Mom Fail

My son asked me to bake some cookies for his half birthday at elementary school. He has a summer birthday so being able to have a half birthday is a big deal. He was excited and asked me to make my “famous” chocolate chip cookies. I’ve been baking these cookies since I was a kid so it’s not rocket science – normally not rocket science. It turned out it was rocket science! It was way too much for me to do after work, dinner, laundry, homework assistance etc. It was a complete debacle- total loss - a big FAIL. Give the mommy an F.

Somehow during the process and all the help I was getting, we ended up putting an extra cup of flour into the mix. The cookie dough was more like a hockey puck then a cookie. Sadly, the big batch of dough went in the trash.

I ended up at the local bakery at 7:45 a.m. before school started to pick up sugar cookies for his party. It all ended up being OK and my son entertained his teacher with our antics – I got a funny email from her today telling me that we are hilarious. I have to agree. It just goes to show that that work life balance everyone is always talking about is never easy – for me it doesn’t exist. It’s the 60/40 or 70/30 or the 90/10 days that I have accepted. There is no 50/50 and no chance of perfection. There are just days where you attempt a cookie and make a hockey puck! But those days are great memories. 

Merry Christmas

For the first time in a long time I’m ready for it – I think, OK, I hope.  It is the middle of the month and the interior and exterior of our house is decorated.  The tree is up and decorated with a ridiculous amount of ornaments just like my Great Grandma Veary’s tree.  Her tree was the most decorated tree I’ve ever seen – it had so many ornaments on it you couldn’t tell it was fake!   Our Christmas cards are done – addressed, stamped and mailed! Thanks to my husband, most of the gifts are ordered and being delivered. I’ve even started wrapping the presents.   This year I actually feel in control of the madness and I’m not so stressed.  I have even planned to make cookies with the boys this weekend.  Cookies from scratch!   I have a sense of calm this year and which has led to organized holiday fun. It’s a good feeling, a Christmas feeling and I’m going to roll with it!


Merry Christmas!

Gone SO Wrong

It went so wrong. We had a client conference call recently that went so sideways I ended up on Pinterest browsing through Christmas stuff while listening to him rant. It felt like we were talking to a 1970’s executive who was smoking and drinking his martini’s while dictating to his secretary and letting his ego do the talking. Keep in mind,  this client was in a high tech, cutting edge industry, but it felt like “Silicon Valley 1970”.  Any question I asked was wrong including when I told him I did some research on the company he worked for -  that was wrong! I was told I shouldn’t do any research! Oh my, the ego. 

We do research on all companies we work for  – the background information we gather on employees, the company website, Glassdoor, press releases etc. is priceless. We can gather all sorts of info. on people and learn who they are by how they present themselves. For example, when they say they are “published” and it’s only a blog – everyone has a blog  - or they have a “white paper” and it’s their non-expert super short opinion with little to no facts.  Or they claim to have worked at a job for 15 years when in fact they have been consulting and bumping around for the last 15 years. 

All that information creates a character profile. Research is priceless!  I have been blessed with amazing clients over all these years but this potential high tech client was a definite NO! We declined to work with them – no going back to the dark ages. 

The Old People vs. The Millennials

I’ve been writing a lot about Millennials lately because there is a significant problem between the over 55er’s and the Millennials according to most of my clients. The over 55er’s think the Millennials are flaky, don’t want to work for a boss, want extra special benefits - matching 401K,4 weeks’ vacation, lunch daily, flex time etc.  They want a lot but don’t want to work for it – they want it NOW.  The Millennials think the 55er’s are old, slow, don’t understand new technology, don’t get social media, they are not flexible, they don’t give them freedom to learn and grow quickly. (I’m just basing my opinion here on all the complaints I have been hearing for months now from both sides.)  

Oddly, I fall somewhere in-between – I’m not over 55 and I work with a lot of the Millennials. I understand where the Millennials are coming from – we all want a great job with great benefits and flextime. I also understand the 55er’s – they just want you to work and not complain. They made it thought the recession/depression and don’t understand why you need more –you have a job darn it and we still need to make a profit!  

Is there a happy medium between pleasing your employees with amazing benefits and still making profit?  I’m sure there is for larger corporations but for smaller entrepreneurial companies it seems to pose a problem.  Most of my smaller under 200MM clients can’t provide the same benefits as a large corporation. Maybe we need to start looking at corporate environments that fit most of your requirements instead of all of your requirements? Maybe a bit of flexibility from both parties the old and the new will make it easier to meet in the middle? 

Shut Up About Free Lunch

I have had the exact same conversation at least a hundred times now. Millennials want a lot - 

-they want more vacation time

-they want matched 401ks

-they want open communication

-they want free thinking 

-they want 'horizontal atmospheres', whatever that means

-they want a homey atmosphere at work

-they want 'work-life-balance'

*All within work week that's less than 40 hours

I have always said that work in moderation is the best kind of work. Pick something you love and try to make a living at it. I tell our intern that she may be at a desk for the next forty years so she might as well be comfortable with it. But these kids are asking for too much. They want the benefits of being retired without ever having to really work for any of it. 

All of the benefits can be achieved, but not without hard work. Disclosure. The word 'millennial' seems to have become more synonymous with lazy and less associated with the year in which someone was born. Which was of course the original intention. If you are numerically a millennial, you may not be one in attitude. There's a difference. 

Now go find something you love and make some money at it! 

What Makes a Candidate Not Place-able

When trying to work with a search firm you may hear, “I can’t place you.” There are a variety of reasons why that may be true. Keep in mind that it’s not personal and you can still find a job but that specific recruiter can’t help you. Bottom line: the client is paying the recruiter a fee so they get exactly the person they want.

• You are out of the recruiter’s specialized field
• You want to move into a new job or industries – most of our clients want people straight out of their industry – they want the industry expert
• You’ve job hopped too much. Clients don’t like to pay a fee for this type of background
• You have no degree. In tech recruiting and some project manager jobs degrees don’t always matter but most of our clients want that basic skill
• You have a very unusual background/skill sets that are niche 

Tips from Bill "The Old School HR Guy"

Advice on how to manage Millennials from Bill M. the “Old School HR Guy”. Bill comes off super old school but then has some amazing nuggets of advice for the future generation. Seriously, this is some good advice -

1. Millennials want a defined career path. Hope for the future. Outline that for them and give them goals to meet.

2. If you are reviewing them praise them a lot and give only one (1) negative. Yup, limit yourself please. If you give too many negatives they dwell on that instead of the positive.

3. Make work a fun place – they want fun at work. Put in a pool table or a ping pong table for them to blow off some steam and let them socialize a bit. They like work to be social.

4. Speaking of being social, you need to plan employee activities outside of the office for them to do after work or at lunch. They love free lunch, drinks out and fun bonding activities.