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sounds like she'll be rich soon. right after speaking with her legal counselor.
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He'll take his cut from the winnings, obviously.
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Well my mom has a PhD, 30 years of work experience, and has been unemployed for going on 2 years now.
Well my mom has a PhD, 30 years of work experience, and has been unemployed for going on 2 years now.A PhD? What in?
Paleolimnology.
A lot of the time this sort of thing happens because the HR person is a stickler for rules, or is young, but usually just lacks real-world experience and has no idea of its value.
For instance, I worked for nearly twelve years at a major university, keeping books, auditing accounts, buying, doing contracts work, doing payroll activities, re-imbursing famous professors for the expenses incurred on their trips around the world, and a few hundred other tasks that weren't in my description. During that time, I helped to test and implement PeopleSoft/Oracle, update the entire university to new purchasing systems, and managed most of the Microsoft and Adobe licensing to hundreds of departments. In a nutshell, I was one of a few people who ran the entire business of the university. All of this with a constantly ringing phone and an exploding email, with big shots demanding I drop everything and fix their issues, pronto. I was a rock star in a metaphorical war zone.
Day before yesterday, I got an email from a local utility telling me I did not meet their minimum requirements for a simple accounting job in their payroll department, double-checking spreadsheets.
Their minimum requirements? Bachelors's degree (in anything) or equivalent working experience. Plus PeopleSoft.
Given my real-world experience, I could teach those bozos more about any part of their business than they could get out of a hundred people with bachelors. I could do their monkey job with one hand on my lunch and my eyes stapled shut with a red Slingerland.
Point is, an old timer like me knows real world beats bachelors any day of the week, and Sundays, too. But HR folks often don't have the experience or influence to allow them to act on that.
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Paleolimnology.Well my mom has a PhD, 30 years of work experience, and has been unemployed for going on 2 years now.A PhD? What in?
USACE has dozens of job openings specifically for PhDs, most in the Eastern Region. I've worked with these guys before, and they prefer experienced people over new grads. She should look them up. Great pay and benefits, too.
Come on, actually being able to do the job? Bah! You need a bit of paper saying how big your ego is (no offence to people who actually have degrees and use them. I just have the misfortune to meet people with degrees who couldn't think their way out of a wet paper bag)!
When businesses wise up and hire competent people instead of beautiful people, related people, or people who know where the bodies are buried then the world economy will find itself pulled out of its current difficulties. Oh, and the skiing will be good in hell that year :(
Except then the people who have money won't be able to keep all the money to themselves, their friends and relatives. They would have to share the wealth with actually competent people. Why would they allow that?
When businesses wise up and hire competent people instead of beautiful people, related people, or people who know where the bodies are buried then the world economy will find itself pulled out of its current difficulties. Oh, and the skiing will be good in hell that year :(
Well, if businesses always hired beautiful people over competent people, they wouldn't be businesses anymore.
In fact, a study by Ben Gurion University showed that ugly women are more likely to get through the initial sorting process than good looking ones. Interestingly, good looking men have more chances than ugly men. The study suggests that both results are due to the fact that women are usually in charge of screening the applications.
Regardless, while movies tend to popularize that stereotype, it is only some non-essential posts that get such treatment. No serious business, unless it suffers from a severe case of agency problem (where the management is highly disconnected from the stakeholders, and thus acts in its own interest, rather than the company's) is going to hand over essential functions to people based on their looks, unless looks can be useful for that job (I've noticed banks send strikingly beautiful excecutives almost every time they want to offer our company something, and standard non-descript men for everything else), or when skills are not a determining factor.
Note that beautiful does not prevent competency. One of my fellow gamers became bank manager. This year, she was stolen by a headhunter to a different company. She's attractive but she's even more competent. Running the legal matters of a gaming club taught her a thing or two about management :)
Note that beautiful does not prevent competency. One of my fellow gamers became bank manager. This year, she was stolen by a headhunter to a different company. She's attractive but she's even more competent. Running the legal matters of a gaming club taught her a thing or two about management :)
Precisely my point. Ceteris paribus, looks can probably give you an edge (though the aforementioned study suggests otherwise), but the person has to be competent if we're talking about essential posts that require skills.
Companies need to make money in order to survive. And hiring people just because they look nice is not a good way of making money.
I have to wonder if the HR person misspoke. Usually, when dismissing job applicants with 30+ years of experience, the language to be used is "you're too experienced," i.e., eventually you'll want a wage increase in line with your experience.
Or maybe they realized it was Mother Dingo...
Doesn't that argument sort of contradict the very study you mention?
Whether they're selecting for ugly women or good looking men, they're still screening based on looks not skills.
Sure, it's not likely to be the only factor or and explicitly required one, but people are not strictly rational and will often favor people based on appearance. Not usually as blatant as hiring an obvious incompetent because of looks, but picking between to comparable candidates based on appearance.
Not quite. If you check the study, it says precisely what I said. Quoting the link:
"Ugly women are twice as likely to get a call back to interview than attractive women with identical qualifications"
That is what I meant when I said that, ceteris paribus (ie, assuming everything else constant/the same), looks (good or bad; the study suggest bad in the case of women, and good in the case of men) can probably give you an edge.
Thinking more about this, I'm suspicious of this argument, because it's the same line of thinking that says business can't be racist or sexist and yet we keep having examples of both.
I would say no. My argument does not say that hiring cannot be based on non-professional qualities; it says that, while cultural components will indeed have an effect, efficient businesses will tend to hire people based on efficiency conditions. Non-efficient companies tend to be left behind in competitive markets, and thus they either end up forced to switch its policies or fall into the background/go out of business.
After all, efficiency and qualifications are not just about your hard skills. Soft skills, presence, personality, looks, and charisma also factor in because they can affect efficiency as well. This will depend highly on the medium in which the company operates. For instance, it would have been problematic for an early XXth century company in a country like the US to hire a black CEO, as it was a society filled with racism, just like it would be for a company in, say, Sweden to hire an openly racist CEO today.
I love the Hot Waitress Ecconomic Index. I would find a link to the theory, but I don't want to be searching for it on my work computer.
Basically, in good ecconomic times attractive people get hired first. In poor times, they work lower end jobs. You can tell how good the employment is by how hot your average waitress is.
Anyone who doubts that good looks matter in hiring -- especially corporate hiring -- is woefully misinformed.
...efficient businesses will tend to hire people based on efficiency conditions. Non-efficient companies tend to be left behind in competitive markets, and thus they either end up forced to switch its policies or fall into the background/go out of business.
While this sounds plausible, it simply doesn't reflect my experience at all. I've worked for three large enterprises in my career, and all three of them were packed with mediocre people, many of whom were obviously hired because they good-looking. The company's survival had more to do with economies of scale and healthy balance sheets than with hiring efficient employees.
She has to find a way to get into a binder.
This is a topic for another thread, but I cringed when he said that. So clueless...
As for the OP, it sounds like his mom may have been the victim of age discrimination.
Not the Lawyers around here...its all don't rock the boat and maybe you get invited to drinks with the bigwigs..
He'll take his cut from the winnings, obviously.
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It must be like living under a Feudal System -- Lords & Ladies and all that.
Guess it sucks to be poor no matter WHEN you live.
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Do Australian lawyers or barristers or whatever have to wear big, poofy wigs too? 'Cuz that would be pretty Feudal.
Is it at all possible that mum just didn't interview well?
Yes, or perhaps she didn't show that she had knowledge of modern tools.
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She has to find a way to get into a binder.This is a topic for another thread, but I cringed when he said that. So clueless...
I thought the "So she can go home and cook for her family" line was far more cringe worthy.
The OP's mom is a bookkeeper. If they are interested in keeping books, they will hire her over someone else. If they aren't, they will hire what they are interested in.
Perhaps eyecandy, perhaps someone who doesn't actually keep the books, or even someone who keeps them looking better than they are.
Not the Lawyers around here...its all don't rock the boat and maybe you get invited to drinks with the bigwigs..
He'll take his cut from the winnings, obviously.
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Yes, you are right. There is no hope for you.
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Do Australian lawyers or barristers or whatever have to wear big, poofy wigs too? 'Cuz that would be pretty Feudal.
Yes and no - it depends on the state you are in (some states have done awawy with the wigs) or if it federal, if it's local court, coroners court, supreme, or high court.
They still wear robes in the US that is just as feudal.
I would say over rather than under qualified. My Dad who is at retirement age and can if he wishes take a pension ( the benefit of living in an evil socialist country) would much prefer to work and is looking for a part time job. He not as mobile as he once was after an illness, but he has so many qualifications and was a project manager for an international construction company, he gets nocked back a lot, primarily because people tell him he will get bored, he is too qualified.
As a former HR professional you all should know that most HR people do the screening but the actual yes or no comes from the person who would be supervising the applicant. The hiring manager can recommend and give you who is qualified but usually the decision is not in their hands. I'm not saying this is the case in this situation but it is like that a lot.
Also I am personally of the opinion having seen what I have that experience AND degrees do not amount for crap in most situations. The most successful hiring is behavioral based hiring where you look and judge the person not by what is on their resume but by what kind of worker they will be based upon behavioral indicators.
Basically resumes and degrees get you in the door with me but your behavior and interview are what get you the job.
...and yeah the binder comment was ridiculous as well as a lie.
The most successful hiring is behavioral based hiring where you look and judge the person not by what is on their resume but by what kind of worker they will be based upon behavioral indicators.
Basically resumes and degrees get you in the door with me but your behavior and interview are what get you the job.
That sounds counterintuitive. How can you really understand somebody based on behavior until you've been around them for hours and hours (in other words, until AFTER you've given them the job).
Unless I am fiending for another hit, I have a hard time believing you can tell everything about me by the way I seat myself in an uncomfortable chair set three inches lower than your own.
Also, how would an experienced person have acquired all those skills and experience if they were not easy to work with and good at their jobs? That's counterintuitive, too.
The most successful hiring is behavioral based hiring where you look and judge the person not by what is on their resume but by what kind of worker they will be based upon behavioral indicators.
Basically resumes and degrees get you in the door with me but your behavior and interview are what get you the job.
That sounds counterintuitive. How can you really understand somebody based on behavior until you've been around them for hours and hours (in other words, until AFTER you've given them the job).
Unless I am fiending for another hit, I have a hard time believing you can tell everything about me by the way I seat myself in an uncomfortable chair set three inches lower than your own.
Also, how would an experienced person have acquired all those skills and experience if they were not easy to work with and good at their jobs? That's counterintuitive, too.
There are good questions you can ask. If you know the questions ahead of time, you can prepare a good answer, but you might not know what answer I'm looking for. I did a little bit of HR hiring, but where I actually honed the skill of interviewing applicants was recruiting for my old WoW guild.
Basically it involves asking questions where you tell me a story about past experiences. Asking about your favorite boss, and then later about a boss you didn't like, I can learn a lot about what kind of boss you will or won't get along with. I don't learn everything, but I learn a lot.
Well, the fifteen traditional interview questions (you know, where do you see yourself in five years, what are your strong and weak sides, what do you know about this company and so on) have actually been shown to have little to no relation to employee performance, except for one.
What do you know about this company?
The only data you can extract from this is that the person has taken the time to do some basic research on you. It correlates to a tiny plus.
The other questions are questionable due to the ease of lying/giving you what you want to hear.
