What not to wear to an interview...

I've read a couple of articles recently about the changes in fashion and how they impact on how candidates should, and should not, present themselves in an interview. One of the articles talked about a lady in England who was told by a career counselor that she'd have a better chance of getting a job with a bag over her head than to show up displaying all of the tattoos she had. The lady's response was that her tattoos were reflective of her lifestyle and who she was as a person and she shouldn't have to change. Who's right?

The article, by Suzanne Lucas (AKA "Evil HR Lady"), argued that lifestyle choices come with consequences and that many traditional companies would not hire someone who doesn't look the part for the position they are seeking to fill. The article pointed out that "By and large, sales people are better looking than other folk because — surprise! — they take better care of themselves and understand that appearances are important." I had never thought of that, but I think they may be on to something. I know our marketing representatives on any given day dress far better than the rest of us at Pinnacol because they are directly meeting with our customers and need to portray  a very professional image. They are the face of Pinnacol to many of our customers.  For them appearance really matters because it makes a difference in the impression our customers have of us.

Some of you are scratching your heads and wondering why I am wasting words on such an 'obvious' topic. Well, like common sense which is unfortunately not all that common, what may be obvious to some is clearly not obvious to others. We get thousands of expressions of interest from candidates each year and I'm fortunate to be able to interview several hundred of them. Over the years I've seen almost everything in candidate attire, from blue-jeaned candidates meeting with suit and tie interview panels, tennis shoes with professional dress, to assorted piercings, tattoos, and other body art.

From a recruiter's perspective anything out of the ordinary is a distraction and from a candidate's perspective its probably not a good idea to distract from what you really want to present about yourself - that you can do the job.

I had a candidate many years ago that I'll never forget. This was a young lady that came in with a tattoo of Calvin and Hobbes (a wonderful  comic strip, alas,  no longer available, about a young boy - Calvin - and his imaginary tiger - Hobbes) on a part of her anatomy that as a recruiter I don't usually spend too much time staring at. To say it was a distraction is an understatement, and to this day I think to myself that Calvin and Hobbes never looked so good. Distraction aside, this young lady proved to be a good candidate and actually got the job we had open. And yes, she was smart enough (or someone pulled her aside and told her) to cover up C&H while at work.

At Pinnacol we work in a business casual environment every day with dress down days (casual days) on Fridays. That said, you won't see a lot of tattoos, body piercings, etc. during the work day. Every company has its own culture. As a candidate I'll finish with a last bit of excellent advice from the article mentioned above: before you go for a job interview, make an effort to find out what's appropriate for the company you are applying with.

A conversation with one of our Web Developers

Over the next several weeks we will be adding a Web Developer to our On-line team. This position will be filled with a contract to hire candidate which is a little different from the way we normally bring people into our organization.

Contract to hire means that we will be going through one of our vendors who source IT professionals for contract assignments. Unlike a normal contract, this one will allow the candidate, if successful, to convert to regular Pinnacol employment as their contract nears an end. Why bring someone on this way? Primarily because it allows us the opportunity to judge the contractor's work product before committing to the actual hiring decision. This is a fairly common practice in company IT groups and we have successfully used this method in the past with other technical positions.

I had a chance to sit down with Kevin, one of the technical wizards on our on-line team, to get his observations about the work this position will be doing, the nature of the team, and the skills we will be looking for:

Job Announcement for UNIX System Administrator

Here's a unique opportunity for an experienced System Administrator to join our team. We are looking for someone having a minimum of 3-5 years as a Solaris Systems Administrator. Experience supporting Oracle in a 3-Tier server environment, Legato Backup Software, AppWorx and Veritas Files Systems a plus. Knowledge of LINUX and administering Lawson and Microstrategy desired. Our System Administrator is responsible for designing, implementing, and maintaining UNIX systems supporting 600 users in a Solaris/Oracle configuration. For consideration please complete an expression of interest via our company website.

When was the last time you had breakfast with your CEO?



Ken teaching
Junior Achievement at a
local school; I had no idea
about his other teaching
background...

 When was the last time you had a conversation with your CEO? At most American businesses its a rare occurrence for an employee to spend much, if any, time with the man or woman heading up their organization. At Pinnacol our CEO, Ken Ross, regularly sits down with employees through his Coffee Talk With Ken series. This morning I had the opportunity, along with a couple of my fellow employees, to chat with Ken on issues ranging from the state of the economy, health care reform, the upcoming legislative session and election, to our company's financial performance. Ken's experience covers both a legal background as well as having headed up the New York state workers' compensation fund. I always learn something new at these sessions which is why I make a point of attending several each year, and today I found out that Ken also has a teaching background having taught insurance classes at the City College of New York. He also indicated that he may have the chance to do some guest lectures with Regis University through their M.B.A. program.

These sessions also give Ken the chance to meet and hear from his employees. This morning he met Curt, one of our newest employees who started with us in July. Curt mentioned that its a fairly steep learning curve upon joining Pinnacol. One of the things I always recommend to new employees is that they attend one of Ken's sessions sooner rather than later and I wish more employees, new and seasoned veterans alike, took advantage of the opportunity.

One thing that always has impressed me with the CEO's I have seen at the helm of Pinnacol Assurance is that they seem to be well grounded with a firm grasp of reality. In this morning's meeting Ken didn't profess to have a crystal ball and he readily acknowledged the uncertainty that the future holds. The nation is in the midst of economic upheaval, Colorado's political climate is up in the air, and the only certain thing apart from death and taxes is that no one on this planet knows for sure what 2011 is going to bring. As another employee, Wendy, pointed out, insurance is all about managing risk, and these sessions with Ken are a nice touch point to get some reassurance that the organization is on track to deal with whats potentially on the horizon.

Its not personal... Its business

I've blogged about The Apprentice T.V. show before, and happened to catch the season premier last night. This season's special twist is that all of the contestants are unemployed. They actually showed one contestant phoning in to his state's unemployment office during the show to do his bi-weekly check-in.

The assignment the contestants were given was to decorate office space - a pretty mundane assignment in my humble opinion. The two teams, men versus women, were both about as dysfunctional workgroups as I could possibly imagine. Even before they had found out which team had won, they were  turning on each other like wolves fighting over scraps. I understand that this makes for interesting viewing but I wondered if the circumstances these contestants found themselves in - being unemployed - was bringing out the worst in these folks. The teams, and I use that term loosely, were brutal in their assessments of the project manager's leadership skills. I don't know if there is such a term as 'followership' but these folks clearly didn't have it.

In my work at Pinnacol I see a lot of employee satisfaction surveys and results. One of the questions these surveys always seem to ask is around the notion of "we're all in this together". Mr. Trump and his management style seem oriented toward the master-slave relationship. The hapless young lady who was the project manager on the losing team was fired not so much for her performance as her apparent inability to fend off the attacks of those working for (not with) her and for not being able to control such a rowdy bunch of wanna-be Donald's.

Pinnacol has been arranged around multi-functional teams since the late '90's. We know that we succeed or fail as a group. It seems obvious to us that the minute we start pointing fingers at our team members instead of helping each other we're almost doomed to fail, but an alien from another world who watched last night's show would think American business  is completely driven by "me" rather than "we". If you watched the show you probably noticed one lady who went above and beyond in her criticism of her project manager to the point that even Mr. Trump commented on her disloyalty. I sympathize with the rest of the group that will continue to work with this individual. Good entertainment perhaps, but the antithesis of good team work.

By contrast, I was watching the talent show series "America's Got Talent" which had its season finale on Wednesday. There were a handful of finalists any one of which I would have been thrilled to see win. While there could only be one winner, they were all worthy. Hard work and sacrifice, real passion for what they were doing, and accountability for their own performance were the common traits. If Jackie Evancho, the 10-year old with the amazing voice, faltered on a certain note in front of an audience of millions there would be no one else to point the finger at. That's a harsh but incredibly valuable lesson for anyone, especially such a young child, to learn.

I may tune in from time to time to catch more of The Apprentice, but if the current crop of contestants reflects the current state of  what's best in American business then I'm afraid recovery is going to be a long time coming.

 

New job announcement for Spanish Services Liaison!

We have just put up on our company website an exciting new opportunity. We are looking for a Spanish Services Liaison to provide enhanced business communication for the benefit of our Spanish-speaking customers.

This position has two primary responsibilities - to support, train and oversee the development of our Spanish Services Representatives and to create, translate, and maintain Spanish language materials, including web-based, for the benefit of our Spanish-speaking customers.

Successful candidates for this position must be fluent (able to read, write, and speak) in both English and Spanish and be able to translate in both a spoken and written format between the two languages in a manner appropriate to the target audience. We do assess bilingual skills as part of our interviewing process. A Bachelor’s degree in Spanish, Communications, or related field along with in-depth professional experience with the Hispanic culture and 1-2 years interpretation training experience or similar teaching background is required.  For immediate consideration, please submit an expression of interest on-line.

Here is a Spanish version of the announcement:

Pinnacol Assurance, el asegurador más grande de compensación de trabajadores de Colorado, esta en búsqueda de un Enlace de Servicios en Español que proporcione comunicación de negocios para el beneficio de nuestros clientes Hispanohablantes. Esta posición tendrá dos responsabilidades primarias – proveer soporte, entrenar y supervisar el desarrollo de nuestros Representantes de Servicios en Español y crear, traducir, y mantener materiales en Español, incluyendo en la web, para el beneficio de nuestros clientes Hispanohablantes.  Es necesario hablar en los dos idiomas, Ingles y Español con fluidez (poder leer, escribir, y hablar) y traducir en forma hablada y escrita entre los dos idiomas en una manera apropiada para la audiencia objetiva.  Se requiere una Licenciatura en Español, Comunicaciones, o en una carrera relacionada, junto con una experiencia profesional profunda con la cultura Hispana y 1-2 años de experiencia con entrenamiento de interpretación o experiencia similar.  Para consideración inmediata, favor de solicitar en www.pinnacol.com

Biggest Loser comes to Pinnacol!

Unfortunately neither Bob or Jillian were available (if you were a contestant, which trainer would YOU prefer?), but some of our employees in our Corporate Services team thought it would be fun to have a Biggest Loser contest. Over a 12 week period our Pinnacol weight warriors are exercising and trying to eat smarter. They are also drinking flavored waters instead of soda and pop. I talked with Heather, who came up with the idea, and she told me they're in week 4 and as a group have already lost more than 60 pounds! And yes, just like on the show they do weekly weigh-ins. Those at the end who have lost the greatest percentage of weight will win cash prizes as well as the admiration of all the rest of us who gain weight just by looking at food. They've even got their manager Amanda participating.

The flavored water was intriguing to me as every day they have a different fruit or vegetable that they add. Everything from mangos and nectarines, to strawberries and oranges, rasberries, apples, lemon, and even cucumbers have been used to dazzle up their H2O. I tried the nectarine water and it was remarkably good. I'm pretty sure I'm glad to have missed when cucumber was the flavor of the day, though several employees told me it was really not that bad. One of the best outcomes so far has been the support of people who are not in the contest of those who are.

Pinnacol hosts Weight Watchers as well as lots of wellness resources including an on-site exercise room and fitness classes, but congratulations to Heather and the team for taking a great idea and turning it into tangible results! Given where they are in only week four, they'll likely lose as a group the equivalent of an entire person by the end of the 12 weeks. Now if I can only get Bob or Jillian to be MY personal trainer...