Gay in the workplace? Better stay in the closet…for now
You know how every once in a while you read news that makes you wonder what year it is? Well, that happened to me this morning. I’m going through my reader and I stumbled across a piece in Career Journal titled, ‘House Approves Measure to Bar Bias Against Gays in the Workplace’. What? Is this 2007 or 1907? Seriously, I had no idea this was still an issue, shame on me.
The article basically spells out that currently while nineteen states have already enacted laws to bar such discrimination in the workplace, but it is currently legal in 30 states to fire a worker based on sexual orientation. Are you F*cking kidding me?! But wait it gets better, after passing the house, the White House is threatening to veto the bill, saying the bill is constitutionally inconsistent with the free exercise of religion and uses language that is “imprecise” and makes enforcement “extremely difficult.”. Leave it to ‘Dubya’ to NOT fix anything!
I’m not a big ‘Call your congressman or senator’ guy, but this is just ridiculous! So if this outrages you, and it should, call, email, or write your senator and insist they pass this in the Senate and shove it up ‘Dubya’s a$$!
Until next time…
The resume needle in a haystack
Many of you may of read my post a while back where I outlined my best practices for your resume and how to help recruiters find it. Today Career Journal posted an article that reinforces what I’ve been telling you, it’s a great piece based on an interview with Prof. John Sullivan, of San Francisco State University.
If you’re like most people out there you’re probably saying, ‘well that’s great Scott, but how do I draft my resume and pick out the right keywords to make it stand out without spending a fortune with a resume writing service?’. Well, I’m glad you asked and help is on the way. I’m developing a resume building course which I will be offering online soon. This course will walk you through the resume building process step by step providing simple yet powerful tools for every aspect of your resume. It will also provide finished product templates so you’ll know how your resume will look when you’re done. Finally, even though cover letters are growing less and less important in the internet age, it will provide some great cover letter templates as well. I’ll be offering a sneak peek as part of a free report on resume development in the near future, so stay tuned. If you want to be sure to receive the free report, drop me a line at scott@careerwaymark.com and I’ll be sure it gets to you when it comes out.
Until next time…
Image is everything
Yes, I know it was a cheesy ad campaign for some camera company, but it also has it’s place in today’s workplace. Recently Brazen Careerist published a piece on this topic albeit from a different perspective than you might think.
If you’ve ever read Penelope Trunk’s Brazen Careerist, you’ll know that she often has a unique approach to workplace issues, but frequently offers career advice that borders on being irresponsible (in this writers opinion…and others). Recently she posted the following on the ‘image‘ question, “So manage your weight, and manage the image you project at work, and you’ll do wonders for your career.” Gee I didn’t realize it was that easy.
She went on to say: “According to a 2005 study by the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, good-looking people make more money than average-looking people for doing exactly the same work. ” This just gets better.
And “Before you get up in arms over how unfair it is to discriminate against people who are overweight, consider that there may be some rationale behind it. If you’re overweight, you’re probably not exercising every day. Ahh, the key to career success, just hit the gym everyday.
Finally, “So don’t kid yourself that if you do good work it won’t matter if you’re overweight. It’s sort of like people who have messy desks: The perception is that they’re low-performers, poor time-managers, and not clear thinkers. This might not be true at all, but the only thing they can do to overcome the perceptions of their coworkers is clean their desks.” So now I have to be skinny and have a clean desk?
