Glass Door is a not-yet-quite-relevant web site where people can check out people’s opinions of companies and get salary info on specific positions at those companies. It’s a neat trick: they only let you look if you reveal  some tidbits from your own past and current employers.

But it’s not going to really, really work until a lot more unethical schmucks like me input more info. (Hint: JobKnobber editor’s salary = zilch).

In any case, this is an interesting if scientifically/statistically meaningless list of Glass Door’s top 50 for 2009. Congrats to GM for the number 1 spot! No, not General Motors . . General Mills! Yay cereal!

Latest addiction

Tons of updates via twitter, The Media is Dying has the depressing latest on things happening in media. Links to interesting articles as well as layoffs of the moment. Distracting. Depressing. Can’t look away.

200 Jobs, Ranked

This is a pretty interesting exercise: JobsRated.com has some fun lists: 10 best jobs in America, 10 worst jobs in America, a  comprehensive ranking of 200 different jobs, and a 10 most satisfying careers.

Interestingly,  they include methodlology  . . . which, truthfully, I haven’t bothered to read.

Even more noteworthy: “paralegal” outranks “lawyer” on the 200 list, respectively coming in at 17 overall (stress level a mere 23!) and82 overall (stress level 64. Geez!)

Every job description on the 200 list includes links to find the job title; I guess it’s yet another job clearance house. But with interesting pieces like this, I have some hope it’s less cumbersome and, um, bullshit prone than crap like monster, hotjobs and, increasingly, craigslist.

Finally, Some Employment-related news

Because obviously there’s been none since August. Thus my absence.

Ah, truthfully, I wasn’t really sure what I wanted to do with this site.

But I paid for my goddamn domain name, so I’m gonna make that ten bucks worth something.

I’m gonna get back to talking about work stuff.

If You Ain’t Cheatin’ . . .

Ahh, corporate malfeasance. My favorite sport. Al the more delicious when the ‘athlete’ is defrauding the public interest or a non-profit.

The Chron has the story of Greg Colley, who allegedly stole almost $4 million from a non-profit agency charged with the lofty duties of running a garage in Golden Gate Park. Colley, the former CFO of the Music Community Concourse Partnership, could serve more than 14 year.

Poor guy must’ve broken two mirrors.

Unabomber Looks Back on Career, Complains

Perhaps Theodore ‘Ted’ Kaczynski, a.k.a. The Unabomber, wasn’t such a fan of show & tell as a lad.

Because he sure as hell isn’t now.

According to the New York Times, the rightly-in-jail-forever, domestic terror-committing, murdering Unabomber wrote a letter of complaint regarding the placement of his former 10 x 12-foot cabin within a display at the Newseum, a, well, duh, museum devoted to the news in Washington D.C.

The Old Grey Lady’s short article sez: “Mr. Kaczynski’s complaint focused on the public interest generated by the F.B.I.’s loan of the cabin to the Newseum”

See, Teddy, had you not bombed the fuck out of a bunch of stuff — an estimated 16 bombs, injuring 23 and killing 3– this would be a moot point. Talk about “a stitch in time.”

No, you want to talk weird? The Unacomplainer should be railing against the fact that a WEB VERSION OF HIS HUT is on the Newseum’s Web Site. He’s probably unaware of it; they don’t genreally let imprisoned douchebags access the net, IIRC. But if he could, he’d be less than thrilled. The informative, interactive Web display aims to provide we visitors with “a closer view at the life of a mad hermit.” Mad Hermit? An accurate description, I suppose, but doesn’t that make this horrible man seam rather charming and roguish?

Observe for yourself — an unwanted tribute to an odd career choice.  What did he expect — a gold watch?

Shaken to the Core: ‘Insightful’ Article on Workplace Rudeness!

Well blow me down. According to some article from some news service, when people are treated rudely in the workplace, it’s a bad, bad thing.

The headshrinker quoted in the piece claims that “75 percent of workers say they’re treated rudely at least once a year” and that it harms workplace productivity. Why, the poor dears may up and quit? The horror.

Seriously, if only that were the case. Why, simply be <i>ruuuuude</i> and your sensitive little incompetents will get out of your hair? I wish!

Speaking as a manager, I’ll tell you I respect someone who calls me on my rudeness than someone who simpers about it and complains behind my back.

The fact is that sometimes worker bees need a little kick in the ass, and if they can’t take it, they should find a new situation. Frankly, in the uncertain economic times, if someone saves me the expense of giving them a layoff package, so much the better.

JobKnobber: We’re Here to Help

I suppose I had to come out and say it: JobKnobber is a place where you can share your nightmare work stories, your career marketplace analysis, amusing workplace anecdotes, rants, or similar to drone@jobknobber.com . Or just post them in the comments section.

We’ve had a few submissions, even in this WP-beta period (likely moving to another host by Sept), but, while we intend to use them all, they are not a representative cross-section. We want to thrill you, make you laugh, AND horrify you.

Because shooting the shit about work is fun when you don’t work with (or, frankly, even know) the people your talking to. When all the gloves can come off.

Screw You, Craigslist

A reader offers a rare moment of clarity on the job market as it pertains to online job-seeking services. I wouldn’t know a thing about searching for positions nor, frankly, hiring. I have people that deal with both (though my headhunter landed me here, as CEO of Jobknobber, so I may have to deign to pick up the phone to at least find a new one of those). In any case, I admire this young fan’s vitriol, even if I have no way to judge his claims:

“I friggin’ love it when a good publication the the Wall Street Journal writes a puff piece on something that they should be turning a critical eye to. “Looking For a Job? Try Craigslist” screams a headline from the career journal page.

We know Craigslist is a classifieds killer, and that brand of assassination isn’t limited to old cardigans and last-generation video games consoles. No, it’s for jobs too. Let me tell you something in all seriousness: in my 8 years as a hiring manager I almost exclusively hired from CL — even when I interviewed candidates from elsewhere, like sector specialty sites, the response and responders were a class above. And the ads are cheap cheap cheap (I’m in San Francisco, where job ads have been $75 all along; not sure about other cities).

Whatever hotjobs, monster, and all those other complicated job banks think, too much technology is just that: too much. This is job stuff; we want simplicity, not signing up for alerts and trying to shoehorn ourselves into some f-cking sector or another that doesn’t quite fit.

So why am I pissed at CL? Well, there’s little monitoring. Little accountability. Community flagging does not work. I’m ready to move on in my career, and I’ve been looking. Hard. Crafting cover letters carefully. Spending good time on them, like I know hiring managers like candidates to. Almost every job I’ve applied for on CL in the past week has been a scam that redirects you to Monster. You spend all this time only to get an email auto-response saying that you need to register for Monster, then, once signed up, reference job X, which doesn’t end up existing.

After the first time, I was upset. Second time, I was pissed. Third time I figured, ‘Why the fuck isn’t Craigslist, which is undoubtedly making money hand over fist, in direct proportion to the job listings money that newspapers have lost, doing a little due diligence in making sure folks that have, say, three adds flagged and removed can’t post ads again? I’m at the end of my rope!”

There you have it — the frustrating world of job hunting via Craigslist. Sounds like it’s good for employers that are dealing in good faith, and online job banks with silly names that are dealing in bad faith. Not so good for the “end-user” when there’s no backup from the people offering the product.

Again, my personal knowledge in this is tenuous — any readers care to back him up (or tear him down? Craigslist catfight, perchance?

I Hope You’ve Left Enough Room For My Fist . . .

Because I’m going to ram it into your bank account!

California’s chief executive officer, the curiously-named Arnold Schwarzenegger (yes, just like the prominent actor from the 1980s) wants to cut state-workers’ pay to minimum wage until such a time that those gadabouts in the legislative body pass the state budget. They were legally obligated to pass a budget on July 1.

Our response to this: state employees make more than minimum wage? Is this why it’s so hard to find a good employee these days?