Saturday, January 19, 2008

More Limbo, Sins of the past, Get me out of here!

I have not forgotten about this blog, I have just been busy. I am still looking for work, only not as actively as I was a couple of weeks ago. Part of the slow down has been dealing with the University of Michigan HR issues.... which I did get some movement on this week. I don't know that I really want to get into all the in's and out's in such an open forum, but I do have some thoughts about having been tagged as 'do not rehire' in a system.

First of all, if that is going to be the case, the employee needs to be told so that they don't come back thinking all is well and that they could be rehired. Now if you get fired from some place, that's a pretty strong message that you are not welcome, but if you leave by your own choice, when you are on your way out, you should have an exit interview and you should be informed at that time that at this time you are not considered a viable rehire. It doesn't have to be a big deal, after all you have left on your own.

The other issue is for how long do you consider someone a 'Do Not Rehire'? The basic nature of life is that people change, their skills change and become refined. The example I have been using when talking to people is let's say that you have a 23 or 24 year old, just out of school, and they are on their own for the first time. They have a tendency to show up a little late often, they don't know how to ask for help, or to get along with the other workers, and after a while they self select their way out of the job, move on and everyone is happy that they are leaving..... and then several years later they return looking for work. In the years since they have left, thing have changed, they have become more responsible, they have settled down, and for the last several years they have had a solid work record of showing up on time and having positive interactions with their co-workers... do you give them a chance? How about just a chance to interview? Also let's say they have gone back to school, they have a new set of skills or experiences do you let them apply for those jobs?

These all seem like questions that I would have, and what I was told by the HR rep, were things that I would have to address in a job interview... which is good advice because a couple of hours before I talked to her, I did apply for a position in my old department, doing what I had done at the end of the 1990's.


When I last left off with my daydream Year on the Road trip, I was in South Carolina. It's a state that has been in the news a lot this week because of the primary that are looming. I have been a tourist in places where elections are about to be held, it was in Sweden of course, and I didn't mind it to much... but I really don't think that I would want to be in South Carolina for this political season, at least not for to long. I think at this point I would start to head west.... but first I would kind of retrace my steps and head to Tallahasee, and from there head west along the coast of the gulf towards Texas. I don't have any places along the way that I would want to see, visit or stop for, and I think I would just take a look at what I saw signs for and what caught my eye.

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