The 14 unicorns of business

Posted on February 20, 2012
Filed Under Employment, Finding a Job, Hiring Forecast, Recession | Leave a Comment

I remember writing a position paper as an undergraduate philosophy student, which, I suppose in some way, epitomizes how philosophy is sometimes characterized by popular culture: arcane, esoteric, and utterly preposterous (or bizarre). My target? I sought to expose the epistemological faults latent in empirical observation. My foil? The unicorn (its single antler does, after all, resemble a sword). While I used more than the mere unicorn to illustrate my point—I used something even more intellectually elusive: theoretical physics—I hoped to change the parameters we use to determine whether a thing exists. In short, I (quite unsuccessfully, I might add) sought to conflate two different categories of being: things that exist only in concept (e.g. unicorns) and the intelligible, observable universe. Read more

Are you in love with your employer? 10 companies worthy of your affection

Posted on February 16, 2012
Filed Under Employment, Finding a Job, Hiring Forecast | Leave a Comment

I can already hear the objection. “Ryan, don’t you know that the title of this blog post inadvertently personifies employers by implying that an employer (an abstract concept) can be made the object of one’s attention?” Alright, so maybe that’s not what you’re thinking at this precise moment. In fact, I don’t think anyone would object to the idea that we oft fall in love with the idea of something, whether that idea corresponds to a person, or the myriad commercial activity comprising business. In the same way that a person can embody certain attributes that may make them biologically (or culturally) desirable, so too employers can embody certain attributes that make them desirable to would-be employees. Read more

Three tips for new job-seekers from the Oracle of Omaha

Posted on February 10, 2012
Filed Under Employment, Finding a Job, First Job, Networking, Promotion, The Workplace | Leave a Comment

To a certain extent, Warren Buffet bewilders me. Although seemingly embodying all of the attributes of a good leader (and a track record bearing signs of financial wizardry), Mr. Buffet strikes me as somewhat of an anomaly. Lacking some of those deficiencies we sometimes like to ascribe to captains of business—in addition to his prescience, Buffet’s apparent lack of haughty egoism gives him an almost neighborly appeal—Buffet is a beloved by many of his peers, and, quite frankly, wonks everywhere. Unlike the figure of antiquity for whom he is named—Pythia, whose storied sulfur-fueled artificial powers of clairvoyance drew the attention of some of antiquities most prolific writers—the Oracle of Omaha gathers his power not by hanging precariously above volcanic, toxin-laden ground, but from a laser-focused intellect and perceptive disposition. Every year Buffett entertains approximately 160 students in Omaha, and plays Oracle, answering questions about his worldview, personal development, and of course, investment strategy (at the conclusion of the trip, he also makes himself available for goofy photographs). Read more

Odd jobs

Posted on February 7, 2012
Filed Under Career Change, Employment, Finding a Job | Leave a Comment

Before I start, allow me to draw a distinction. What I intend to talk about are not “odd jobs”— shorthand for irregular, perhaps short-term work. Rather, I want to talk about odd jobs. Have you ever watched the television show Dirty Jobs? Although I realize the intention of the show is to showcase jobs which, literally, require that one get down and “dirty,” what I enjoy most about the show is, in fact, the variation of jobs it highlights. Jobs you’d never known existed. Elephant nose-hair clipper. Human penguin. While neither of those aforementioned jobs exist (to my knowledge), I think they capture the spirit of Dirty Jobs nicely—a show which brings attention to some of the more odd and peculiar elements comprising America’s job-scape. And despite the name and its focus, I think what’s driving Mike Rowe, the show’s host, are venerable, almost democratic intentions: the show is as much about people who get dirty at work as a vehicle through which Rowe is able to examine, first-hand, the bowels (no pun intended) of Western society and reveal each and every single gear that helps to power the Modern Age. Keeping this in mind, Rowe’s object is to show—in the same way that a documentarian might—how each gear (every job in America’s job-scape), from investment banker to zoo keeper, is equal and ultimately works toward the same goal. The philosophy driving Dirty Jobs aside, I, like a lot of people (I think), am interested in odd, uncommon jobs. Not because of what they may speak to, but because of their novelty. Thus, TheWorkBuzz must have had me in mind when it recently published its list of “least common jobs in America.” Read more

Saying goodbye to the resume, RIP

Posted on January 31, 2012
Filed Under Career Change, Cover Letters and Resumes, Employment, Finding a Job, Social Network | Leave a Comment

It’s the last vestige of our antiquated, analogue past. A symbol of a bygone era. Putting it in really dramatic terms, it’s the last, remaining remnant of an Ancien Régime. You know, Ancien Régime: the old French socio-political order that was upturned by the French revolution. Although “Ancien Régime” may seem like a rather obscure bit of language to folks who have yet to be pulled in French history’s mystical gravity, Ancien Régime is a phrase that has come to embody a very peculiar idea relating to the collapse of an old, established regime—a changing of the guard, if you will, but on a paradigmatic scale. In this context, I am using this term as a way of conveying the seismic shift taking place in the world of hiring, or, Western life in general. How a new establishment—way of thinking—characterized by attaching a lowercase ”i” random nouns, e.g. iPotato, digitization, and (what some might call) digital escapism, has come to replace vestiges of the pre-Information Age: handwritten letters, vinyl records, hardback books, and yes, the almighty resume. The resume, has remained the thing connecting the hiring process of the not-to-distant past from our present. Read more

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