Putting Up or Shutting Up: My Response

If you are reader of Victorio Milian's blog, Creative Chaos Consultants, then you have already seen his post, "Are You Ready To Put Up or Shut Up, Paul Smith?"  If you have not, click the link and see my response.

Thank you to Victorio for letting me be part of this project. 

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Laugh At Work Today

I don't mean laugh toward work.  I mean, while at work today...laugh.

I just had a good hearty laugh.  And over something quite simple.

I was walking by the entrance to our office, as one of my colleagues was entering. When he saw me, he stopped and bellowed, "Hellloooow! and saluted.  Because it was such an unlikely gesture and genuinely happy, I just started to laugh.  It felt good and really lifted my spirits.

I hope someone or something makes you laugh today at work. If they don't, try to make it happen for someone else. It will make them feel good and lift their spirits.

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Tell It Like It Is, Joe

One of the fun things about having a blog is sharing your ideas and beliefs with the world. When someone does a better job of explaining a shared belief, it's not necessary to try and one-up their work.  Blogging allows the liberty of taking their work and plopping it into your own blog. Needless to say, one doesn't call it their own. Credit should always be given.

So if you don't know Joe Gerstandt, let me introduce him to you now.  Joe is all over Twitter at @JoeGerstandt and definitely worth following.  Joe writes a blog that interjects positivity into our world called "Our Time To Act". Joe is a keynote speaker and workshop facilitator.  Over the past weekend, Joe put a short video on his blog explaining the definition of diversity and inclusion.  Because I have a deep appreciation for how he defined each of them, I wanted to share his video.

Well enough out of me, tell it like it is Joe:

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Job Security Is The Devil

You know what else is? Snuggies. Snuggies are the devil.

They come to me through the TV with the promise of warmth and security.  They spring off the shelves of the local Walgreens and scream, "Buy me. I’m only $14.99.  And see, I come with a little book light to help you read at night.  You’d like that wouldn’t you?"

And every time I say no, it replies with, “What's the matter with you, don’t you want to be warm and secure?”

“Sure, but."

“But what?” it replies.

“But it’s an illusion.  I don’t need to take you home to know you’re just a flimsy blanket. Just one with arms.” 

“You still want me though. You need security.”

“Yes I know I do.  And I hate you for it,” I cried.

I then fled from the store believing I had escaped.

As I walked home quickly, I realized to my dismay, I was wrong.   I could not escape the need and want for security.  I wanted that Snuggie. 

I am proud to say though that as of this day I have not bought into the illusion of a Snuggie.

Apparently though I’m not the only one who has heard this siren's cry. At least 20 million people have sought the security of a Snuggie. And if it's not the Snuggie people seek for security, there are other illusions: illicit drugs, alcohol, gambling, or codependent relationships to name a few.  

But millions of people are seeking security from what I believe is the granddaddy of security illusions: their job.

According to the SHRM Workplace Visions survey from last year on job satisfaction, upwards of over 60% polled claim job security is what they value the most.

I ask, how can so many people value something that simply does not exist?

I've heard the greatest trick that the Devil ever pulled was convincing people he did not exist.  I say the opposite.  The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing people to value something that did not exist.  Why?  Because its very dispiriting to put all of your hopes in your job only to have the carpet pulled out from under you when it's gone.  You want to feel low?  This is a fast track to lowness.

I confessed I want to feel secure.  But I know it's an illusion.  I know that there are no guarantees in free market economies.  I know that no matter how many years I stay in my job, or how hard I think I'm working, or how financially sound my organization is, my job could end tomorrow.  And there is nothing I can do about it.  I could spend all of my energies on wishing and hoping I will have my job until I choose to leave, but wishing results in nothing. 

Changes will always occur.  Thinking you're untouchable from these changes is a fool's game and the Devil loves a fool. So stop believing in something that will never occur.  It only leads to disappointment and low self-esteem. Put your faith in what you know is real: yourself. Never be tricked into believing your job is anything more than just your job right now.

Your job may offer warmth and security, but when it all comes out in the wash, it's still just a job.  Just like a Snuggie.  A Snuggie is still just a blanket with arms.  It offers no more warmth and security than any other blanket.

This is your sermon today. Thanks for visiting.

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Unpaid Leave For Victims of Domestic Violence

Just a quick post to share information on a little known Philadelphia ordinance: "Entitlement to Leave Due to Domestic or Sexual Violence." This ordinance was signed by Mayor Michael Nutter with little or no fanfare on December 1, 2009 following a temporary year-long trial run.

I don't quite remember how our office discovered this ordinance when it was first issued as a temporary ordinance.  I recall that it was purely accidental, possibly due to an internet search on a related topic.  The silent way in which this law has been unveiled is unfortunate. Keeping silent about this law only encourages the continuation of the behavior it's trying to alleviate.  If employers and employees alike are not made aware of it, how does it help those whom it seeks to help?

If you're a Philly resident or employer, I'm curious have you heard about this?  If you have, am I wrong about the limited broadcasting of the ordinance?

For those not in the know, this is an interesting addition to existing FMLA laws. Below are the benefit details:

Reasons for Taking Leave
You may take leave to do any of the following for yourself or your household or family member:

• Seek medical attention for physical or psychological injuries;
• Obtain help from an organization that provides services to domestic or sexual violence victims;
• Obtain counseling or therapy;
• Make safety plans, including possible relocating to increase safety;
• Seek legal assistance.

Advance Notice and Certification

• You must provide your employer with at least 48-hours notice of the leave unless it is not practicable for you to do so.
• Your employer can require you to provide a certification of the domestic or sexual violence and the reason that you must take the leave.

Job Benefits and Protection

• You may take up to 8 workweeks of leave in a 12-month period if you work for an employer who employs 50 or more employees.
• You may take up to 4 workweeks of leave in a 12-month period if you work for an employer who employs fewer than 50 employees.
• This leave, when added to any leave you have taken under the Family and Medical Leave Act (FLMLA), cannot be more than 12 weeks in a 12-month period provided under the FMLA.
• You may take this leave intermittently or on a reduced work schedule.
• You may use any paid leave available under your employer’s policies during this leave, but it will not increase the amount of leave you can take.
• You are entitled to maintain all benefits accrued prior to taking the leave.
• For the duration of your leave, your employer must continue the health benefits for you and your family or household members on the same terms as if you were not on leave; you must continue to pay your share of the cost.
• Upon return from leave, you must be restored to your original position or an equivalent position with equivalent benefits, pay and other terms and conditions of employment.
• All information provided by you to your employer pursuant to the law must be kept confidential

Here is the link to the complete and amended ordinance.

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Try Not To Eat That Doughnut

Boston-cream doughnuts. They taste good but really they're bad for you.

The boston-cream doughnut, in question here, is the new job you've just been offered.  You've been out of work for a long time and you're hungry.  Taking a bite of this new job is going to feel so good. You'll have disposable income again; you'll get off of COBRA; you can go on a guilt-free vacation.  But, in the back of your mind, as you take that first bite, you know this job is a bad choice for you.

But what other choices are there if you're hungry? The answer is different for each person. Yet most answers involve personal finances and the major reason for taking the job is for money. If you had your druthers you'd hold out for something more nutritional and better for you. But like the doughnut, this new job, even though it's bad for you, it's still subsistence.

Currently I'm not in that situation.  But I have been and know this can be hard call to make: take the job or hold out. Even though it may not be possible to hold out, it's still important to know which situations would make for a good work environment.  So that when that time comes when you can make better nutritional choices, you have the self-awareness and knowledge to not eat the doughnut.  My advice is to make a short list of workplace situations that are not good for you.  For example, here is my short list:

Hypocrisy:
I don't want to work where the commercials show how much they love their customers, only to discover the opposite. Example: Southwest Airlines stance on overweight passengers. Southwest positions themselves as a bunch of earth-loving, people-hugging samaritans making you feel like you just bettered the world, because you bought their product. Market yourself how you like. But Kevin Smith is overweight, angry with how he was treated by Southwest and people are listening.  Considering that 1 out of 3 adults are overweight in the U.S., Southwest may just as well advertised they use kittens as jet fuel.  I don't want to be somewhere when the party's over and the host turned out to be a creep.
(Revised author's note: to clarify, the above reference is a mere example of how hypocrisy can occur.  It is not intended as a full recollection of the events that occurred or as a full judgment of Southwest's philosophies.)

Stupidity:
I don't want to work for a company that hires former pickpockets to walk the city streets in order to place money into pedestrian's pockets, or for the company that allows Fridays to be clothing optional.  I don't believe any of the hype around these supposed business success stories that are from actual U.K. businesses.  I believe these situations are just inviting unnecessary problems into the workplace. I don't want to be on the end of massive numbers of employee relations issues that I could have prevented with common sense, or that need to be swept under the rug to save the face of the company's image.

Meanness:
This is truly the one thing I despise the most and view with the least amount of tolerance.  It comes in many different levels, i.e.harshness, rudeness, bullying, harassment, discrimination, etc. and different configurations, i.e.cover-up, overtly unaware, bragging. Add in, each person experiences meanness from different levels of sensitivity. Example: the CEO of AMS, possibly a great guy and possibly a great place to work, still in a recent interview with the New York Times had some choice words which I would judge as too harsh for me. He is quoted as saying, "Fear is the best motivator" and when asked if he was a tyrant, he replied, "I’m sure many people would view me as difficult. If I ask you to do something and you say, 'Geez, I don’t have enough time to do that.' Well, maybe I don’t have enough time to sign your check this week." As much as I appreciate candor in the workplace and the need to have a successful workplace, just because one thinks or feels something, does not mean they need to express it.  And it doesn't mean I need to be around it.

The recession is still a big problem for many people in this country.  Hopefully as you travel your way through it, you are able to stick to your guns and not work somewhere that you know is going to be bad for you.  And if you have no choice due to your individual circumstances, go ahead and eat that boston-cream doughnut and remember you can always go on a diet tomorrow.

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Support (If It's Not Love, Then It's The Bomb)

After I posted the article, "Being Gay At Work" on this blog. I received a good number of comments and emails with words of gratitude and support. One of these messages came in a text from my father. I quote, "...liked your blog but you did not mention the support you receive from your family."  True, I didn't.

So let's make it official: my family rocks.

It has not always been easy.  But as it stands today, my father, my mother, my brother and sister-in-law accept me for who I am and who I partner with.  Even my 5-year nephew (who rocks unconditionally) calls my partner Uncle. Without their support I would have lived my life how I saw fit anyway.  But with their support, it makes it much easier. 

This is true for anything.  Whether it be something that is inherent in you, or if it's something you want to change in your life. 
Do you want to change careers?
Do you want be a blog writer?
Do you want to expand your network and meet new people? 
Do you just want to be better in your life? 
All of it can be done on your own.  But without support from someplace, it's difficult and over time can become increasingly tiresome.

As I have aged, I have become wiser.  I have surrounded myself with great support in my personal and work lives. I'm also less tolerant.  If you are not a supportive force in my life, then I'm moving on.

As we move through this economic downtime and period of greater reflection, now is a good time to take stock in who is your support system. 
If you're out of work, who is helping you and who is shunning you because you have less income?
If you want to explore a new venture, who is cheering you on and who is afraid you are changing from the person you once were? 
Who have you helped endlessly in the past and who are those that cannot be bothered to return the favor?

Think about it, measure it and make the wise decision about the support you receive.

All in all, your support should be singing this song to you (herein lies the meaning of the article's title):

Ask - The Smiths

For the video of the song, click here

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Cat On A Business Trip

Since Tuesday, my main laptop has been acting like Paul Newman in Cool Hand Luke and has forced me to act like Strother Martin....took a strap to it so it would fall into a ditch and proclaim, "What we got here is failure to communicate."

This is just a humorous way of dealing with the fact my computer forced me to reinstall Windows and then in turn reinstall everything else.  If you have ever had to do this, you know how painfully time-consuming this is. So to keep a smile on my face this week, I watched this Japanese commercial about 20 times:

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My Job Is To Yell At You

The people, are in a line.
The line, is in a building.
The building, is guarded by security.
Security, has the walls lined with signs.
Security wants you to read all of these signs and move quickly through the line.
If you miss one of the instructions, security will yell at you.
Security will repeat the yelled words; this is called berating.

The people in this line are headed for jury duty.
One of the persons that was berated was me.

In turn, I fumed and ranted (mostly to myself).
I eventually calmed down and wondered what the berator's job description must look like.
Let's review:

1. Effective verbal communication skills
Well, I did what I was told.  So, check.

2. Must be knowledgeable of all policy and procedures.
Berator was quick to remind me of procedures and repeated it clearly and loudly. So, check.

3. Must maintain good working order of security conveyor belt and x-ray machine.
Berator recognized the Dunkin' Donuts bag that I placed on the conveyor belt may have coffee in it. Berator's suspicions were correct.  Berator assured liquid did not spill in the x-ray machine. So, check.

4. Must be able to facilitate the movement of hundreds of people in a short period of time.
I did not spend any time lollygagging around security.  I wanted to leave the berator's presence immediately. So once again, check.

5. Nothing in job description mentions how job is accomplished.
I guess, check.

Conclusion
I see jury duty as a job, work if you rather.
No one should be treated poorly at work.
I don't think I should have been treated poorly.

But what if it's part of the job description?

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FOT/HRCapitalist v. 6.0 Talent Management Blog Power Rankings - Top 25 Blogs!

Yesterday, Fistful of Talent announced their current list of Top 25 Talent Management/HR blogs. I am proud to say that Welcome To The Occupation was ranked #21.

When I was told about this, I was speechless.  I felt like I just won an Oscar and I did not prepare an acceptance speech. All I could think to say was, "thank you."

FOT chose the movie poster from Eminem's movie, "8 Mile" for the badge design to signify this honor. How appropriate for a new blogger like myself.  To quote a song from the movie: Eminem's "Lose Yourself", I have felt this way at times:

"His palms are sweaty, knees weak, arms are heavy...."
"...He's nervous, but on the surface he looks calm and ready
To drop bombs, but he keeps on forgetting
What he wrote down" 
only to pull it together and....
"... lose yourself in the music, the moment
You own it, you better never let it go go
You only get one shot, do not miss your chance to blow
This opportunity comes once in a lifetime yo"

So as this nice badge of honor sinks in, I think about winning that Oscar and how it's all so fleeting.  Today you celebrate, tomorrow you get back to work, writing. I never want to take any of it for granted. I never want it to mean that I'm something that I'm not. In the immortal words of Cher when she accepted the Best Actress Oscar for Moonstruck: "I don't think this means that I am somebody. But I guess I'm on my way. Thanks."

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HR Bloggers Corrupt the Youth of America

Last Sunday night the Grammys were on (poohw gib)[1].  I didn’t watch but I did read the list of winners the next day.  Taylor Swift and Beyonce were the big winners. But heavy metal wise, Judas Priest walked away with the honors of Best Metal Performance for “Dissident Aggressor”.

I’m not a Heavy Metal aficionado but I knew the Priest rocked years ago (wal eht gnikaerb)[2]. Still I thought it odd in 2010 they won a Grammy. So being the inquiring mind, I hit Wikipedia and sure enough the Priest are still putting out records (gnimoc gniht rehtona tog ev’uoy)[3]. For over thirty years, they’ve been gloriously making us bang our heads.  But the road has not always been smooth for the Priest.  Some very sad and unfortunate teenagers committed suicide in 1985 and the Priest were blamed due to subliminal messages in the song, “Better By You, Better Than Me”. They stood trial and the case was ultimately dismissed. But I remember when I was in high school, backmasking and subliminal messages in rock songs was a distressing issue for some.  Some concerned citizens were sending around a cassette tape that preached backmasking was Satan working through your favorite bands (yekcohesroh)[4].  With their subliminal messages kids were persuaded to commit sins, do drugs and be generally rotten.

Backmasking and subliminal messages have been around a long time (ghihtyreve wonk I)[5].  They have been and are still used in our favorite mediums: music, movies and television (skcor golb siht)[6] but you don’t hear much about this in Social Media.  Or maybe we just haven’t heard of it yet (golb ym daer ylno)[7]. I’m sure it’s all over You Tube (suomaf eb ot tnaw I)[8] and possibly lodged in those shortened HTML links on Twitter (em wollof)[9].

Most likely though you will find it in blogs written by HR pros.  I can’t explain it but every time I read Sharlyn Lauby (rednetrab rh)[10] I end up on a 3-day booze bender. I read Laurie Ruettimann (rh kcor knup)[11] and I find myself sticking safety pins in my cheeks.  I read Michael VanDervort (sesroh ecar namuh)[12] and I end up spending my weekly pay at the track.

And the list goes on and on (yppah em sekam golb siht)[13]. I’m telling you, the HR bloggers are disintegrating the fabric of our nation and corrupting the youth with their wayward messages.

All except for this blog.  But you knew that already, didn’t you?
 


[1] big whoop  [2] Breaking the Law  [3] You’ve Got Another Thing Coming  [4] horsehockey  [5] I know everything  [6] This blog rocks  [7] Only read my blog  [8] I want to be famous  [9] Follow me  [10] Hr bartender  [11] Punk rock hr  [12] Human race horses  [13] This blog makes me happy

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