Category: Corporate Games

Repeat after me…
gossip is bad.

Repeating gossip means
you can’t keep a secret.
No one rises in the ranks
in a company
without being able to keep a secret.

There is informing certain people
(like the boss)
and then there’s gossip,
yapping to anyone
and everyone who will listen.

The only thing worse
than gossiping
is gossiping about bad news.
Not only does everyone know
you can’t keep a secret
but the people hearing the gossip
won’t appreciate hearing it.
Bad news is usually associated with the teller.
That’s where we get the phrase
‘don’t shoot the messenger.’

If it is not your role
to pass along bad news,
don’t.
Heck, if it is not your role
to pass along any sort of secret news
and it won’t hurt the folks you should protect
(i.e. your boss),
don’t.

One of the most underutilized
sections of a resume
is Interests and Hobbies,
that section stuck
at the end of the document
which many of us
think of as filler.

It isn’t.

One of my buddies,
competing against hundreds of grads
straight out of college,
landed the single spot
at a Fortune 500 company
because he touted his skills
with a yo-yo in the Interests And Hobbies section.

Yes, he had all the other skills
they were looking for
but so did hundreds of other candidates.
Turns out the manager also had an interest
in the yo-yo.

Yesterday,
I heard that an interviewing manager
simply HAD to meet a candidate
based on her Interests And Hobbies section.
The candidate filled it with silliness,
the creme de la creme being
“Eating Cheese Bagels”
as one of the lines.

Yes, once again,
the candidate filled all the other requirements
but so did hundreds of other candidates.
The manager feels that
if her unique Interests And Hobbies section
is due to her sense of humor,
then she is a person
he’d like to work with.

Interests And Hobbies
can set you apart from other candidates.
Use this section to your advantage.

Scott Ginsberg has a post
on how to be heroic.

His first point
“Decide to matter”
says it all.

Mattering is a decision.
Being great is a decision.
Success is a decision.

It isn’t one single, large decision.
It is a collection of little decisions.
Each of these decisions
may look insignificant on its own
but when added together,
they ARE significant
and they DO matter.

That is why goals are important.
They allow you
to make all these little decisions quickly
without being dragged into
paralysis analysis.

Make a goal of mattering
then align each decision with that goal.

One of my buddies was ‘shocked’
that rapper TI was busted
for drugs
so soon after being released from jail.

I wasn’t.

A drug charge
for a rapper or rock star,
let’s face it,
is a pretty minor violation.
It would be like busting
a race car driver for speeding.

But TI has been busted once
and it is human nature
for people to look for reasons
to bust him yet again.
They are waiting (and some are hoping)
for him to screw up.

Before you get all smug,
that happens to us regular Joe’s too.

We make a mistake at work
and suddenly everyone is looking out
for our next mistake,
however minor that may be.

We’re extremely late for a meeting once
and the next time we’re five minutes late,
it is a big deal.

So when you screw up
(and if you’re attempting great things,
you WILL screw up),
be on your best behavior,
at least until people forget.

The company you’re working for
has a gym.
It is subsidized.
It is convenient.
It is tempting.

Resist that temptation.

Why?

There are a number of reasons.

You don’t want co-workers to know
that, instead of working on that project,
you’re working out.

Gyms are a great place to network.
Why would you network
with the same faces you see every day?

Gym complaints
(and if you work out often enough,
there WILL be gym complaints)
will be put on your employee file.
Do you really want prospective managers
to know you let one go
during yoga class?

Pay the $30 a month
and use an external gym.

After surveying recruiters,
Cosmopolitan drafted the top ten interview mistakes.

They are
1. You Say, “This Is My Dream Job”
2. You Trash Your Old Boss
3. You Ask About Vacation Days
4. You Drink Water or Coffee
5. You Look Hot
6. You Talk Salary
7. You Play It Too Cool
8. You Wear Jeans
9. You Don’t Turn Off Your Cell
10. You’re Late

Many of these are no-brainers
but wait a minute,
what about #4
(You Drink Water or Coffee)?
Isn’t that a common offer
by interviewers?

Yes, it is
but it is one of those insincere questions like
‘how are you?’

When your prospective boss asks you
if she can get you a coffee or water,
she doesn’t want you to say ‘yes.’

Her time is valuable.
Expecting her to source beverage for you
is ridiculous.
It also communicates that
she should wait while you refresh yourself.

Drink coffee or water on your own time.
Take the interview time
to sell yourself.

When a new employee is hired,
management makes a big splash
about it.
Notices are sent out.
Introductions are made.
Some managers even host a welcome lunch.

When employees leave or are let go,
it is a quieter affair.
Often there’s no official notification.
Going-away lunches are more and more rare.
Real reasons are hushed up
and plastered over with official phrases
like ‘she’s exploring new opportunities.’

Everyone notices the new hires.
Very few employees
notice who leaves a company.
Even fewer care enough
to figure out WHY people leave
and what this might mean
to their own careers.

BTW…
if you see high turnover in
the finance department,
you may want to dig into
the financial status of the company
you depend upon for your paycheck.

I also get very nervous
when long-term senior executives leave.

In a workshop I attended yesterday,
we all worked on a problem
and then presented it.

The presentations weren’t to practice presenting
or to get feedback on our solutions
or so other groups could use our solutions.

The presentation was
to ensure we did the assignment.

WTH?
A professional workshop is not grade school.
The only one hurt
by not doing an assignment is the attendee.

Don’t waste time
(your time and, in this case, the entire class’s)
by checking something that doesn’t need to be checked.

And if you want to get the most
out of a workshop,
do your homework.

Yesterday a new author
posted an email to a publisher’s loop
asking how she should best grow her career.

The best answer…
publish often with many different publishers
wasn’t offered.

Why?

Because that advice goes against
what the publisher wishes.
The publisher wishes to grow her publishing house,
not necessarily grow an author’s career.

Almost every corporate human resources department
offers career counseling.

When I was a freshly minted grad,
I thought that meant I’d get…
well… career counseling.

Except that the best career counseling
one can give an entry level employee
is to job jump at least
until she earning a livable wage.
You’ll never hear that
from a corporate human resources employee.

(Another reason not to get advice
from your company’s human resources department
is because the employees in HR
traditionally are the biggest gossips
in every company.
That’s a place to spread rumors,
not keep secrets.)

I was assigned a new writer to mentor.
She asked me a question.
I spent about an hour of my time
replying and then discussing that reply.

A day later,
she posted the same question
on the general writing loop.
That is the last bit of mentoring I’ll be doing
for this writer.

Getting a second opinion
on important decisions
is a great, great thing to do.

However…
if you value the first opinion,
you may want to keep
the fact that you’re getting a second opinion
to yourself.

Successful people are busy.
If they don’t think their opinion is valued,
they won’t offer it.