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Kathu
Me, too, same field. It's bizarre. I was freelance for so long, then basically worked for a start up and stayed there until they went out of business ten years later. I'm not prepared for some of the stupidity I've been seeing. There is no humanity or common sense in most workplaces. It fascinates me that anything gets done.
posted by
terpgirl30
on September 8, 2006 at 7:11 PM
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I'm looking for a job in publishing and they can be so rude sometimes!
posted by
Kasthu
on September 8, 2006 at 2:14 PM
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I'm looking for a job in publishing and they can be so rude sometimes!
posted by
Kasthu
on September 8, 2006 at 2:14 PM
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HR these days is a nightmare.
posted by
Kasthu
on September 8, 2006 at 2:14 PM
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Good luck in today's market. Go work for Cynthia!
posted by
majroj
on August 27, 2006 at 9:09 PM
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Maj
I like the way he thinks.
The woman they made supervisor of my department came in ostensibly as a grunt just like the rest of us. It turns out she was best friends with the VP since third grade which, of course, was her main credentials for getting the higher job.
She held a meeting asking for how our department would meet the company's stated 2006 goals. Now, let me start by explaining that it was April. It had taken until March for the braintrusts of the company to come up with their main goal: to make more money in 2006. (I swear, that's what it was.)
Teresa spent an hour picking our brains on how our department would help bring in more money. I think I made about 6 suggestions. In the end, she sent an email around. The hour we spent was wonderful, she said. Together, Teresa emphasized, we had come up with one giant way to help the company reach its goal. I can't for the life of me tell you what it was, but what I CAN tell you is it was the FIRST thing out of her mouth when we walked in the door. That's all she wrote, for all we talked about in that hour.
My favorite part was that one suggestion I gave had been something to do with a fairly seriously problem we had in our department. Everyone bit on my suggestion and had thought something similar along the way but couldn't put it into words. Well, I walk into doors, so I'm the one who said it. Teresa's answer....HEAVY SIGH, HEAVY SIGH, Slumped shoulders...."But that will make work for meeeee." I SWEAR to you that's a quote. She gets paid around 60-80k for sitting on one of those exercise balls at her desk and basically avoiding work.
And they kept her and let about 5 others in the department go. My theory is that they are keeping her long enough to get through all the "letting go" stage so everyone hates her. Then they'll get rid of her and the higher ups will have no blood on their hands. Too late, of course.
When I left, I went into investigative reporter mode and found out all sorts of crap about the people who had taken over the place. Scum from top to bottom. And losers. That's what's scarier. We went from getting a wad of cash handed to us for making so much money last year, to borrowing to make simple payroll and having the fax machine line turned off. Scary.
The sad part is, I had come up with a great marketing plan for the original owner. We were told there was a merger, but it was definitely a hostile takeover. The man was sick and has cheated death more than once. He's battling another cancer, so he had no fight in him with the guys who pilfered his company. When these guys took over, I had no desire to share my marketing plan. They don't care about the idea itself. It was a cash cow to be gobbled up. They're basically snake oil salesmen.
The man who started it really believed in what he was doing, and pretty much everyone in the place would follow him off a cliff if he told them it was the right thing to do. He is that good and honest. I've met maybe one or two like him. The first week I was there, he was running around in an Hawaiian shirt and shorts handing out Eskimo Pie to everyone in their cubicles. I told him I'd been self employed most of my life, and he treated me better than I treated myself. If they could clone people like him it would be a great world.
posted by
terpgirl30
on August 26, 2006 at 6:44 PM
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Townsend thoght one shold throw away "HR" and "Personnel" and start
a "People" departmewnt.
Here are a few more of his thoughts.
http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/r/robert_townsend.html
posted by
majroj
on August 26, 2006 at 5:06 PM
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Maj
I'm may be having a really dense day, but I didn't get what you were saying. If you meant human resources + people, my feeling (limited, mind you) is that they are anything but. What I have seen is that they parrot whatever the corporate line is. I have one woman whom I really think acted as a liaison between the company and the employees. In the real sense I think she got the idea right. Other than that, I've seen it just as a marketing tool for the company.
posted by
terpgirl30
on August 26, 2006 at 4:43 PM
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I defer to my gooroo, Robert "Up The Organization" Townsend
who said every "Personnel" or "Human Resources" department should be stripped and renamed the "People Department".
Our mores originate from a time when people were scarce and the work enormous (pre-industrial 1700's Europe and America). Now were are where other urbanized places like China, Japan and Britain have been for a while; too many people for the work, and the limitting factor now is capital and its distribution (i.e., greed).
posted by
majroj
on August 26, 2006 at 7:34 AM
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Thanks all
An hour or so after I wrote this I got a call from a man who heads up an online writing group I belong to. There are 6,000 people in that group. He runs three groups and maintains a full-time writing career for a New York daily. His call couldn't have come at a better time. I learned lots from his words, as I always do, but the fact that he thought enough to call during an off minute in New York, did a lot for me.
There really are great support systems. It just takes a bit to figure out how to lean on them, I think.
Kim
posted by
terpgirl30
on August 25, 2006 at 12:46 PM
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Hang in there.... please!
posted by
colbor1
on August 25, 2006 at 11:42 AM
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Things have changed
but at my place, until recently our rep was we were nicer to outside people applying then internal people applying for jobs.
posted by
mikea18
on August 25, 2006 at 9:53 AM
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