June 26, 2003

What are your former employers saying about you?
Posted by deisenhart@bostonworks.com">Douglas Eisenhart at 5:15 PM -

High unemployment and the lousy economy are creating a boom in an uncommon industry: reference checking.

Not employers checking job candidates, but job seekers finding out what former bosses may be saying about them.

Read the article, entitled "Tough times a boost for reference-checkers", from the Atlanta Journal Constitution web site.

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It's 90 degrees and sunny
Posted by jbutler@bostonworks.com">Jason Butler at 9:44 AM -

We've just suffered through the worst winter and spring since the dawn of time. Now, we are finally getting some decent weather, but of course it's during the workweek.

So now, while I'm counting down the hours (~31.5 or so) to my vacation, I'm looking out my window past Morrissey Boulevard to the green grass of BC High and I'm pondering this article from ABC News: Americans get short-changed when it comes to holiday time.

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You make the most money. Bye.
Posted by jbutler@bostonworks.com">Jason Butler at 9:29 AM -

You can always count on the Journal for jolly trends. Today: well-paid professionals draw unwelcome attention.

[Lay-off victim] Mr. Wood and the others were faulted for nothing. They simply made too much money at a time when the company was desperate to economize. Circuit City then hired about 2,100 lower-paid hourly workers to replace Mr. Wood and the others, who had represented 20% of its sales force.

In doing so, the retailer made an increasingly common cost-saving move: swapping expensive labor with lower-paid workers. The approach, which is generally legal, doesn't eliminate the position but rather the high-paid person in it. The technique is especially attractive to service businesses such as retail. Like so many companies today, they face massive pressure to cut their labor costs. But unlike manufacturers, they have jobs that can't easily be automated or shipped overseas.

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Putting all your email eggs in one basket
Posted by jbutler@bostonworks.com">Jason Butler at 9:22 AM -

The New York Times takes a look at what happens when you run all your email through work, then leave the company.

For much of the working population, e-mail is not only available but indispensable, a tool not just for work but for maintaining personal bonds. Like Ms. Finnie, many workers are accustomed to using a work computer and e-mail address to stay in touch with friends and family in the course of the day.

Yet with the convenience comes risk. Although many people are aware that they may be sacrificing privacy by using workplace e-mail, they are sometimes indiscreet in what they write. And for those like Ms. Finnie who spend years in a single job, the e-mail address becomes part of their identity. Leaving a job and its e-mail address can cause practical and emotional upheaval.

I'm lucky, I have my own domain so I don't have to worry about it.

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June 25, 2003

The high cost of efficiency
Posted by jbutler@bostonworks.com">Jason Butler at 9:19 AM -

J. Bradford DeLong, in Wired, takes a look at whether computers really raise or lower productivity.

Computers are tremendous labor-saving devices. They give us power to accomplish extraordinary amounts of work in extraordinarily short intervals of time: financial analysis, data mining, design automation. But they also give us the capability to do things like play solitaire. Or send instant messages. Fiddle with fonts. Futz with PowerPoint. Twiddle with images. Reconfigure link rollovers.

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June 24, 2003

Worker's compensation insurance costs are soaring
Posted by jbutler@bostonworks.com">Jason Butler at 9:22 AM -

The New York Times reports on yet another burden for employers which prevents them from hiring: soaring costs for worker's compensation insurance.

Prices are escalating, government and industry officials said, because of rising medical and legal costs; a recent devastating price war by insurers; and, many insurers and business executives say, a significant amount of fraud.

In the last few years, the cost of almost all kinds of insurance has been rising sharply. But workers' compensation insurance, which pays for treatment of on-the-job injuries and lost wages, is a particular problem because its purchase is mandatory. Businesses cannot trim their workers' compensation coverage to save money because, every employee must be fully insured.

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How to annoy your best customers
Posted by jbutler@bostonworks.com">Jason Butler at 9:18 AM -

This morning's New York Times reports on the inventive new ways travel organizations are sticking it to business travelers.

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Law Firms easing up on Associates?
Posted by jbutler@bostonworks.com">Jason Butler at 9:16 AM -

Another promising trend spotted in this morning's Globe: law firms are easing up on associates in the name of family.

The partners' plan tries to address one of the legal profession's most challenging questions: How can lawyers balance intense dedication to their work with the equally demanding task of raising a family? The three men point to a 1999 report by the Boston Bar Association that found the legal profession was ''in danger of seeing law firms evolve into institutions where only those who have no family responsibilities'' can thrive. Many law students and attorneys like the partners' plans, but others maintained that long hours are a fundamental part of being a good lawyer.

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Biogen merges with Idec
Posted by jbutler@bostonworks.com">Jason Butler at 9:13 AM -

Big news in the local biotech market: Biogen is merging with Idec in a stock-swap valued at $6,440,000,000.

The new company, to be called Biogen Idec, would be based in Cambridge, rather than Idec's headquarters in San Diego. Biogen's chairman and chief executive, James C. Mullen, would be CEO of the combined company. Idec's current chairman and CEO, William H. Rastetter, would become chairman. Each company would have six members of the new board of directors.

Now may be the time to buy that condo in Kendall Square.

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Sprung from cages on Landsdowne Street
Posted by jbutler@bostonworks.com">Jason Butler at 9:09 AM -

The Boss to play Fenway?

Not everyone's in love with the idea, reported Newscenter 5's Mary Saladna, but so far there have been very few naysayers.

Red Sox officials haven't confirmed that it is Bruce Springsteen who would be playing, but that is the word all over town. If it does happen, there will be two shows Sept. 6 and 7. It will be the first time a rock concert would be played at Fenway Park.

This would be exciting, the best-known singer of songs for the working man playing a show at Fenway Park. Now I just need to figure out how to use my work connections to score tickets. Let's see, the Globe is owned by the Times, who are part-owners of the Sox. Hmm.

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June 23, 2003

Older and Far Away
Posted by jbutler@bostonworks.com">Jason Butler at 1:46 PM -

Sometime this morning, between the college nostalgia and the paternity anticipation posts, I came across fellow Syracuse alum Amy's post about her reunion with her early-twenties, post-college friends.

This weekend I also had a reunion with a group of friends from "back in the day"... that glorious early 20's, just finished college time. You have a job, and thus real money for the first time, but most likely you don't have much responsiblity so you can get away with going out and drinking massive amounts pretty regularly. ... This weekend, I look around the table in the bar/restaurant located within our old stomping grounds. We discuss things like home purchases and 401(k)'s and the job market. I see people I don't know. I see an infant at the table with us (his parents having made the hour long trip to the big bad city) and I wonder: what happened? When did we become so uncool? And then the baby's father says: remember that time during a blizzard, the T wasn't running, this place was packed and we just sat in here and drank all day... Someone else jumps in: or the time that.... and we are off. And I realize there is a little part of us that will always stay young and cool.

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Newspapers and Unions
Posted by jbutler@bostonworks.com">Jason Butler at 1:24 PM -

Editor & Publisher writes this morning about union conflicts at newspapers around the country, including here at the Boston Globe and at the New York Times [full disclosures: I am a non-union consultant here at the Globe. The Globe is owned by the Times].

Tim Porter writes an interesting insider's view of the subject over on his weblog.

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Here's one for all you RSS geeks out there
Posted by jbutler@bostonworks.com">Jason Butler at 10:00 AM -

If you don't already, you should subscribe to the BostonWorks articles feed. We update this feed every Friday night with the BostonWorks stories coming out of the Boston Globe newsroom.

Are there any other feeds you'd like to see? Email me and let me know.

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More firms are offering paternity leave
Posted by jbutler@bostonworks.com">Jason Butler at 9:55 AM -

This is a trend I like, more firms are offering paid paternity leave to new fathers.

Currently, about 13 percent of companies with more than 100 employees offer [paternity leave], up from just a handful 10 years ago, according to the Families and Work Institute in New York. ''We are seeing more young men who are actively parenting,'' said Kathie Lingle, national work-life director for KPMG LLP, an accounting and tax services firm based in Montvale, N.J. ''There has been a general societal shift. They want to be involved.''

Paternity leave is not an immediate issue for me, but may be in the next few years. I hope all businesses will offer this benefit by then.

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College grads not liking the job market
Posted by jbutler@bostonworks.com">Jason Butler at 9:55 AM -

Graduating college students are feeling the cold slap of reality.

Just a few weeks ago, they were facing the future with blind optimism, confident that a job would turn up someplace soon. Now, members of the class of 2003 are finding that it's a lot tougher in the real world than they'd anticipated.

Full-time employment has yet to materialize for students who delayed their job search. Others are banking on the relationships they built while on internships to help them find permanent work. Still others are the envy of their peers: They've got jobs.

In 1994, a similarly tough year, I graduated without a job. It was depressing. A couple of months later, I ended up getting a job through my sister's best friend's husband.

Keep trying, job leads can come from the strangest places.

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Competion at work. Good? Bad?
Posted by jbutler@bostonworks.com">Jason Butler at 9:54 AM -

Is competition among co-workers inspiring or debilitating?

Some say competition among employees is helpful because it keeps workers working and interested in their jobs. Others believe competition has gotten to dangerously high levels. Jobs are at stake now, that argument goes, and people are worried somebody else might get promoted while they get the boot - and it's to the point that some of them are sabotaging their perceived rivals.

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