January 30, 2004

Bill Belichick, CEO
Posted by Douglas Eisenhart at 11:01 AM

OK, all you wannabe CEO's - do you have what it takes? Can you tackle the tough issues and meet, or exceed, your company's goals? Can you take your team to the top of its profession? Do you really stack up against the best?

As we count down the minutes to Super Bowl XXXVIII and the hometown New England Patriots head into the championship arena for the second time in three years, many have focused on the team's leader, coach Bill Belichick. How does he do it? What does he have that the others don't? What does it take to be a real leader?

The Boston Globe's business section asked GE's Jack Welch, Hancock's Dave D'Alessandro, and other CEO's what sets the Patriots' coach apart:

"He's done a brilliant job," said Stuart Sadick, who recruits executives for a living as managing partner of the Boston office for Heidrick & Struggles International Inc., a search firm.

[GE's] Welch and Sadick were two of the people we consulted to evaluate Belichick as a manager. Our other consultants were chief executives themselves or academics who study organizations and leadership. It helped that all were Patriot fans.

GO PATS!!!
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January 29, 2004

Reality or non-reality in the "Apprentice"
Posted by at 2:03 PM

I am unequivocably not a fan of the reality TV craze that's sweeping our world, but today's Boston Globe has a story on The Apprentice's Omarosa Manigault-Stallworth an Africa-American contestant, that caught my interest. While her competitors have labeled her "shrew","detached from reality"," and "playing the race card" Manigault-Stallworth's response has been to suggest that they "can't handle working with a strong black woman."

The story reminded me of a similar conversation I had once with a colleague about that workplace paradox where men are viewed as "decisive, commanding, admirable" and conversely women are viewed as "uptight, controlling, (insert expletive that begins with a 'b')" if they both display the same level of ambition, passion, and assertiveness.

And if you haven't seen it yet, don't forget to visit the home page and vote in Doug's Apprentice-oriented poll.
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January 28, 2004

I've had 150 jobs
Posted by Jason Butler at 12:47 PM

I just saw this over on the Fast Company blog: Emma Gold has had over 150 jobs in her career.

My 150 jobs may be astonishing to some. What I find astonishing is someone who works eight hours a day, five days a week, year in year out, in a job they hate but are too scared to try something else. You may have to wander in the wilderness for a while, but for some of us, it's the only way to the Promised Land.

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Startup Skills
Posted by Jason Butler at 12:46 PM

Here is an weblog for people interested in starting their own company. All sorts of interesting items within.
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The Cheating Culture
Posted by Jason Butler at 12:44 PM

I'm currently reading The Cheating Culture, which is a fascinating book about how much of our system is set-up -- intentionally or not -- to reward those who break the rules.

The author has a weblog on the topic, an extremely interesting read.
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Another way to volunteer
Posted by Jason Butler at 12:43 PM

Still out of work? Consider giving some time to local charities, donating the skills you already have, and maybe learning some new ones.

Here's a local example of a Skills Bank, from our friends at Boston Cares.
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The Brain Drain and the election
Posted by Jason Butler at 12:41 PM

Robert Cringley has a take on how offshoring must be one of the critical issues in this fall's presidential election.

In the 1950s and '60s in England, there was a phenomenon they called the "brain drain," which was the mass emigration of scientists and engineers to the United States.  The UK was still suffering from World War II, which had a much greater effect on that country's economy than on that of the U.S. Americans and even many younger people from Britain have little understanding of how difficult it was for that country to recover after the war.  The war ended in 1945, but food rationing continued in some form in the UK until 1954, and foreign exchange restrictions remained in place well into the 1960s.  The package holiday industry was invented solely because it was the only way to have a vacation in sunny Spain when you were only allowed to take £25 in cash out of the country.  Against this austere economic landscape, America with its big cars and big salaries and technical industries with big ambitions looked to be the place to go.  We as a nation benefited immensely from this migration as European science gave us the bomb and took us to the moon.  Europe and the UK, in turn, did not particularly benefit from this technical exodus, which hurt their local industries and local economies.

That was then and this is now, and while America remains a country of great technical capability, that capability is being compromised by a new kind of brain drain as we simply allow our local industries to fall apart.  Send enough technical work to India or China, and what once was the engineering department ends up working down at Home Depot.  The industries that are being particularly affected are information technology, telecommunications, and aerospace.  These are also the only U.S. industries that in the 1990s produced substantial trade surpluses.  We are shipping overseas the only manufacturing work that still makes money for America.

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Don't worry about the fruits. They'll come on their own.
Posted by Richard Cook at 10:09 AM

As a companion piece to Dean's post, this article in Wired magazine visits India and how they view the current job situation between the US and India.

Aparna Jairam isn't trying to steal your job. That's what she tells me, and I believe her. But if Jairam does end up taking it - and, let's face facts, she could do your $70,000-a-year job for the wages of a Taco Bell counter jockey - she won't lose any sleep over your plight. When I ask what her advice is for a beleaguered American programmer afraid of being pulled under by the global tide that she represents, Jairam takes the high road, neither dismissing the concern nor offering soothing happy talk. Instead, she recites a portion of the 2,000-year-old epic poem and Hindu holy book the Bhagavad Gita: "Do what you're supposed to do. And don't worry about the fruits. They'll come on their own."

Wired 12.02: The New Face of the Silicon Age
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January 26, 2004

On the other side of the fence
Posted by at 3:12 PM

It's a pretty well-established fact that we are losing jobs overseas, in particular to places like India, which represent the epicenter of the IT outsourcing revolution. But as Naeem Mohaiemen, a native of Bangledesh writes on Alternet.org, there is a darker side of the outsourcing revolution no one is yet talking about.

Outsourcing is an incredibly complex economic and ethical issue, with winners and losers on both sides. Yes, why shouldn't Indians (and by extension, my native Bangladesh) have a chance to improve their living standards through hard work? On the other hand, as thousands of jobs are lost in the West during the present recession, much of the blame will fall on outsourcing. But free trade means the flow goes both ways. If the West demands open access to global markets for its exports, doesn't the Third World have the right to demand free access to labor markets?

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Joel on Resumes
Posted by Jason Butler at 11:53 AM

A small-business owner gives some advice on writing your resume so that it doesn't get immediately deleted.

Some of [these guidelines] may sound pretty superficial. Indeed, what we're really looking for when we look at résumés is someone who is passionate and successful at whatever they try to do. We like people who are passionate about software. Writing a shareware app when you're a teenager is just as good a qualification to us as getting into MIT. This is your life story, and by the time you're applying for a job it's probably too late to change that.

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¡hombre de la helada! caiga el oro verde
Posted by at 10:29 AM

Jason just returned from a trip out to San Diego for what he claims was a conference, business trip and vacation rolled in one. But I now know the real reason for his left-coast jaunt, his recent increased use of acronyms in unusual circumstances, his "hey, you talkin' to me?" swagger. He was really out there interviewing to become a "Guac Cop".

They call it green gold. "When the Super Bowl comes, there is going to be thievery," Mr. Luce said. "People want guacamole."

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January 23, 2004

. . .and the bad news
Posted by Douglas Eisenhart at 1:20 PM

Ugh:

Massachusetts' unemployment rate rose to meet the national rate of 5.7 percent in December, breaking a nine-year streak of registering a lower monthly jobless rate than the nation, according to new figures from the Division of Employment and Training.

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Good news
Posted by Douglas Eisenhart at 12:39 PM

More positive economic signs, from today's Boston Globe:

An improving job market and increasing consumer spending lifted a key measure of future economic activity in December to its highest level ever, a private business group reported yesterday.

The 0.2 percent gain in the Conference Board's composite index of leading economic indicators met analysts' expectations -- and coincided with fresh government unemployment data that also suggested the economic recovery is solidifying.

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January 22, 2004

Doing what you love -- for six figures
Posted by at 10:10 AM

CNN/Money has revived its Six-figure Jobs series, with the latest installment looking at occupations other than the usual suspects, e.g. doctors, lawyers or celebrities.

...not everyone in the fields covered commands paychecks over $100,000 – only those with enough experience and talent and who, typically, live in markets where their skills are in highest demand. That is, the jobs that command six figures are almost never easy money. That's why, as with any job, it's important that the work be a reward unto itself.

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Spending for R&D in Mass. is on rise
Posted by Douglas Eisenhart at 9:19 AM

From the Boston Globe, a good sign for the local tech economy and job market:

Federal funding for research and development in Massachusetts, fueled by a rebound in defense spending, is rising, according to a report by the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative.

Read the brief.

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Backlash looms as white-collar jobs leave US
Posted by Douglas Eisenhart at 9:08 AM

Part of the news that has emerged during the past couple of years' economic slump has been about the loss of jobs to foreign countries. The rise in the long-term unemployment rate, some labor market experts argue, has partially to do with a structural change in our economy that includes a permament outsourcing of jobs - not just blue collar - overseas. Now the trend may be turning into a hot button issue in a presidential election year:

Executives from Silicon Valley to Wall Street are adamant that shifting white-collar jobs from the United States to developing countries is good business, but a backlash is brewing.
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Outsourcing critics say Americans have been complacent about the loss of technology jobs to overseas workers since the trend began in the late 1990s. But with elections in both the United States and India, they believe that 2004 could be a turning point.

Read the piece from the Boston Globe.

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January 21, 2004

Analyzing the analysis
Posted by at 10:32 AM

The New York Times' David Leonhardt asks: "Is the job market improving more quickly than most people realize?"
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January 19, 2004

Tech reality check
Posted by at 10:54 AM

We do a lot of blogging here about the tech outsourcing issue but a new Forrester Research report suggests that all the stories we've been reading about tech going overseas may be somewhat over-exaggerated by the media (mon dieu! Say it isn't so).

While it's still uncertain whether job outsourcing will become a major issue in the Presidential election, IT executives are going on the outsourcing offensive as the government ponders whether to start limiting what jobs go where, and offers its own report on the state of technology in '04. Meanwhile, The Boston Globe's own Hiawatha Bray offers his two cents on what's hot and not in tech, and where to look for growth.
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The true believers quiz
Posted by Douglas Eisenhart at 10:02 AM

From today's Globe, @ Large columnist Scott Kirsner notes the uptick in tech hiring but also notes that, after the recent hard times, only the diehard techies remain in the market. Further, he offers a test to determine your true colors:

The shakeout has separated the gold rushers from the true believers -- industry veterans and dedicated newcomers who thrive on trying to bring new technologies to market. "It's a much smaller community, but it's people who feel, `This is what we do,' " says Ed Takacs, CEO of the Cambridge recruiting firm High Tech Ventures. "The people who don't have the backgrounds in technology aren't in it anymore."

Are you one of the diehards? Or an especially tenacious gold rusher? The utterly unscientific quiz below will supply the answer. Using Google to research the answers constitutes cheating -- but a very resourceful kind of cheating.

Read the article and take the quiz. Then - and no cheating now! - check your answers and compute your score to find out if you are one of the "true believers".

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January 16, 2004

Techies Left Behind
Posted by Richard Cook at 1:22 PM

Here's another story about IT jobs being relocated overseas. This guy was a factory worker in the 70's when his job was being outsourced, so he went into IT like he was told, and now 23 years later is being outsourced again.

The article touches a bit on The Organization for the Rights of American Workers (TORAW) group. They're the ones who are lobbying for tighter limits on foreign worker visas, etc. I'm a proponent of free trade and work, so I don't think that's the right way to go about things, even though I work in the tech field.

New Haven Advocate: Techies Left Behind
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Working wounded: Adding insight to injury
Posted by at 11:12 AM

Tired of people whining about their wounds at work? Well you've come to the right place claims Bob Rosner's Working Wounded site which attempts to "cut through the hoo-haw and give you solid advice on a variety of workplace issues" facing workers, job seekers and executives.

Besides the Fast Company article below, the site travels the working world spectrum from the serious to the silly. Rosner posts items like his regular column that gets picked up by ABC News, on topics like how to start your own business to how to handle a jerk at work to an interview with Dilbert creator Scott Adams.

WW: What impact has Dilbert had on the workplace?

SA: People tell me that it has a dampening effect on management stupidity. Bosses are less likely to introduce a new program that they know could become fodder for next week's Dilbert comic.

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Fess up, fido
Posted by at 10:54 AM

Fast Company's Marshall Goldsmith on the phenom of derriere-kissing the boss, how to identify if you are a culprit, and how corporate leaders can break the behavior in their own backyards.

I use an irrefutable test with my clients to show how we unknowingly encourage sucking up. I ask a group of leaders the following question: "How many of you own a dog that you love?" Big smiles cross these executives' faces as they wave their hands in the air. They beam as they tell me the names of their always-faithful mutts. Then we have a contest. I ask them, "At home, who gets most of your unabashed affection?" The multiple choices: one, your husband, wife, or partner; two, your kids; or three, your dog. More than 80% of the time, the winner is the dog.

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January 15, 2004

Retirees face pinch on benefits
Posted by Douglas Eisenhart at 3:13 PM

As if the cold weather these days were not enough to put the hurt on older folks, the cost of getting sick - or even paying not to get sick (aka, health insurance) - has just gone up again, this time for those on fixed or limited income - retirees:

Companies are drastically increasing what their retired employees pay for healthcare benefits, and many are eliminating them altogether, according to a comprehensive study on employer provisions for retiree health coverage.
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For baby boomers approaching retirement, the outlook is more troubling. Ten percent of employers surveyed eliminated health plans last year for workers who will retire in the future. . . The trend is expected to accelerate and will be devastating. . .

Ouch. Bad news for us baby boomers, nearing retirement. Should this seem like a distant prospect to you twenty-something, entry-level types, think again. If you don't salt it away now, it could come back to haunt you later. Better get ready, or you, too, might find yourself left out in the cold.

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Defense contracts good for local firms
Posted by Jason Butler at 1:29 PM

The uptick in defense contracts is creating jobs at local companies.

Up and down the region's roads, along corridors such as Route 3 and Interstate 495, technological know-how and the push for innovation have made the region an important source of the cutting-edge material sought by the Defense Department and other agencies to fill today's high-tech needs in combating threats to the United States.

As a result, the companies are reaping billions of dollars in government contracts to provide the latest in equipment and systems.

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Ethics in broadcasting?
Posted by Jason Butler at 6:52 AM

Today's Boston Globe reports Gary LaPierre, veteran WBZ morning news anchor, was complaining about the cold from his home in Florida.

Asked whether he thought he was misleading people into thinking he's shivering along with them, LaPierre said he doesn't see a need to share his whereabouts with his audience since it doesn't affect the quality of the broadcast. "I don't think it's being disingenuous," he said. "I'm not lying to anybody."

During his 5 to 9:30 a.m. shift yesterday, the anchor did make several comments about the weather. "It doesn't get any worse than this," he said at one point. "When do we get a break?" he exclaimed at another.

Do you think this is an ethics violation?
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January 14, 2004

Another blog worth reading
Posted by Jason Butler at 1:06 PM

It looks like Business 2.0 has a new weblog.
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Gen Y'ers come of age
Posted by at 11:35 AM

Some encouraging news about our nation's youth. Despite the (perhaps unfair) perception that Generation Y'ers want everything but don't necessarily want to work for it -- comfortable in knowing mommy and daddy will provide them the means to buy whatever (insert expensive object of desire here) is hot today -- more teens are finding jobs give them self-esteem, buying power and independence.
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January 13, 2004

From the odd jobs file...
Posted by at 10:43 AM

NPR Marketplace's archive of short vignettes with people who've found their calling in unusual niches such as Flavorist, Planet Seeker, Button man.
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January 12, 2004

An' up thru the ground came a bubblin' crude...Boston tech, jobs that is
Posted by at 1:52 PM

The Globe's @Large columnist, Scott Kirsner, writes today that the market for tech jobs is starting to percolate again after a lengthy hiatus.

More techie news in our technology channel.
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January 9, 2004

The Big Help!
Posted by Jason Butler at 5:04 PM

The Big Help is Sunday.

Pick up your Boston Sunday Globe, pick up your highlighter.

Remember the new economy? Jobs'a'plenty? Hope boundless? Was it ever actually like that, or is what we feel nothing but (to quote Jello Biafra) nostalgia for an age that never existed?

The past few years have been rough. But, there may be hope.

My office here at Morrissey Boulevard is right next to the sales floor. All day long for the past couple weeks, I've heard our sales folks talking to employers from all over the region, employers who are finally starting to hire after a long freeze, technology employers whose startups didn't exist a few weeks ago, little employers who want to be in The Big Help.

I've been here for a couple of years; this is the biggest Big Help I've seen.

Is it possible that the tunnel may actually have an end? And that end may have a light?

Good luck.

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The phones don't stop. And I don't care.
Posted by Jason Butler at 12:57 PM

Salon runs a first-person narrative of life in a North Carolina phone center.

The phone does not stop. Problems, catalogs, orders, ringing, ringing, ringing. The phone does not stop. It's easy enough if you're young and this is your first job. It's a way to pay the rent and get some experience, a stepping stone. But if you've got a college degree and talent and the curse of self-awareness, the job scrapes at your soul, call by call, day by day.

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Levis - Made in China
Posted by at 11:13 AM

Levi Strauss Co., an icon of Americana as well known as apple pie, and a symbol of U.S. manufacturing strength, closed its last two U.S. sewing plants in San Antonio Thursday.

Levi Strauss spokesman Jeff Beckman said the 150-year-old company was making a delayed but unavoidable business decision.

"We tried to do our best to maintain manufacturing in the United States, but we have to be competitive to survive as a company," he said.

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January 8, 2004

Not just a temporary lift?
Posted by Douglas Eisenhart at 5:09 PM

BusinessWeek says temp hiring appears to be maintaining a steady rise, a good sign for the whole job market:

Research by Daniel Sullivan, a senior economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago and others shows that an uptick in temp jobs precedes an increase in overall employment by three to six months. And with temp jobs beginning to grow last May, sure enough, total nonfarm payrolls began to inch up in September.

The fact that temp employment has picked up since bodes well for more jobs overall in 2004.

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January 7, 2004

Czars, evangalists, gods & divas
Posted by at 8:02 PM

If you worked at a startup during the Dot-bomb era, you probably know that it wasn't unusual to find oneself working beside talented people with whimsical titles like Production Czar, Content Diva or Technology Evangalist.

Well, it looks like those wild-and-crazy titles are making a comeback. Meet Martin Pichinson, liquidator of nearly 150 failed startups since 1999, "Doctor of Reality".
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Tech firms defend moving jobs overseas
Posted by Douglas Eisenhart at 4:02 PM

More on the overseas job shift, which promises to really heat up as an issue in this presidential election year:

Worried about possible government reaction to the movement of U.S. technology jobs overseas, leading American computer companies are defending recent shifts in employment to Asia and elsewhere as necessary for future profits and warning policy makers against restrictions.

In a report released Wednesday, the companies said government efforts to preserve American jobs through limits on overseas trade would backfire and "could lead to retaliation from our trading partners and even an all-out trade war."

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Dealing with information pollution
Posted by Jason Butler at 10:27 AM

Jakob Neilsen gives some advice on cleaning up information pollution so that you may get more work done.

Better prioritization, fewer interruptions, and concentrated information that's easy to find and manage helps people become more productive and stop wasting their colleagues' time.

One of the smartest things I ever did was going into Lotus Notes and turning off the email alert function. Now I only check email every half-hour or so, and I get much more actual work done.
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January 5, 2004

First tech goes offshore, now taxes, testing and billing
Posted by at 12:02 PM

So you thought IT workers were the only ones losing out to overseas professionals? Apparently, tax accounting, cancer pathology testing and medical billing are also among those jobs going over to India these days.

The reason lies in the numbers; accountants in the United States typically earn $4,000 a month. In places like India it's closer to $400, says David Wyle, CEO and founder of SurePrep, a tax-outsourcing firm based in southern California that's employed more than 200 accountants in Bombay and Ahmedabad, India...Xiptax, of Braintree, Mass., is another tax firm that's moved much work overseas for "a whole number of reasons," besides money, says CEO Mark Albrecht.

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All fun and games until someone loses his job
Posted by Jason Butler at 10:23 AM

The Boston Globe's Hiawatha Bray tackles a subject near and dear to my heart: blogging can cost you your job.

Last October, [Microsoft employee Michael Hanscom] published in his blog a photo of a pallet of Apple Macintosh computers being delivered to Microsoft headquarters. The following week Hanscom was fired for allegedly violating a confidentiality agreement he'd signed when Microsoft hired him.

On the other hand, Robert Scoble talks about how Microsoft places no "prior restraint" on his postings.

Scoble's blog offers an insider's view on current and future Microsoft products, unfettered by any restrictions except those he places on himself.

''I have absolutely no prior restraint on what I publish,'' said Scoble. That's why his blog, and those published by about 100 other Microsoft employees, attract thousands of readers in search of reliable inside information on the company.

The laws of etiquette are all very unclear in this case. I've had my own blog for three years (no blatant self-link, though I'm easy to find if you really want to) and we've had the Job Blog for a year. In that time, I've only had a few questionable calls. Like Scoble, the only prior restraint is my own good judgment; still, it's a fine line sometimes.

I seeing blogging about work in the same light as dating people from work: great if it works out, but with high potential to become a CLM, a career-limiting move.
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