Surviving the Workday

A Bible-based theme park in Tennessee has yet to woo locals:

The project’s developer Armon Bar-Tur, co-founder of New York-based SafeHarbor Holding, says he knows what comes to mind when people hear “Bible Park USA.”

“Commercializing and tacky and it being a Six Flags [theme park] over Jesus,” he says.

But that’s not what he’s going for. Unlike smaller religious attractions, Bar-Tur says, the park would focus on the historical aspects of the Bible — not on ministry.

What’s odd to me is that one of the actual ”rides” or “events” or “whatever”  in the park description is something that already exists. Moses parts the Red Sea at Universal Studios, dude. Now a swarm of locusts? That I haven’t seen as a ride.

Yay! There are many work-related implications for same-sex marriage, including receiving benefits through your spouse, so what a relief that the California State Supreme Court has made this decision:

“There can be no doubt that extending the designation of marriage to same-sex couples, rather than denying it to all couples, is the equal protection remedy that is most consistent with our state’s general legislative policy and preference,” said the 120-page ruling.

It said that the state law’s language “limiting the designation of marriage to a ‘union between a man and a woman’ is unconstitutional, and that the remaining statutory language must be understood as making the designation of marriage available to both opposite-sex and same-sex couples.”

Analysis at the Workplace Prof Blog is helpful for understanding the implications.

Marianna M. Vieira taught at the University of New Haven for 14 years as non-tenure track faculty. She was dismissed by a dean without a hearing when she was on the cusp of getting a multi-year contract:

Vieira was dismissed under standards for those with minimal job security — not tenure or even the assurances that come with multi-year contracts. Under these standards, the AAUP found, her department’s backing meant nothing and a dean could — and did — make a decision to get rid of her. AAUP officials noted that the case demonstrates the vulnerability of adjuncts to such treatment.

The irony in this case was that before the inquiry that led to her dismissal — when Vieira was serving on the Faculty Senate — she raised questions about the status and protections of non-tenure-track faculty members. Further, she was backed by a faculty grievance panel, and her department, which believed it was close to winning a multi-year contract for her.

This seems like another example of a university adopting corporate behavior as well as an example of the huge discrepancy between standards and protections afforded to tenured and untenured faculty.

I have to admit that someone telling me to “just relax” is about as annoying as presumptions such as “I know how you feel” (You don’t. Even if you think you do) and “It’s a no brainer”* (It’s probably not). I don’t relax. I don’t seem capable to relaxation by external command.

But apparently the commandment”Just relax!” is also non-relaxing for others. Steve at All Things Workplace runs down two recent studies on relaxing, and why it may not be helpful to instruct someone to relax (particularly at work).

 *”That’s a no brainer” is best said in a Massachusetts accent for the full effect.

Workplace Prof Blog notes that there has been a flurry of pregnancy discrimination discussions in the blogosphere of late, which is helpful because I thought it was just me, and then goes on to discuss the details of pregnancy discrimination in law enforcement in two new stories.

And as we’ve noted, there has been a surge of complaints and inquiries to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Then there’s that whole Bloomberg thing.

Psychology Today has an interesting article on how we all live on credit, one way or another, and not the financial kind:

Certainly credit can be in the form of tangible reward, whether unexpected bonus, surprise vacation, or plum new assignment. But credit is also highly sought after when it stands alone, in the form of a public e-mail, an open compliment, or—simply, quietly—specific praise from the boss for a great idea or a job superbly executed. You can’t pay your mortgage with that credit, but we still hunger for it. In that universal desire, we are all puppies, and credit is the scratch behind the ears that gets us wagging.

As you rise in a company, the author claims, you may receive less credit (Is this true? I’m thinking I’ve frequently seen the opposite). Ideas tend to rise without a definite source in a company (This is definitely true, though sometimes I think the source has been deliberately removed).

There is also specific advice for those of us who work with credit snatchers, and those of us who simply work with others:

CNN has a list of the top 10 interview mistakes, which includes all sorts of odd behaviors in terms of grooming and hygiene gaffs, some oversharing, some underpreparation, and then plain rudeness:

• Candidate answered cell phone and asked the interviewer to leave her own office because it was a “private” conversation.

• Applicant told the interviewer he wouldn’t be able to stay with the job long because he thought he might get an inheritance if his uncle died - and his uncle wasn’t “looking too good.”

• The job seeker asked the interviewer for a ride home after the interview.

• The applicant smelled his armpits on the way to the interview room.

• Candidate said she could not provide a writing sample because all of her writing had been for the CIA and it was “classified.”

• Candidate told the interviewer he was fired for beating up his last boss.

• When the applicant was offered food before the interview, he declined saying he didn’t want to line his stomach with grease before going out drinking.

• An applicant said she was a “people person” not a “numbers person” — in her interview for an accounting position.

• During a phone interview the candidate flushed the toilet while talking to hiring manager.

• The applicant took out a hair brush and brushed her hair.

Advice in the article seems pretty obvious.

Here’s a funny overview of how yogurt is marketed towards women, in particular, women who wear hoodies and have master’s degrees.

I am wearing a hoodie, and have a master’s degree, but fight the urge to eat the Yogurt.

Via Feministing

Never Been Thawed is a mockumentary following the lives of the members of a club of frozen dinner collectors in Mesa, Arizona. The premise takes a little getting used to, and the movie has a slow start during which countless repulsive meals are featured.

Yet, and this is a big yet, it has some of the most hysterically funny satirical workplace scenes of any movie: Clown Cuts where “smilists” cut your hair, The William Jefferson Abstinence Center where we follow the calls of an “intercourse prevention counselor” (Keep her on the phone, so she’ll avoid the bone), an anti-abortion cafe called the No Choice where anti-abortion hecklers can have a cappucino in between protests at Planned Parenthood, and gigs with The Christers, a Christian punk band that seems only vaguely Christian.

Roughly 50% of readers will be deeply offended by this film, but some of us found it was funny.

Can someone vouch that this device actually works? I’ve seen the videos. I’m amazed, and I’m envisioning my life without each weekend devouted to hair removal from all surfaces. If you have one, could you see if it is labeled with Made in China too? Yes? And that it doesn’t hurt the animal? I’d love this to be a solution to the German Shepherd hair problem.

 I’m not sure this post has anything to do with spirituality and the workplace. I’ll live with that.

How much money would a stay-at-home-mom make, if a stay-at-home-mom made money? Salary.com, a website that is perhaps best known for its “cost of living” tool, has developed a wizard that helps compute the monetary value of a SAHM’s work.

According to their 2006 press release, Salary.com says they “consulted with Stay at Home and Working Moms and determined the top 10 jobs that make up a mom’s job description. If paid, Stay at Home Moms would earn $134,121 annually …. Working Moms would earn $85, 876 annually for the ‘mom portion’ of their work, in addition to their actual ‘work job’ salary.”

Any guesses at those top 10 jobs? Despite being the child of a former SAHM, a few of them never even crossed my mind. Compare your answers to theirs here.

The nice thing about the Mom Salary Wizard is that it’s not a generic figure tossed out, but a customizable one - this is important, because not every SAHM spends the same amount of time on the same tasks. It’s pitched as a potential “mother’s day gift” that children or partners can make for the moms in their lives, but I think it has more meaningful possibilities.

This came to me through a woman in my Real Wealth of Portland group, where we’re striving together to make aspects of our local “invisible economy” more visible. Author Riane Eisler notes that in 2004, a survey conducted by the Swiss government showed that if unpaid work done in the home were included as part of the Gross Domestic Product, it would represent 70% of the Swiss GDP.

So, what’s your mom (or dad) “worth?”

So Ms T suggested that we select an area of expertise for this blog. It was obvious to me in looking at my collection of links that my specialty should be weird workplace news. Ms T also suggested a regular column. Genius! This will force me to do that writing I’ve been neglecting.

Just look for the red stapler when you want your fix of wacky workplace hijinks. I’m going to aim for every Friday.

(more…)

In Great Britain, a database listing employees with identifying information including photos, and their grounds for dismissal will be available for future employers to check on potential hires. The database, called the National Staff Dismissal Register (NSDR) raises a number of concerns for employees. First, and foremost, these grounds for dismissal don’t have to be reported for police. Employers seem to be able to literally enter any information without fear of penalty. Second, there is no method for addressing any inaccuracies in the database:

James Welch, the legal director of human rights group Liberty, also says that he is concerned that the register does not offer sufficient redress to the falsely accused.

“This scheme appears to bypass existing laws which protect employees by limiting the circumstances when information about possible criminal activity can be shared with potential employers.”

Aee. I’m all for sharing information, but as you can see in the comments, there seems to be a lot of room for abuse, and once on the list, what will you do for work?

Oooh! Look at this home office! It’s really a glorified shed, but so cute, bright, and tucked away in the shade in the yard. And, of course, if you put some wheels on the bottom, you might be able to get away building it without a permit. Not that I would ever suggest doing that. Never mind me forwarding this to someone I know who likes building sheds…..

Via Treehugger

Even though literally a quarter of my living relatives live in your lovely city of Toronto, I know nothing of your culture, especially this word, Timbit. And even finding out the meaning (donut hole), I fear you have picked up some management practices from your neighbors down south: fire first, ask questions later. You really can’t buy PR this bad. And, as always with a story from Consumerist, the comments are quite funny, including some folks waiting for the first person to blame the victim, a popular Consumerist commenter practice.

If you were to send your mother flowers rather than clipping them from your garden, you might give try California Organic Flowers. I sent ranunculus to my mom for her birthday, and due to my own zip code error, there were issues with them arriving on time, but California Organic Flowers sent another batch for free after I developed a relationship with Marc trying to track down the flowers, which became world travelers. Again, that was due to my error, not theirs. 

You can also see Marc below, which is funny only that my husband stumbled across this video when looking for information on organic cover crops, and not organic flowers.

And why would you even care if the flowers you send are organic? About 70% of the cut flowers in the U.S. are imported, and often from countries that use pesticides and fumigants that are banned in North America. Furthermore, there are some serious labor issues with who cuts the flowers:

Meanwhile, two-thirds of Columbian and Ecuadorian workers suffer from problems associated with pesticide exposure, including nausea, conjunctivitis, neurological disease, reproductive problems, and birth defects. Plus, the International Labor Organization estimates that 20 percent of flower workers in Ecuador are children, who are even more vulnerable to hazards these chemicals pose.

After yesterday’s post, I remembered a survey in the United Kingdom of bosses and managers and how they felt weighed hiring people who might become pregnant (a pretty big group, mind you):

More than 75% of bosses would not take on a woman recruit if they knew she would become pregnant within six months of starting a job.
During the selection process, 52% of those surveyed will weigh up the chances of a candidate getting pregnant, taking into account age and whether they have just got married.
68% would like more rights to quiz candidates about their plans for a family.
Only 5% of bosses have employed someone knowing the candidate is pregnant.

I find the second and fourth point most disturbing. It’s interesting that in a place with paid maternity leave, there is what appears to be discrimination in hiring so as not to have to offer that paid leave and other parental leave and flexible work options.

In Alabama, father bikes to work and picks his daughter up from school. Apparently this is unusual as only 1,656 out of 1,611,160 residents bike to work.

I wasn’t going to post this link, but I’ve seen it three or four workplace blogs, and it seems now that I’m deliberately not posting it, which really wasn’t my intention. Basically, an attorney was laid off promptly after having a miscarriage, and rather than signing an agreement not to talk about it in exchange for three months salary, she refused, and sent her email to everyone under the sun to expose the callousness of her employer.

A number of points aren’t clear in the email, but it does raise issues about how we deal with the tragedies in the lives of coworkers.  If a coworker tells you she has a miscarriage, you need to express sympathy. Many people compare a miscarriage to the death of a child, including in support group structure, and while I won’t do that, it is just that big for many of us.

From Eight Violent Truths About Freelancing:

3. Freelancers Work For More Jerks Than Anyone Else.

Wait, What? I thought freelancers got to be their own bosses! How does that work?

It’s easy. It works like this:

1. Client provides project specs.
2. Freelancer completes and submits project.
3. Client changes specs.
4. Freelancer revises and resubmits project.
5. Client drops the order altogether, posts both sets of submissions anyways.
6. Freelancer finds new client.
7. Repeat.

Maybe #5 becomes “client doesn’t pay the invoice for 6 months” or “client offers half the original bid amount“, but you get the idea.

And that explains my jerk expertise. Feel free to ask any jerk-related questions. We’re talking about coworkers and colleagues of course. I don’t think Ms. Theologian has received any queries in a long time.

Honestly, if you are going to make certain arguments, it might be good to spell-check your sign first.

I’ll abstain from Gawker posts for the rest of the week as penance for two today.