and send out mass emails in desperate attempts to fill a position with a company that has engaged you, without regard to the people that are looking for a job. You are noncommutative, masters of the slick salesman talk and dishonest in your intentions. Not all employment recruiters are like this, but 99% of you are and the other 1% are about as common as Bigfoot sightings. To aid you in becoming better, I am providing a few items that when addressed, I believe, will help you and your way of conducting business with job seekers suck less.

  • Communication: When I am filling out the information for the position that you have me in mind for, you are great with the phone calls and emails encouraging me to send it over so you can submit me ASAP. Usually, this is where the communication ends. After you have what you want, I rarely hear from you again. To get a status, I often have to reach out to you to find out the job has already been filled. A phone call or an email would be nice.
  • Be Honest: Don’t tell me that you really care for me and my career goals when you don’t. It’s like having a waiter in a restaurant telling me he really cares about my diet. Like they said in The Godfather: It’s not personal, it’s business. If you have a position open with a company you are working with and you are trying to get me into this position, just say so. But don’t feed me the line about trying to match me with a bunch of positions, because you ain’t, and that you care about me getting my dream job, because you don’t.
  • Don’t make me do all the work: A firm that I worked with recently had me re-do my resume, write a new cover letter, take a personality quiz, write up a few success stories and then input all this information into their custom system. Job leads from all this work? Zippo. Calls back from the agency on my search status? Bupkis. If you are working for me, why am I doing all the work? To return to the restaurant analogy, it’s like telling the waiter what I want and then having to go back to the kitchen and cook my own steak. You have all my information, you fill in the forms.
    On a personal note: Please stop sending mass emails about a position with the caveat “If this isn’t a match for you, can you please forward it to any of your friends who might be interested?” Yeah, right. Why don’t I wash your car while I’m at it.
  • Research my background: The positions you send over to me often are a reach for my skill set at best. Recently, I got an email from a recruiter about an accounting position. Look at my profile: do you see the word “accounting” in there anywhere? I am guessing that a more focused search on my skills would gain you more positions filled than the Johnny Appleseed approach: “He knows how to use a computer, I’ll send him a job for a Analytics Intelligence Director!”

Job recruiters, these are simple fixes; a little courtesy and effort on your part would go a long way to sucking less. Gain a good reputation and these job seekers will beat a path to your door: I guarantee it.

Yours,

Michael.

A corporate benefit all companies can afford: Get rid of the dress code

I have a confession to make: sometimes when I have lots of work to do and I am going to be at my desk all day, I take off my shoes.  It’s just more comfortable for me and allows me to think more clearly then when I have dress shoes on.

Can you guess how many people in my office know this?  Zero.  Unless I walk around my office, or have somebody stop by my desk, nobody sees me for the entire day.  Many people I know are in the same sort of position as myself: they do not have many face-to face contacts with other workers or clients and yet they are still being forced to adhere to a dress code that is simply out of touch with today’s workforce.

When I began in the workforce in the late 1980’s, the code of dress was even stricter: Men had to wear jackets and ties and the women had to wear skirts and hose.  “Casual Friday” meant we got to ditch the jacket and tie for what we commonly wear to work now.  We could wear jeans to work a few days out the year but they were usually centered around some corporate event.

I remember there being a shift in the dress code around the middle 1990’s, but it wasn’t without a great deal of apprehension from the senior management of the company: What if somebody dresses inappropriately?  What if the employee’s start acting less professional?   What will our clients think?  After much hand-wringing they decided to change the dress code from suits/tie/skirt/hose to the casual Friday wear and jeans on Friday.  You can probably guess what happened next:

Nothing.

Business went on as usual: people wore the appropriate attire (the people who crossed the line on their choice of clothes turned out to be people the company didn’t want anyway), productivity continued and eventually the clients (and almost everybody else) changed their dress codes too.  The world did not end.  With this in mind, I say to the business leaders of the world: time to take the next step and get rid of the dress code completely.

I loved the show Mad Men.  It was like watching a live time capsule: set in 1961, the men wore suits and smoked and drank in their offices, demeaned their employees and delegated women to minor roles such as secretaries and hostesses (until of course, they got married and quit their jobs).  I asked my father if that was accurate and he confirmed it for the most part: he had never seen someone with a bar in their office where he worked, but he knew of others that had, yet otherwise it was spot on.  It was, he explained, the way it had always been.

As modern-day office worker, how many of the things from the Mad Men era survived?  Practically none (women still are not equal to men in business, but that’s another column).  Smoking is banned, nobody drinks in the office or at lunch any more, management is trained on how to get the best out of their employees without belittling them and there are much more opportunities for women.

Did the American economy collapse?  Of course not, the times simply changed and business changed with it; this is what I am suggesting should happen now.  With easy access to the internet, email and wifi you don’t even have to be in an office anymore, much less dress up, and the relationship between corporate workers is more virtual (the majority of people I interact with every day aren’t even located in my state).  So we are we holding up this pretense of wearing slacks equals productivity/professionalism?

According to an article on the Inc. website, the trend against work dress codes is coming and there is little anybody can do about it.

“Formality is breaking down–just think of Mark Zuckerberg in his hoodies and the explosion in flat organizations. Is this all for the better?  Formality is like a virus that infects the productive tissue of an organization.  When did you last hear a programmer or designer clamor to wear a suit to work? The order always come from the executives (followed shortly by a request for those TPS reports!).  In other words, it’s all about posture, not productivity.”

Case studies on successful organizations such as Google, Facebook, Apple and top creative agencies that have eliminated their dress code show they have not missed a beat with their productivity.  In a profile on Google by Fast Company, it noted “The search giant’s lack of a formal dress code means employees’ clothing choices run the gamut of buttoned-up button-downs accessorized with pearl earrings to jeans and T-shirts. But that hasn’t hurt productivity. In fact, while some staff liken its Garage innovation space to a cross between kindergarten and a classy law firm, Google is consistently ranked as one of the top best companies to work for.”

Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban takes it a step further by stating that a casual dress code policy could be a benefit that their employees will love and does not cost them a cent.

“If you are a CEO, are there not better things your employees could spend money on than multiple suits, ties, dress shirts, dress shoes, dress socks, dry cleaning, and all the other associated costs ? Gee, no suits would be the same as giving your employees a tax free raise. Think that might make them happy ? Or do employees consider having to spend money on suits a perk?”

Gary Vaynerchuk, CEO of Vayner Media, believes the issue of a office dress code and professionalism comes down to context:

“To say that professionalism is one way or the other is complete insanity. To a twenty-five year old startup guy or gal, professionalism is a hoodie and jeans. To a fifty-three year old Madison Avenue executive, professionally dressed is, at the bare minimum, a dress shirt and jacket. Context. And as these two worlds collide, you start getting a mix. Some people are wearing hoodies on Wall Street, and we do Formal Friday at VaynerMedia.

Over the next decade as these worlds come together, they will become all one and the same. Professionalism will be agnostic.”

There is no real reason for us to keep this up: if Steve Jobs could transform society by wearing jeans, a black turtleneck and Nikes everyday, why can’t people at other companies?  Is the wrapper on the gift more important than the gift inside?

Markup: HTML Tags and Formatting

Headings

Header one

Header two

Header three

Header four

Header five
Header six

Blockquotes

Single line blockquote:

Stay hungry. Stay foolish.

Multi line blockquote with a cite reference:

People think focus means saying yes to the thing you’ve got to focus on. But that’s not what it means at all. It means saying no to the hundred other good ideas that there are. You have to pick carefully. I’m actually as proud of the things we haven’t done as the things I have done. Innovation is saying no to 1,000 things.

Steve Jobs – Apple Worldwide Developers’ Conference, 1997

Tables

Employee Salary
John Doe $1 Because that’s all Steve Jobs needed for a salary.
Jane Doe $100K For all the blogging she does.
Fred Bloggs $100M Pictures are worth a thousand words, right? So Jane x 1,000.
Jane Bloggs $100B With hair like that?! Enough said…

Definition Lists

Definition List Title
Definition list division.
Startup
A startup company or startup is a company or temporary organization designed to search for a repeatable and scalable business model.
#dowork
Coined by Rob Dyrdek and his personal body guard Christopher “Big Black” Boykins, “Do Work” works as a self motivator, to motivating your friends.
Do It Live
I’ll let Bill O’Reilly will explain this one.

Unordered Lists (Nested)

  • List item one
    • List item one
      • List item one
      • List item two
      • List item three
      • List item four
    • List item two
    • List item three
    • List item four
  • List item two
  • List item three
  • List item four

Ordered List (Nested)

  1. List item one
    1. List item one
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      2. List item two
      3. List item three
      4. List item four
    2. List item two
    3. List item three
    4. List item four
  2. List item two
  3. List item three
  4. List item four

HTML Tags

These supported tags come from the WordPress.com code FAQ.

Address Tag

1 Infinite Loop
Cupertino, CA 95014
United States

Anchor Tag (aka. Link)

This is an example of a link.

Abbreviation Tag

The abbreviation srsly stands for “seriously”.

Acronym Tag (deprecated in HTML5)

The acronym ftw stands for “for the win”.

Big Tag (deprecated in HTML5)

These tests are a big deal, but this tag is no longer supported in HTML5.

Cite Tag

“Code is poetry.” —Automattic

Code Tag

You will learn later on in these tests that word-wrap: break-word; will be your best friend.

Delete Tag

This tag will let you strikeout text, but this tag is no longer supported in HTML5 (use the <strike> instead).

Emphasize Tag

The emphasize tag should italicize text.

Insert Tag

This tag should denote inserted text.

Keyboard Tag

This scarcely known tag emulates keyboard text, which is usually styled like the <code> tag.

Preformatted Tag

This tag styles large blocks of code.

.post-title {
	margin: 0 0 5px;
	font-weight: bold;
	font-size: 38px;
	line-height: 1.2;
	and here's a line of some really, really, really, really long text, just to see how the PRE tag handles it and to find out how it overflows;
}

Quote Tag

Developers, developers, developers… –Steve Ballmer

Strike Tag (deprecated in HTML5)

This tag shows strike-through text

Strong Tag

This tag shows bold text.

Subscript Tag

Getting our science styling on with H2O, which should push the “2” down.

Superscript Tag

Still sticking with science and Isaac Newton’s E = MC2, which should lift the 2 up.

Teletype Tag (deprecated in HTML5)

This rarely used tag emulates teletype text, which is usually styled like the <code> tag.

Variable Tag

This allows you to denote variables.

Markup: Image Alignment

Welcome to image alignment! The best way to demonstrate the ebb and flow of the various image positioning options is to nestle them snuggly among an ocean of words. Grab a paddle and let’s get started.

On the topic of alignment, it should be noted that users can choose from the options of NoneLeftRight, and Center. In addition, they also get the options of ThumbnailMediumLarge & Fullsize.

Image Alignment 580x300

The image above happens to be centered.

Image Alignment 150x150The rest of this paragraph is filler for the sake of seeing the text wrap around the 150×150 image, which is left aligned

As you can see the should be some space above, below, and to the right of the image. The text should not be creeping on the image. Creeping is just not right. Images need breathing room too. Let them speak like you words. Let them do their jobs without any hassle from the text. In about one more sentence here, we’ll see that the text moves from the right of the image down below the image in seamless transition. Again, letting the do it’s thang. Mission accomplished!

And now for a massively large image. It also has no alignment.

Image Alignment 1200x400

The image above, though 1200px wide, should not overflow the content area. It should remain contained with no visible disruption to the flow of content.

Image Alignment 300x200

And now we’re going to shift things to the right align. Again, there should be plenty of room above, below, and to the left of the image. Just look at him there… Hey guy! Way to rock that right side. I don’t care what the left aligned image says, you look great. Don’t let anyone else tell you differently.

In just a bit here, you should see the text start to wrap below the right aligned image and settle in nicely. There should still be plenty of room and everything should be sitting pretty. Yeah… Just like that. It never felt so good to be right.

And just when you thought we were done, we’re going to do them all over again with captions!

Image Alignment 580x300
Look at 580×300 getting some caption love.

The image above happens to be centered. The caption also has a link in it, just to see if it does anything funky.

Image Alignment 150x150
Itty-bitty caption.

The rest of this paragraph is filler for the sake of seeing the text wrap around the 150×150 image, which is left aligned

As you can see the should be some space above, below, and to the right of the image. The text should not be creeping on the image. Creeping is just not right. Images need breathing room too. Let them speak like you words. Let them do their jobs without any hassle from the text. In about one more sentence here, we’ll see that the text moves from the right of the image down below the image in seamless transition. Again, letting the do it’s thang. Mission accomplished!

And now for a massively large image. It also has no alignment.

Image Alignment 1200x400
Massive image comment for your eyeballs.

The image above, though 1200px wide, should not overflow the content area. It should remain contained with no visible disruption to the flow of content.

Image Alignment 300x200
Feels good to be right all the time.

And now we’re going to shift things to the right align. Again, there should be plenty of room above, below, and to the left of the image. Just look at him there… Hey guy! Way to rock that right side. I don’t care what the left aligned image says, you look great. Don’t let anyone else tell you differently.

In just a bit here, you should see the text start to wrap below the right aligned image and settle in nicely. There should still be plenty of room and everything should be sitting pretty. Yeah… Just like that. It never felt so good to be right.

And that’s a wrap, yo! You survived the tumultuous waters of alignment. Image alignment achievement unlocked!

Markup: Text Alignment

Default

This is a paragraph. It should not have any alignment of any kind. It should just flow like you would normally expect. Nothing fancy. Just straight up text, free flowing, with love. Completely neutral and not picking a side or sitting on the fence. It just is. It just freaking is. It likes where it is. It does not feel compelled to pick a side. Leave him be. It will just be better that way. Trust me.

Left Align

This is a paragraph. It is left aligned. Because of this, it is a bit more liberal in it’s views. It’s favorite color is green. Left align tends to be more eco-friendly, but it provides no concrete evidence that it really is. Even though it likes share the wealth evenly, it leaves the equal distribution up to justified alignment.

Center Align

This is a paragraph. It is center aligned. Center is, but nature, a fence sitter. A flip flopper. It has a difficult time making up its mind. It wants to pick a side. Really, it does. It has the best intentions, but it tends to complicate matters more than help. The best you can do is try to win it over and hope for the best. I hear center align does take bribes.

Right Align

This is a paragraph. It is right aligned. It is a bit more conservative in it’s views. It’s prefers to not be told what to do or how to do it. Right align totally owns a slew of guns and loves to head to the range for some practice. Which is cool and all. I mean, it’s a pretty good shot from at least four or five football fields away. Dead on. So boss.

Justify Align

This is a paragraph. It is justify aligned. It gets really mad when people associate it with Justin Timberlake. Typically, justified is pretty straight laced. It likes everything to be in it’s place and not all cattywampus like the rest of the aligns. I am not saying that makes it better than the rest of the aligns, but it does tend to put off more of an elitist attitude.

Markup: Title With Special Characters

Putting special characters in the title should have no adverse effect on the layout or functionality.

Special characters in the post title have been known to cause issues with JavaScript when it is minified, especially in the admin when editing the post itself (ie. issues with metaboxes, media upload, etc.).

Latin Character Tests

This is a test to see if the fonts used in this theme support basic Latin characters.

! # $ % & ( ) *
+ , . / 0 1 2 3 4
5 6 7 8 9 : ; > = <
? @ A B C D E F G H
I J K L M N O P Q R
S T U V W X Y Z [
] ^ _ ` a b c d e f
g h i j k l m n o p
q r s t u v w x y z
{ | } ~

Markup: Title With Markup

Verify that:

  • The post title renders the word “with” in italics and the word “markup” in bold.
  • The post title markup should be removed from the browser window / tab.

Edge Case: Nested And Mixed Lists

Nested and mixed lists are an interesting beast. It’s a corner case to make sure that

  • Lists within lists do not break the ordered list numbering order
  • Your list styles go deep enough.

Ordered – Unordered – Ordered

  1. ordered item
  2. ordered item
    • unordered
    • unordered
      1. ordered item
      2. ordered item
  3. ordered item
  4. ordered item

Ordered – Unordered – Unordered

  1. ordered item
  2. ordered item
    • unordered
    • unordered
      • unordered item
      • unordered item
  3. ordered item
  4. ordered item

Unordered – Ordered – Unordered

  • unordered item
  • unordered item
    1. ordered
    2. ordered
      • unordered item
      • unordered item
  • unordered item
  • unordered item

Unordered – Unordered – Ordered

  • unordered item
  • unordered item
    • unordered
    • unordered
      1. ordered item
      2. ordered item
  • unordered item
  • unordered item

Post Format: Standard

All children, except one, grow up. They soon know that they will grow up, and the way Wendy knew was this. One day when she was two years old she was playing in a garden, and she plucked another flower and ran with it to her mother. I suppose she must have looked rather delightful, for Mrs. Darling put her hand to her heart and cried, “Oh, why can’t you remain like this for ever!” This was all that passed between them on the subject, but henceforth Wendy knew that she must grow up. You always know after you are two. Two is the beginning of the end.

Continue reading “Post Format: Standard”