Sirona Says

Why does society accept discrimination and yet it is outlawed in the workplace?

 

I feel like I am stepping into the lions den, writing this post today, as it is on the thorny subject of race discrimination - more directly, white vs black.
Within the world of recruitment / employment / job seeking etc the whole subject of discrimination is around us. We are now subject to many restrictions about what we can / can't say, what questions we can't ask because of the risk if inference for something else, and what we are allowed /not allowed to put on career websites etc.
Even with all these legal restrictions, companies still flout the law and blatantly discriminate. So much so that the DWP (Department of Work and Pensions), recently sent out 1000+ bogus applications for jobs, with similar CV's but with 'white' and 'non-white' sounding names. They were trying to prove discrimination is still rife in the employment market - with the (mad) end goal of having nameless CV's!. In my opinion I think that sets a dangerous precedent.

What I can't get my head around is the way that discrimination by skin colour can be so public with things like the MOBO's , Black Movie Awards and (unbelievably in my opinion) the Black Engineer of the Year Awards (and for all these awards ceremonies there is no comparative white awards), and yet in the workplace it is legally outlawed.
These seem to have become an 'accepted' part of society, but do you think that the flip side would be so true? Surely if there were 'White' only award ceremonies, there would be uproar from the 'non-white' community?

So returning to the workplace for a moment, is it any wonder that discrimination still goes on, when 'society' is still giving out very mixed messages to people in a very public way?

Advertised in a Job Centre: One Witch required, salary £50k!!

When I saw this I just started laughing. The advert says "must be able to cackle" and "must not be allergic to cats" - the job? A witch.........being advertised in a Job Centre!!

It isn't often that you see Witch jobs like this advertised in the 'mainstream' is it?

Just in case you think it is a wind up, it isn't  The job is in the Wookey Hole Caves, near Wells in Somerset, and they are recruiting for a new Witch to teach their visitors how to cast spells. And just to show there is no female sex bias - the Witch vacancy is open to men, women and trans-gender witches!! And the salary is £50,000!

Any suggestions who should apply?

Employee engagement: Is it just about satisfying the 'me, me, me' attitude?

According to the Gallup Management Journal’s Employee Engagement Index survey, in a typical workplace:

• 29% of employees are actively motivated and engaged in their jobs

• 71% are unmotivated and disengaged

• 54% are not engaged at all

• 17% are actively disengaged

Many people are just grateful to have a job in this climate - even if they have higher workloads due to less staff to do the work.But experience tells us that when the (eventual) upturn actually happens, employee engagement will get get worse, with the resultant figures above reducing.

But what is interesting is the summary of what workers responding to this survey said they what they want from their managers:

• Focus me
• Know me
• Care about me
• Hear me
• Help me feel proud
• Help me review my contributions
• Equip me
• Help me see my value
• Help me grow
• Help me see my importance
• Help me build mutual trust
• Challenge me

Does this sound about right for your place of work? Are all the employees 'me,me,me' focused? Are there certain industry sectors that are better than others from your experience?

Do these statistics lend more to any of the generational groups? More gen Y or more gen X for example?

What do you think?

Transformers 3?: Twitter Autobots Vs Spam Decepticons

The other day I went to see a truly awesome film - Transformers 2. Yes, it is escapism, cheesy and full of unadulterated action, but it is a great way to spend two and a half hours!

For those of you who are not transformer fans, it is a classic story of good Vs evil - the good  Autobots (led by Optimus Prime) Vs the evil  Decepticons (led by Megatron).

I just wonder, did the creator - Simon Furman - of The Transformers see the vision of Twitter or Facebook or spamming many years ago, just interpreting it in a creative way?
No, I haven't lost the plot here......just think about it for the moment.

What is currently the scourge of Twitter and Facebook? Spammers and merciless internet marketers!
They try to get us to part with money for the latest, quickest, 'guaranteed' way to make money, or they try and get all our bank details. They use many different ways to 'trick us' into clicking on their links - and, to be fair, some of them are very clever. While there are a few genuinely useful products out there, the majority are just deceptive money making schemes and malicious ways to gain access to your computer to take over the world!  I give you the Decepticons! 

In defence of the 'evil force' are Optimus Prime's 'Autobots'. They are all the automated tools that Twitter, Facebook, email systems and Firewalls etc use every day to try and stop the invasion of the 'evil' spammers and marketers - the 'Decepticons'.

Either side wins battles but every single day this battle rages on relentlessly.

Twitter has inadvertently helped the rise of these 'Decepticons', with the desire to produce ever shortening URL's like bit.ly, tinyurl etc. so that Twitter users can cram more into their 140 character limit. These have helped direct people to  websites that they wouldn't previously have gone near, and this, unfortunately, will only get worse.

The Autobots will fight back and will find ways of stopping them.....until the next time, and the next and the next. For the future of Twitter and the internet, we all need them to win more battles than they lose!

Come on then, what are you going to call us?

Last month at the CIPD Recruitment and HR exhibition, Mike Taylor captured on film, a rare moment indeed!!
Peter Gold, Stephen Fowler and myself, kindly referred to by Mike as "three of the top UK bloggers", all happened to be in the vicinity of his stand at the same time!! Cue the camera!!

(Just to clarify, it is Stephen that actually has some hair!!)

Mike has decided to take this further!! He is running a photo caption competition - "What do you call three recruitment bloggers?"
So if you have a great/funny/rude/amusing caption, head over to Mike's blog to post your entry!

He will announce the winner of the competition at the Social Media in Recruitment Conference and on his blog, with the winner receiving a mystery prize!

Can you afford not to be at the Social Media in Recruitment conference?

Last month saw the first Social Recruiting Summit in the Google offices in Mountainview, California. This month sees a UK conference - Social Media in Recruitment -  dedicated to using social media within recruitment, on the 16th July 2009 at the British Library in London.. It has been put together by Mike Taylor from Web Based Recruitment, and the subject matter being discussed includes:

• An overview of Social Media including social networking sites,
  blogs and podcasts
• How social networking sites such as Facebook can be used to get messages to your target audience
• How to use LinkedIn to promote your vacancies and source new candidates
• How to use Twitter, TwitterJobSearch.com and the Job Search Engines for recruitment
• The legal issues re the use of social media web sites
• Using online video to promote your company and your job  vacancies
• How to put together a social media strategy for your company
• The future - taking social media to the next level

Are you going on the 16th? 

If you are, let me know - it would be great to meet you there.

Arrgghh! Why are candidates still being muppets at interviews?

This a mini-rant is born out of frustration and disbelief! Yesterday I spent the day with a client during one of their interview events. What I witnessed at the actual interview stages, was both unforgivable and unbelievable - from the candidates being interviewed -  in this current climate of large amounts of unemployment.
As a 'recruitment dinosaur' (someone who has been in the industry for 20+ years!) I have briefed more candidates than I care to remember on interview techniques and expectation - you could say, I tend to overbrief candidates - although you can never give a candidate too much information! So when I sat there yesterday listening to the responses to some standard 'every interview has them' questions, I was completely stunned with the answers given....or rather lack of answers!! And bear in mind here, that 99% of the candidates interviewed all had 2:1 degrees and above, and all really wanted it as their dream job!

There were three questions that nearly every interview asks, and yesterday was no different:

1. What are your strengths and/or weaknesses?
2. What motivates you? (or What gets you out of bed in the morning?)
3. Why do you want this job?

The answers varied from bad to awful to zero (Yes! One graduate couldn't even unbelievably answer the second question!!)

So my message is a simple one - if you are attending interviews for a new job, make sure you PREPARE FOR THE INTERVIEW otherwise you are completely wasting both yours and the company's time by even attending in the first place. You might as well just go and sit on a park bench and talk to the ducks, for all the good it is going to do!

Don't be a muppet - you know these questions (and other obvious ones) will be asked of you, so make sure that have thought about it, and what you are going to say in reply. These are basic, bog-standard interview questions, they are not exactly a curve ball question - but many many people sitting in an interview screw them up time and time again!  If you are really stuck (or being really thick) then Google it - many others have written the perfect answers for these questions.

Answer them well, and it will impress the interviewer;  answer them badly and you can go back to talking to the ducks - again, again and again!!

The Worthing Crocman to 'fly' at the Worthing International Birdman Competition

Follow him @worthingcrocman

Friend the Crocman on Facebook
 
Sponsor him at http://www.justgiving.com/andyheadworth-worthingbirdman

The Worthing International Birdman competiton returns this year on the 22nd/23rd August to Worthing, West Sussex. The Worthing Crocman - aka me - will this year attempt to become the world's first 'flying' crocodile! (Does verticle flying count?)
For any of you that don't know what the Worthing International Birdman event is, it is a competition for human powered flying machines that take off from a special ramp constructed on Worthing Pier 30+feet above the sea.  There are 3 flying classes so prospective entrants can decide if they wish to be a serious aviator or want to take part for fun and raise money for charity.

Last year the weather, unfortunately,  took hold of the event, with gale force winds and very high seas on the Sunday, when I was due to 'fly'. It meant that after all my plans and fundraising - we raised over £1500 last year - , all we could manage was to 'go for a dip'  - see the photo below, of me 'fighting' the Hulk in some very rough breakers on the beach (the press thought that would be amusing!!)

http://www.justgiving.com/andyheadworth-worthingbirdman/

 

After last years weather problems, I am even more determined to tell everyone about  Worthing Crocman, because the reason I am doing the Birdman, is in honour of my brother David, who died from leukaemia 18 months ago.
David was diagnosed with a rare form of leukaemia soon after his 40th birthday, in April 2007, and sadly died just before Christmas the same year, having only spent just 4 months with his newly born son Dara.

Ultimately, there was nothing that current medical knowledge could have done to save my brother. So I want to raise as much money as I can for Leukaemia Research, so they can hope fully save the lives of other unfortunate cancer sufferers in the future.

Why Crocman - a giant crocodile?

I have been asked by many people why a giant crocodile? The picture left below, will help to answer that question.
On Christmas 2005 David and Marlynne (his wife to be) were exploring Australia. We sent them out a Christmas package to open on the beach on Christmas Day, which apart from an array of crackers, silly hats etc included an inflatable 6ft crocodile (shown in the photo on the left  with David).
With my brothers sense of humour, he readily  adopted 'Snappy' as their 'guest' for the day, and proceeded to have some fun. They even sat him down for their christmas day meal - for some reason he didn't eat much though!!
It obviously created lots of strange looks and much fun for the day for David and Marlynne, and it has become a part of our family's 'folklore'.

So you see my choice of a crocodile was an easy decision really, and now you know why it means so much to me and my family!

This year Crocman has gone social!! @saraheadworth has 'morphed' into the online alter ego of  @worthing crocman and is regularly croc twittering at @worthingcrocman and can be found over on Facebook.com/worthing.crocman    Also watch out for the new 2009 'blinged out' Crocman outfit that @saraheadworth is creating specially for the Worthing Birdman event - and yes you will need sunglasses!!!

So this year we are going to try and raise as much money via social media, so please follow us on Twitter and be a 'croc friend' on Facebook!

Is this what Twitter has become?

From the excellent Hubspot......

Is Twitter now becoming more akin to Robbie the Robot?

For me, it IS about interacting and engaging with people - is it the same for you?

Who are the recruitment dinosaurs?

Yesterday I read a very interesting, albeit slightly controversial article in Personnel Today, written by Peter Gold. Titled 'Recruitment Agencies: the fight for survival', in it he likens recruitment agencies to dinosaurs - in that they will have to move, adapt, or die (a great analogy, I have to say!) He even tagged the recruitment agencies as 'Agencysaurus', with the clever and smarter agencies being the same as 'Velociraptors' - mind you, I could actually name some recruitment companies who have been called that for years!!

It got me thinking. The recruitment industry is a huge £multi-billion monolith of an industry, that has been around for a good few years now. Things have changed hugely over the years, with the internet being the key driver, but as Peter predicts, the industry will have to evolve further again to survive.

So working on the 'Agencysaurus' them, who represents  the part of the Tyrannosaurus Rex - the big daddies of the dinosaur world? (I know you will enlighten me with your opinion here!)

Taking it a stage further, who are the dinosaurs of the recruitment industry?

Would it be the likes of myself, Peter Gold or Keith Robinson with 20+ years in the industry? Or would the big job boards like Monster (aptly named), Jobserve or Jobsite qualify?
Could you even consider recruitment print advertising, to be on its way to extinction?

What do you think? Who, for you, represent the dinosaurs of the recruitment industry?

Let me get you started with one that is possibly extinct now. The Rolodex! Used by all of us recruiters in the early days, but quickly became surplus to requirements when the internet came along.

So what do you think? Who is heading for extinction?