First Comment

I hope everyone had a very happy Fourth of July. As everyone is getting back to the workplace over the next few days and going back into work mode, we have a guest post about the opposite: the workplace farewell. This one is submitted to us by Maria Rainier. Maria is a freelance writer and blogger for First in Education where she’s recently written about online landscape architecture programs along with a piece on tax examiner jobs. In her spare time, she enjoys yoga, playing piano, and working with origami. Without further ado, here is Maria's guest post:
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It has become more and more common for employees to send out a mass e-mail to their co-workers announcing their departure. The e-mail usually offers some words of appreciation for co-workers, provides some details about future plans, and invites everyone to keep in touch. For most of us, the e-mails are forgettable, if not groan-inducing. But in a few rare cases, some disgruntled employees have become Internet legends for their memorable send-offs. Your writing skill and your ability to inspire or inflame aside, should you send out a mass e-mail bidding farewell to your co-workers when you’ve decided to move on to greener pastures? Or is it unprofessional not to send such a note?

To Send or Not to Send

There are many reasons to send out the farewell e-mail. If you work in a large company, it gives you the opportunity to notify those in other departments of your departure and the impending change in procedure. No matter the size of your company, the farewell e-mail also gives you the opportunity to express appreciation for your co-workers and to lay the ground work for maintaining those relationships after you’re gone.

There is no rule of thumb for whether you should or should not send the e-mail. The best barometer is your own company culture. If workplace farewells are common at your company, your co-workers may think you cold or aloof if you don’t send out a note. On the other hand, if no one sends out such notes, you may seem inappropriate if you do.

Follow precedent for constructing your note, but be sure to always keep it positive and end on a high note. If company e-mails tend to be long and reflective, don’t be too terse in yours. You don’t have to match previous examples sentiment for sentiment, but do try to convey the same overall tone (i.e., adding a few more sentences if you’re usually brief, or learning to pare it back if you tend to go on and on). Try to fit in, but always be sincere and do what feels comfortable.

Some Guidelines

Farewell e-mails can be as unique as you are. However, there is one concrete rule: Don’t bash your boss or your company. There are plenty of notorious examples of letters that broke this rule, but it’s safe to say those employees won’t be getting a good reference and won’t be able to rely on those contacts for any networking in the future. If you want to be able to list your job on your resume or maintain your contacts, then keep any bitterness or frustration out of your e-mail. Focus on the positive.

Some easy ways to keep things positive are to thank your co-workers for the work you shared and to reminisce fondly about the times you had together. Remember to be appropriate and professional. Don’t talk about that wild bachelorette party in accounting or your boss’ rumored affair. Do share funny stories if you have them. It will help break up the tedium of the typical, form e-mail farewell.

Give some reason for why you’re leaving, but don’t get too personal and – again – don’t vent frustrations about the job. It is appropriate to say that you’re leaving to take a new job, or to move for family reasons, or because you’re taking time off from the work force. It’s not appropriate to talk about how you’re taking a new job that pays a lot more, or how you’re leaving because you’re sick of your boss.

Leave your contact information, such as your e-mail or links to your Facebook or LinkedIn page. But leave these details only if you really want to stay in touch.

Finally, remember to be yourself in your e-mail. You want to say goodbye, but you also want to be memorable. No one wants to read a tedious, form e-mail. Let your personality shine through, but remember to be appropriate. When in doubt, ask yourself: What would your new employer think if he or she saw your e-mail?

Back in February I wrote a blog post about the vicious cycle of unemployment where the unemployed find it harder and harder to get hired which just keeps them further away from being employed. Many states (like New Jersey) have gotten ahead of the federal government and has banned discrimination against the unemployed, but as a bill is going to be introduced before Congress banning this type of discrimination on a country-wide level, TIME Magazine took another look at what happens when companies refuse to hire the unemployed (H/T Wendy):

Refusing to hire people on the basis of race, religion, age or disability — among other categories — is illegal. But companies that turn away jobless people as a group are generally not breaking the law — at least for now.


Job seekers have long known, of course, that it's easier to land a job when you are still working. There are no hard data on discrimination against the unemployed. But there have been reports from across the country of companies' making clear in job listings that they are not interested in people who are out of work. Employment experts say other companies have policies of hiring only people with jobs — but do not publicly acknowledge their bias.

TIME did a lot of work in this issue profiling the out of work in America including profiles of some of those who are unemployed. Check it out and know that your refusal to hire someone who is unemployed could end up being illegal in the very near future.

I haven't disappeared--we merely have been having some technical issues with the blog. But I am back with a great guest post from Mariana Ashley on the departure of a co-worker who was a positive influence. We've all had this happen and this is some good advice on how to deal with it. Mariana is a freelance writer who particularly enjoys writing about online colleges. She loves receiving reader feedback, which can be directed to mariana.ashley031 @gmail.com. Here is her guest post:
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Think of the kinds of things that keep you happy at work. Probably you enjoy your job or some aspect of the work you do. You might have a great supervisor who understands your skills and needs as an employee. Maybe your commute is easy and stress-free and you have good benefits. And maybe you consider your co-workers to be your friends.

All of these factors can contribute to a great workplace atmosphere, especially if you have for a co-worker someone whom you consider to be a friend and a positive influence.

But what happens if that special co-worker leaves the office for greener pastures? How do you respond then in the wake of that departure? How do you maintain that great work atmosphere and keep up your productivity?

As an employee, you have to do your best to maintain your productivity, despite the departure of your friend. Because it's much easier to stay focused at work if you have a good work atmosphere, you should try to follow some of these tips in order to quickly help things return to normal.

Change Everything!

Okay, you don't have to change everything, but you should at least consider making some changes to your daily return in order to minimize the effect of your former co-worker's absence on your own day. If you and your co-worker often met for mid-morning coffee to talk about your latest projects, then avoid this habit. Do something different, such as going for a walk, instead. By changing up how you work through the day, you can help your mind focus on the tasks you have before you in new ways, thus minimizing the effect of your friend's departure.

Begin Working on a New Project

Another way to get your mind off of the departure of your friend is to lose yourself in a new project if possible. By launching a new project, you can refocus on your tasks, what you have to do, and the goals you'd like to accomplish. This is incredibly helpful, especially if your former co-worker worked on past projects with you. Without him or her, you'll have a chance to see how you work on your own. This new project doesn't have to be anything complicated either; it could be as simple as reorganizing your files or preparing a six-month evaluation of your productivity.



Expand Your Friendly Horizons

After your co-worker leaves, especially if he or she was a good friend, you're going to need to make a new friend or two to expand your social circle of co-workers. Go out on a limb and interact with others; go out to lunch with a group you haven't really met for lunch before. Seek out others who might be good members of your team and try to involve them in new projects. The increased social activity and the amount of interaction you have with others will boost your ability to focus on your work.

Flee Negativity

One of the biggest killers of a good office environment is negativity in any form. You're job as an employee is to flee negativity. Don't cultivate negativity and if others are negative, you have to try to keep them out of your day as much as possible. Yes, you'll be disappointed that your co-worker has left, but you should keep that disappointment to yourself. The best way to make yourself happy is to think that you're happy. Letting negativity in you workday, especially negativity associated with the departure of a co-worker, will hurt your mood and ruin your productivity.

Stay LinkedIn

Finally, depending on the nature of your relationship with your former co-worker, you could try to stay in touch, either through a social networking site like LinkedIn or Facebook, or by socializing with him or her on the weekends. This is a good idea if you think having such a contact could improve your own career path as well; however, it could also be nice to keep that person in your life in some way, especially if you were good friends at work.

Yesterday President Barack Obama pushed 20 CEOs to "start investing in job creating enterprises." According to the Wall Street Journal, though, "nearly half of the executives [in a quarterly survey by the Business Roundtable]—45%—expected to hire within the next six months, compared with 31% who said that last quarter." As the article says, US businesses are sitting on $2 trillion in cash. Although slack demand is adding to their reluctance, hopefully a new year means new jobs appearing in the market.

In good news this morning, Bloomberg is reporting that jobless claims in the US unexpectedly fell to 420,000 last week. The bad news, though: "the total number of people receiving unemployment insurance and those getting extended payments rose." So what does that mean for hiring in the new year? "Fewer firings signal employers may be gearing up to add to their payrolls and help reduce a jobless rate hovering near a 26-year high. While the economy is gaining momentum heading into 2011, Federal Reserve policy makers said this week it isn’t strong enough to reduce unemployment."

And if you decide to look for one of those jobs in the new year, Simply Hired Blog has the best 50 careers of 2011 (H/T Wendy).

Want to know if your job is being eliminated? Well, the first place to look is to see if the industry you work in is disappearing. To help with that, Yahoo! Finance and CBS Money Watch have put together a list of high-paying jobs that are disappearing (H/T Wendy). Let's just say that if you were planning to work in sports journalism, you may want to rethink that decision.

Want to know why you can't treat your employees better than their manager? Well, look at the situation going on in Miami with the Heat, their star player, LeBron James, and their head coach, Erik Spoelstra as told by Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports. This one passage should make most managers and Human Resources professionals cringe: "The fundamental problem for Spoelstra isn’t that James doesn’t respect coaches – he doesn’t respect people. Give LeBron this, though: He’s learned to live one way with the television light on, and another with it off. He treats everyone like a servant, because that’s what the system taught him as a teenage prodigy. To James, the coach isn’t there to mold him into the team dynamic. He’s there to serve him." Eek.

Most people don't want to invest their own pensions, 401(K)s or IRAs, but if you do, there may be a book by two former Wall Street honchos you may want to pick up. As told by the New York Times: "when Mr. Murray, a former bond salesman for Goldman Sachs who rose to the managing director level at both Lehman Brothers and Credit Suisse First Boston, decided to cease all treatment five months ago for his glioblastoma, a type of brain cancer, his first impulse was not to mourn what he couldn’t do anymore or to buy an island or to move to Paris. Instead, he hunkered down in his tiny home office here and channeled whatever remaining energy he could muster into a slim paperback. It’s called “The Investment Answer,” and he wrote it with his friend and financial adviser Daniel Goldie to explain investing in a handful of simple steps."

Happy Hanukkah to fall my fellow Jews out there. May your nights be full of light and your bellies be full of oily foods. Even without the presents, it's probably my favorite holiday.

Yes ladies and gentlemen, it's that time of year again. It's time to give and receive performance reviews. But while most people dread that time--and since it's usually tied to bonuses and raises, that's totally understandable--it should be a time where an employee can reflect on their progress from the previous year and managers and Human Resources can access an employee's year-to-year performance AND development.

The development aspect of it can be the most important part of the process. It is important to look at what happened in the past year but other than compensation or layoff purposes, it's all information of what's already happened. What can be just as important--or more important in many cases--are the development growth planned to build on the the current year's performances for next year and beyond. Since the goal is to retain most of your employees and make sure they perform to the highest capabilities, the development plan for the future--and employees goals being aligned with that plan--is vital to make sure that you meeting your overall corporate goals.

And that's why goal planning should always be tied into the performance review. That isn't to say that there needs to be punishment for not meeting goals or great rewards for exceeding them, but it is important to make sure everyone is rowing in the same direction. That way, when the actual performance review takes place, the employees next-year development plan can be ironed out more easily. Employees would go from fearing reprimand to wondering what they needed to incorporate into their own planning for the next year. In the end, if their goals are tied to the company's goals, then they can actually feel like they're making a difference--which makes performance reviews just a little more palatable.

With Warren Buffet coming out today (via Telegraph) and saying that next time the financial world goes bust, the chief executives of those banks and their wives should go broke too, I figured it was a good time to delve back into the job market in the financial world.

Within the same article came this ominous forecast: "Despite the difference in the fortunes of those on Wall Street and many Americans in other industries, analysts have said that banks may decide to cut jobs in coming months as trading revenues decline. Meredith Whitney, for example, has forecast that up to 80,000 finance jobs could go over the next 18 months." Eek

More specifically, Morgan Stanley came out last week and said they were going to freeze investment bank hiring in 2010 according to Bloomberg (H/T Wendy).

For those looking for a job in this market, FINS has some advice for college graduates about how to find a job in the financial world (one of the pieces of advice "Take on Internships" is a good one).

Also from FINS, a different type of sheriff is coming to town: the IRS is hiring special agents for their Criminal Investigation Division, one of its prime divisions.

Lastly, Corporate Compliance Insights has two Dilberts that hopefully don't hit too close to home for many compliance professionals.

Way back in November of 2007 I wrote a post on the Astron Solutions blog titled "You're Fired...Wait...You're Hired" after Circuit City decided to rehire some of the employees they had fired. It continues to be one of our most-visited posts and even though Circuit City is no longer around, the themes in that post (and Michael Scott's words) continue to resonate, especially with the recent "resignation" of Shirley Sherrod.

I posted a little while back from HR hero's The Oswald Letter about terminating in haste can lead to regret at leisure. Last Thursday, Fistful of Talent (H/T Jennifer) looked at the process of welcoming back rehires (AKA "The Sacred Boomerang Ceremony"). The author describes the ceremony:

At Kahler Slater, not only do they accept employees back (the good ones of course) but they believe that having a strong employee come back is reason to celebrate. John Horky, the HR Guy, creates for each one of these employees a boomerang and presents it to them during a staff meeting with their very own “Sacred Boomerang Ceremony”.

Imagine, a celebration where the entire company is gathered to welcome an employee back into the fold. They present the boomerang, tell everyone what the employee has been doing since he/she left, and celebrate them coming back to the company. 

This isn't a process without problems, however. In finance, where there have been recent signs of hiring according to the Wall Street Journal (H/T Wendy), many firms are taking a strict stance against rehiring former employees. While one (or multiple) co-workers may vouch for them, there may have been reasons that the employee was let go during the layoffs. There may still be some bad blood there and rehiring can have negative effects on moral. In some instances, lesser employees may be hired because of a feeling of familiarity with the company they were let go by.

The lesson here is that while done right, rehiring can be a great idea, many other factors need to be taken into account--and it should never be done in haste.

We've all seen it at one point or another: a bully in the workplace. This person can be a boss, an owner, someone in power or someone just on a power trip. They can work in any department and they come in many shapes and sizes. But Human Resources needs to be aware of these people and take care of them before they dominate and intimidate the workplace. Like a school bully, it can be intimidating to stand up to these workplace bullies, but someone needs to do it. And that someone needs to be from either management or human resources.

A few articles on the subject:

Bloomberg Businessweek starts us out with ten signs of a fear-based workplace so you know what to look out for (H/T Wendy). Some of them are more obvious than others but #10 seems to sum it up: "When senior leaders make virtually all decisions in secret, dole out information in unhelpful drips, and base hiring on sheeplike compliance rather than energy and talent, and the PA system all but blares "Be glad to have a job, stop whining, and get back to work," your company's fear problem is off the charts."

TIME via Yahoo! News is next with an article saying that New York just passed a bill which may make workplace bullying explicitly illegal: "If New York's Healthy Workplace Bill becomes law, workers who can show that they were subjected to hostile conduct - including verbal abuse, threats or work sabotage - could be awarded lost wages, medical expenses, compensation for emotional distress and punitive damages"

This would seem to be good news for the group of workers who have filed a class action lawsuit against New York chain Pio Pio according to Grub Street New York.

Lastly, the Employment Law Blog cautions against terminating in haste and says that you need to have a total command of the facts before you decide to let someone go, even for what seems like a misdeed.

George Steinbrenner was known as "The Boss" in his time owning the Yankees. When he passed away last week, Steinbrenner took with him a complicated legacy as an owner who produced championships but a boss who could torment his employees. He was at the same time charitable (he had a saying that if more than one person knows about a good deed you've done, you've done it for the wrong reasons) and a criminal (made illegal contributions to Richard Nixon) but always interesting. Today the New York Post went through how to succeed the Steinbrenner way, but while they have praised the man and the team's success, it's also helpful to note that "The Boss" was not always the ideal boss:

BE FOCUSED From the day George Steinbrenner bought the Yankees for $10 million until he permanently stepped down last week, the former shipping executive had one all-consuming goal: to win. And he seems to have spent pretty close to every waking minute thinking about how to make it happen — just ask the minions who fielded his constant phone calls, endured his tirades and his meddling, and spoke of his obsessive attention to every corner of the organization. And his focus never let up, even in the off-season.

“Winning is the most important thing in my life, after breathing,” he famously said.

That was just one of the pieces of advice put forth by the post article. The others included "work tirelessly", "don't be afraid to shift gears--even if you swore you wouldn't", "fire when ready", "be a boss, not a friend", "hire top talent, and pay them well", "demand results", "set clear goals", "never always criticize your employees in public", "pay attention to the little things", "don't give your stars preferential treatment", "build your brand", "have a heart OK", and "don't rest on your laurels". All of these are good advice for someone running a business and while George M. Steinbrenner III was very good at accomplishing some of these in a way that helps an organization, some of his actions certainly hurt his organization and his employees. A good balance is certainly needed for an organization to have successful leadership.

We start you off on this Monday morning with a link from the Huffington Post which says that the real unemployment number is at a dismal 19% and we're 22.4 million jobs short of having a full unemployment rate of 5%. Ouch.

Speaking of the unemployed, The 405 Club (a great blog name) has a post about what really bothers the author about not having a full-time, steady, paying job.

Lastly, UpstartHR has a look at the future of HR and asks "is it you?" Some keys they give are:

• Know what impact you want to have
• Ask smart questions
• Identify a potential path
• Take charge of your professional development
• Stay flexible

 Some good advice, indeed! 

Two interesting articles for your Thursday:

-The first is from Career Solvers and gives a lesson on how to get fired. Although the author is talking about firing her phone company, many of these same principles apply to the workplace. They are:

1. Not showing up for work
2. Coming to work unprepared
3. Blaming others for the team's errors
4. Not communicating with others
5. Telling the boss (me) you couldn’t get a project done because it was understaffed.
6. Asking for a raise before you have proved your value. 

The post ends with this bit of advice on why to eliminate these practices from your repotoire:

According to CareerBuilder’s 2010 Jobs Forecast a trend for 2010 may very well be replacing lower performing employees and taking advantage of the large percentage of top talent in the labor force to strengthen their work force. Because in this economy, employers have choices…and there are plenty of job seekers out there that would love to be employed by them.

-On the flip side, Easy Small Business HR has Do's and Don'ts (or is it "don't's"?) when firing employees. Some of those:

Don't: 

• Leave the task to someone who does not have direct supervision of the worker being fired.
  
• Fire an employee on the spot unless the actions are so egregious that it requires immediate removal from the workplace.

Do:

• Fire workers who have crossed the line of what is considered egregious inappropriate behavior if you are absolutely certain based on the facts that the employee is guilty of misconduct.
• Respect the privacy and confidentiality of everyone involved by meeting with your employee(s) in a private area
• Tell your employee the reason for the termination.

Some good advice from those two sources...though you should only be following the latter!

Happy New Year to you from everyone here at Astron Solutions. Let's hope 2010 is a great one. 2009 has seem some rough times in the economy and especially with Human Resources, but hopefully better things are on the horizon for the new year. A few articles to send out the year:

-Since one of our themes this past year has been layoffs, let's take a look at the way the Washington Times is saying goodbye to people they're letting go from the Washington City Paper:

...the individuals hustled with great dread to a couple of tables where lots of letters were waiting. People walked away carrying word of their fate. Those that are getting laid off are being asked to finish up their shift tomorrow and then depart. The letters come with a list of open positions at the paper, just in case the departed want to try their luck with a different department.

Ouch. Does not sound like a good way to do this. Especially over a holiday weekend. The blog article quips "Is the paper going to raise those individuals on their cell phones and say, Hey, come back from Vail and pick up your letter to find out whether you've been sacked or saved?". Not the best idea by management. Many companies need to meet personnel numbers by year end but this isn't the best way to do it.

-Another big theme in 2009 was the use of social networking for job searches--especially the ever-growing Twitter. Well Career Solvers has some great advice as we close out 2009 about how you can use Twitter in your job search as they interview someone who has written a book about it.

-Lastly, looking ahead to 2010, Yahoo! HotJobs has a list of the most secure jobs in 2010.

Wishing a Happy and Healthy New Year to you and your loved ones from all of us here at Astron Solutions!

Most Fantasy Football Leagues are currently in the playoffs. That means that the stakes are the highest and fantasy football owners are constantly making sure their top guys are playing in the big games. But be careful if you're updating your team at work or discussing roster moves with your co-workers. Why? Because, as Yahoo! Sports wrote, if you work for a company such as Fidelity, it could lead to your firing (H/T Ari).

Said Fidelity spokesman Vin Loporchio: "We have clear policies that relate to gambling. Participation in any form of gambling through the use of Fidelity time or equipment or any other company resource is prohibited. … We want our employees to be focused on our customers and clients."

We would also like to point out – in our professional capacity as fantasy gurus, not as legal advisors – that laws have been passed which define the terms "bet" and "wager," and fantasy participation has been excluded. Here's a link to a million-word legal definition. Whatever else he did, Pettigrew wasn't gambling. Back off, company spokesman.

Yahoo! Tech has the news of one unfortunate woman who was fired for getting to Caps Lock friendly (H/T Wendy):

That's exactly what happened to Vicki Walker, who was abruptly kicked out of her job for sending "confrontational emails" with text formatted in a variety of red, bold, and all caps fonts. Walker had sent the emails to fellow workers within the company, usually with stern and detailed instructions on how forms should be properly filled out.

Someone at ProCare didn't like her approach, suggesting she caused "disharmony in the workplace" and was being too confrontational via email, eventually firing her without warning.

Walker, however, got the last laugh. She sued for wrongful termination and won the case, pocketing $17,000 in lost wages and for other unspecified harm caused due to the firing.

What do you think? Are Caps Lock really that big of a deal? Do you train your employees in proper e-mail formatting?

Wanted to pass this along, but Vault has been keep track of all the big layoffs that have occurred. Definitely worth checking out.

Also from Vault's blog "Pink Slipped", advice on how to make being laid off, pay off.

A sad baseball night in New York as the Yankees and Mets both lose one-run games against their arch-rivals. So how about some great HR articles instead?

-CNN has a great article up on how significant others should react when their men get laid off -- but they still have a job. Some great advice there.

-24 Hours Vancouver is next with some advice not to lie on your resume because it'll come back to haunt you.

-Next, the Zanesville Times Recorder writes about mandated sick leave. It may not have passed in Ohio, but it is has a chance of becoming a national law.

-You have some questions for HR? Well the Atlanta Journal-Constitution has an "Ask HR"

-Lastly, Business Management Daily says that while HR salaries weaken, comp and benefit pays have grown.

Let's hope tomorrow is a better night for New York baseball...

-We start out on this Wednesday with Human Resource Executive Online with some advice on how to understand Human Resources value

-Next is Market Mixup which says that instead of cutting jobs, think about cutting salaries

-Lastly, the Zanesville Times Recorder says that now that you have figured out the FMLA regulation, there may be more changes coming down the pipeline

-The South Florida Business Journal starts us up with a Society of Human Resources Management (SHRM) survey which says that hiring is slowly improving and the Central Valley Business Times has some more information on that

-CNNMoney says that after layoffs, layoff survivors are now stuck with more responsibilities and more stress but aren't getting any more money.

-Lastly, after we just quoted a few surveys from employees...word from the Associated Press (AP) that companies are turning away from employee surveys

Since most of us don't have the luxury of punching our boss when we get mad at them, there's this from AngstCorner which allows you to virtually punch them.

Strangely enough, this was sent by my boss, Wendy. She also sent me this article from Harvard Business School on how to get fired with dignity.

So I'm not sure what to think about my job security at this point... (just kidding...I hope!)