Friday, March 30, 2012

My crazy job search/interviewing stories, part IV: Baruch College, Union County College, Hudson County College, Ramapo College

I must have wrote good resumes; people take 15 seconds or less to view a resume and decide if they want to interview the person. I did get a number of interviews. Although at colleges, most positions go to a candidate who will fill a quota, or to someone's friend.

Anyway, it could be me, maybe it's just the way the interview process works for other people. They feel it's appropriate to turn every answer that a candidate gives into a negative, like when I interviewed at Baruch College. If I'm such as awful candidate, why did you even call me in for an interview? The guy asking the questions looked more like an actor than the director of an office. Tall, dark, and handsome. Too bad he didn't seem to know much about interviewing.

The negativity continued at Union County College; I left thinking, why would anyone want to work at this place, surrounded by these miserable people?

An interview at Hudson County College found me listening to some guy on a power trip brag about his knowledge, and lecture about what he needed in an employee. Asking interview questions? I guess he forgot about that part.

At Ramapo College I walked into the conference room where the interview was held. I was told to sit at the end of a very long conference table. Odd thing was, the five people on the search committee sat at the other end of the table. Maybe they had a bad experience with other candidates? Did their clothes smell? Did they have bad breath? Maybe the interviewers wanted to see how a candidate reacted by this seating situation? If that's the case, what kind of reaction were they looking for? What would be a positive reaction? What type of reaction would be construed as negative? Or was it that the people doing the interviewing were just morons? Hmm, I think that might be it...

Thursday, March 29, 2012

Crazy Job Search/Interviewing Stories, Part III

I was pretty targeted in my job search, and knew how to write an eye-catching resume, so I did land a decent number of interviews. Some of the bizarre stuff that happens during the interviews though...I couldn't have made some of it up if I had tried. Previously I wrote about the dude at Goldman Sachs who abruptly ran out the door during the interview, and the woman with the greasy palm who shook my hand at Seton Hall University Law School.

I also had an interview once at William Paterson University in Wayne, NJ. The first person I met with said, "If you get this job, you will not have very big shoes to fill." Hmm. That's good, I thought.  I did know the guy who held the job I had been applying for. I met him at a couple of conferences in years past and wasn't very impressed.

Anyway the first group interview went pretty well. One person said something odd, saying the student leaders were "seasoned." To me, a student leader is just someone who has attained a position of power. "seasoned" just isn't the word I would use to describe a college student who still has a lot to learn.

Then I met with two other people, a guy who talked about a business he had on the side from his college job, and the intramurals director who didn't look at me or ask me any questions. Weird. I tried to engage her but she just had this strange look on her face.

Later I met with a few upper level administrators and faculty members. Talk about goofballs. Two of the guys kept looking at each other while they talked in circles at me, never really asking me any direct questions. It seemed like they were totally unprepared and had never interviewed anyone in their life. Maybe they hadn't, who knows. A faculty member who slurred his speech, like he had been drinking, asked me a couple of odd questions. I politely answered, and asked my own questions, like it was a wonderful interview and I was glad to be there.  The chair of the search committee, a guy named Mark, was affable enough. Unfortunately he was only around at the start and end of the day.

I didn't get that job, and I heard that the person who did was only there for about a year. I guess they didn't pick the right person, unless it's okay to spend all that time searching for a worker who is going to be in a position for just a year. Seems like a big investment of everyone's time for something so short term. Why not just have two or three people interview the person over two or three hours? Who knows. American colleges are models of ineffective bureaucracies.

Tuesday, March 27, 2012

The 10 best teams/seasons in Minnesota Viking history

The Minnesota Vikings have had some dominating teams in their 51 year history. Let's take a look at the top ten seasons for the purple and gold.

Honorable mention:
1992: A 11-5 record and a trip to the playoffs.

1968: A 8-6 record and the team's first playoff appearance.

1989:
While reaching the playoffs with a 10-6 record, the defense ranked number 1 in the NFL, giving up the least amount of yards of the 28 teams.

1977: While not a dominant team like in previous seasons the 1977 version finished with a 9-5 record and did make it all the way to the NFC championship game.

1986: Interestingly, while this team did not make make the playoffs with a 9-7 record they scored 398 points, the most in franchise history up until that point. The defense gave up 273 points, good for 5th in the NFL, and ranked 4th in takeaway/giveaway ratio.

The Top 10:
10) 2009: The Vikings rode Brett Favre's magic all the way to the NFC championship game, before losing excruciatingly to the Saints.

9) 1988: Although losing in the playoffs this team had a potent offense, scoring 406 points, good for 4th in the league. The defense was outstanding, coming in second in the NFL with 233 points allowed, first in yardage allowed, and first in takeaway/giveaway ratio.

8) 1971: An amazing defense allowed only 139 points, the second least amount in team history. A 11-3 season ended with a playoff loss.

7) 1974: The team compiled a 10-4 record en route to to its third Super Bowl appearance, and ranked in the top 3 in the NFL in several offensive and defensive categories.

6) 1970: This team steamrolled opponents with a 12-2 regular season record before losing in the playoffs. The offense was third in the NFL in points scored, and the defense was incredible coming in first the NFL in points and yards allowed and 4th in giveaway/takeaway ratio.

5) 1998: A dream season that ended with a nightmare. A 15-1 record and 556 points scored - the second most by any team in NFL history - couldn't stop an overtime loss in the NFC championship game.

 
4) 1976: The Vikes' last Super Bowl season, the team's veterans still dominated opponents and finished with an 11-2-1 record.

3) 1973: A 12-2 regular season ended with a Super Bowl loss. This team was well balanced, with a potent offense and strong defense.

2) 1975: The best Vikings team to not reach the Super Bowl, this squad sent 9 players to the Pro Bowl. A 12-2 record in the regular season and rankings in the top 3 in the NFL in most offensive and defensive categories makes this the second best team ever.

1) 1969: A Super Bowl loss doesn't discount this team from being the best in franchise history. They scored 379 points, which led the NFL. The defense allowed allowed a mere 133 points, which also led the NFL and is tops in team history - and second in NFL history. In addition, the defense allowed the least amount of yards in the NFL that year, was 3rd in takeaway/giveaway ratio, and won games by an average of 17.6 points. Two great playoff wins over the Rams and the Browns cement the 1969 team as the best in Vikings history.



Thursday, March 15, 2012

My crazy job search stories, part II

My last job search article discussed an incident that happened on an interview with a company in the private sector, Goldman Sachs. But I had some odd experiences while interviewing for jobs at colleges. (Oh, and “universities.” Excuse me for that major oversight).

Once I went to an interview at Seton Hall University Law School, and met with a committee of four people. So when I walked into the room each person introduced himself or herself and held out their hand. I smiled as I gave each person a firm handshake.

Unfortunately I grimaced when I clasped the last woman’s hand. Her hand was greasy. She must have just smeared it with some sort of hand lotion, before I entered the room. Now my hand was covered with whatever this oily slime was. Afterward I wondered if this was her, or the committee’s way of trying to trip up a candidate. A stress test of some sort? A clever way to see how someone would react to adversity? Perhaps it was a signal that if I got the job I would have to “grease palms” in order to get ahead in the organization?

Or maybe the woman was just a moron. Even with all their degrees some people who work in higher education are pretty strange.

They asked me a couple of questions, the asked me if I had any questions. I asked one and had a few more prepared but one guy with an unkempt beard (must have been a sleazy lawyer before landing his cushy job at the law school) abruptly thanked me for coming and stood up.

Needless to say I didn’t shake anyone’s hand as I left. I didn’t bother to send a thank you note either.  I decided I didn’t want the job. I guess some lawyers really are slimy, literally.

Donald Trump is right to not shake anyone’s hand. Smart man…

Wednesday, March 14, 2012

Why do bosses ask their workers to do this?

I’ve never understood why organizations ask their workers to do silly stuff that really has nothing to do with the kind of job a person can do, or has any relevance to the organization’s success.
 
Like expecting employees to attend various social events.  Why is this kind of thing so important?  Do you really need to feel liked by everyone in your organization?  Do you really think that camaraderie among people can be created? Not likely. If it’s going to happen it’s going to happen naturally. You can’t force it to happen. A better idea would be to have several events that might appeal to large group of people within your organization. Going to a basketball game, volunteering at some kind of activity, or having a day at an amusement park for people with kids are better than expecting people to hang out at the bar after work, or expecting people to donate money so you can “celebrate” every single person’s birthday at the office.

Along those lines, what’s the point of “team-building” exercises? You don’t need to know about an employee’s private life. You do need to know how to help an employee improve their performance on the job.  When hiring a new worker, you need to know if they can do the job in an efficient manner. Asking them what kind of an animal they would like to be isn’t going to help you to determine that.

A person’s private life is considered private because they don’t want the whole world to know about it. Getting to know someone too well can make me want to work with them less, not more. Team-building activities can make people too uncomfortable to work together, not work well as a “team.”  Discuss performance and results, not inner demons.

Another question is, why ask certain people to do someone else’s job?  John has a project to do but hasn’t finished it, so you ask Tom to do it since you know it will get done on time. That’s wrong. If you’re going to do that you better pay Tom a bonus.  Come one, deal with John and let Tom do his own work.

Maybe a lot of these concepts came to be because certain people in organizations didn’t have enough to do, and they felt like they needed to justify their salary. ….

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Long-winded bosses, asking employees to evaluate themselves and their peers, and other American job nonsense

Ever have a boss who asks you to keep them on track, then when they start droning on about nothing at a meeting and then when you signal them to stop, they ignore you? I would think I’m not the only one.  I guess whatever the boss was saying (I don’t remember anything of what they were talking about) was just too critical for them to say, that they couldn’t stop talking. Some people just need to make themselves feel important, I suppose.

Can anyone tell me what the point is of having workers evaluate themselves? How silly. Someone who is doing an excellent job is going to wonder why you, as a boss, don’t already know that. Someone who is doing a lousy job isn’t going to give themselves a poor rating, obviously (or not obviously to people who think these things up). Instead of self-evaluations why not ask workers what the organization can do to help them improve their skills – which would benefit the organization as well as the employee.

Maybe worse are “peer” evaluations. It doesn’t matter if the evaluations are confidential or not, who wants to work with someone who is critical of them? That’s hardly the best way to develop a “team first” attitude among your workers.

Does anyone have any proof that the above concepts actually do produce positive results in an organization, and I’m wrong? Let’s see it…

Thursday, March 1, 2012

Creepy employers who ask you to donate to their charity

I once worked at a community college in New Jersey where a creepy, high level Dean went around asking staff members to fill out a form and donate money to some social/political charity. I don't remember the name of the organization.  What's the point of pressuring employees to contribute to a certain charity? Just so you can brag to the world what a great boss that you are, that you got 100 percent participation of workers to contribute to a charity of your own personal or political liking? That's wrong. I told the Dean no, I have my own charities that I contribute to, and walked away. He left the office grumbling. I would think a high level Dean would have better things to do, like maybe helping students in some way. 

What employees do with their money is their own business. Why not offer to match whatever employees contribute? I would guess a lot of bosses are too cheap to do that. 

What's almost as bad is when your boss sends his kids to you to ask for money, for a fundraiser for their school or church. Come on. That's rude.  And unprofessional.

Keep the job separate from this type of stuff.  Please.