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Fast Company
6 hours ago
- General
- Fast Company
When the ‘fun' in ‘funemployment' fades away, the mental gymnastics kick in
I still wake up at 7:15 a.m. Not because I have a meeting. Or a commute. Or a list of deliverables that's longer than a CVS receipt. I'm up early because something about lying in bed while my corporate counterparts clock in makes me feel like I'm behind, even if there's no race I'm actively running. The day kicks off with the usual: matcha, oatmeal, a spin on the Peloton, and a shower. But then? Stillness. No Slack pings. No check-ins. No one asking for a 'quick sync' to 'circle back' so we can get our 'ducks in a row.' Just me, refreshing LinkedIn, wondering if today is the day a recruiter cannonballs into my DMs like Ron Burgundy. I launched this column five years ago as a mid-level marketing manager in Seattle—corporate's middle child, navigating microaggressions, vague feedback, and vibes that often felt . . . off. I wrote about working through a pandemic, watching my well-meaning white colleagues bumble through a so-called racial reckoning, and climbing org chart rungs while staying woke to the wonkiness of upper management. Back then, I wrote as The Only Black Guy in the Office. Now? I'm still him, but there's no office at all—unless you count the one in my spare bedroom. For the first time in a long time, I'm unemployed. There, I said it. I used to pray for times like this, imagining being unshackled from the chains of recurring standups, performance reviews, and a 27-tab document named 'Final_FINAL_V3_(1).' I'd see myself rewatching The Boondocks episodes on a random Tuesday afternoon, hitting up local museums during off-peak hours, day drinking with a pinky pointed toward the clouds. But since those first couple of weeks post-layoff, the 'fun' in 'funemployment' has hopped on a paper plane and gone MIA. I'm over the midday mimosas and matinees, especially now that I'm fresh out of severance dollars to spend and Severance episodes to binge. My savings and sense of purpose are each trending downward, dawg, without a namaste in sight. There's an odd grief that hits the moment your work account passwords go inactive. It's the coldest closure, like an ex changing the locks while you're still packing your things. Except here, your belongings are stored in a shared Google Drive and a Slack archive you'll never access again. I once thought I couldn't feel any more like an outsider. I was wrong. But that wasn't the only wake-up call. Things done changed for this era of job hunters. I'm learning the futility of cold applying, the scams targeting desperate job seekers, the absurdity of stuffing resumes with keywords to appease the bots. Even when I make it past the algorithm bouncers and land in front of an actual human, I wonder if the HBCU degree I worked so hard for is a reveal that invites bias before I've said a word. The hardest part of this all? It's not my obsessive clocking of banking apps and job boards, nor the dystopian friend-or-foe role of artificial intelligence in the application process. It's the identity shift with which I've only recently come to terms. When you've spent your entire career outworking self-doubt, imposter syndrome, and perfectionism, being unemployed feels like failure, even when it's not. Doesn't matter if it's due to a layoff, a budget cut, or a 'strategic realignment.' For years, my job was more than a source of income and fodder for my therapist. It was where I could be a rockstar in one conference room and a firefighter in the next. A place I could lift up others who looked like me and, when necessary, check those who didn't. If I'm keeping it a bean, it was validation. Now, with no decks to compile or KPIs to hit, I've had to sit in that stillness. I've had to create the structure in my days that I once dreaded. I've had to convince myself that the 'you're too talented to be in the market for long!' sentiments shared by friends and peers are sincere. This column has always been a pressure release valve—a space to process what it means to be Black and corporate and exhausted. I didn't realize how much I'd need that outlet again. Maybe even more now than before. So I'm brushing off the cobwebs and writing again. To make sense of this moment. To connect with folks who are navigating the same in-between. And to remind myself, and maybe you too, that being without a job doesn't mean being without value.
Daily Mail
04-08-2025
- Business
- Daily Mail
Aussie recruiter reveals why many bosses are refusing to hire Gen Z workers
An Aussie recruiter has sparked outrage by claiming many hiring managers won't hire anyone under 30 because they're 'lazy'. Specialist recruiter Tammie Ballis said the feedback she had received from companies was that workers over the age of 30 tend to have a stronger work ethic, and companies were avoiding Gen Z. 'I need to be transparent with you,' she said. 'I'm getting a lot of feedback from hiring managers that don't want to hire people that are under 30 because the ones that are over 30, have a better work ethic. 'I don't believe all young people are lazy and have a bad work ethic. 'I'm just saying what is happening at the moment.' Her comments sparked a firestorm of responses, with many Gen Zs saying they're simply less willing to accept low pay and toxic workplaces, unlike previous generations. 'We can't afford to live, buy houses and pay groceries and get other bills and we also don't tolerate abusive behaviour either,' one person wrote. 'I'll work weekends, longer hours when the culture and pay is good and reasonable. This generation will hold employers accountable for toxic work environments. We can't afford to rent a room let alone own a house, we're less inclined to go above and beyond because it's getting us nowhere,' said another. 'We will work hard to a degree but we will not be exploited nor tolerate toxic management.' But many agreed younger employees were often slow, lazy and lacked initiative. 'We are very relaxed with our expectations, it's literally pick/pack work,' one employer said. 'Most won't work a full week.' Another millennial said the new 22-year-old receptionist at their psychology office was 'very lazy' and didn't do the job she was hired to do. 'We only work one five-day week a month and there is a company Uber account we can use whenever,' they said. 'She misses phone calls, is late a lot. She is almost at the end of her probation so I doubt they will keep her, but this isn't the first time. We have had a few Gen Z staff and it's all the same; it's not their fault.' Meanwhile, another store manager said she preferred hiring young people because they were less problematic than older workers. 'Older employees who have been in the company for a long time or the same field have the mentality that they've been there longer so they don't have to do certain tasks and don't like change,' they said. 'I also personally don't hire older people as even though I'm a manager, because I'm younger than they are, in my experience they've taken that as an opportunity to tell me how to do my job.'
Irish Times
21-07-2025
- General
- Irish Times
Who answers the phone and says nothing? People under 25
The other day, a recruiter in the United States posted something online that quickly racked up an improbably large number of views. This was no rant about war, strife or US president Donald Trump. It was merely an observation made by a heavy phone user that many workers in their 20s now answer calls without saying 'hello', 'hi' or indeed anything at all. 'I can hear their breathing and the background noise, but they wait for you to say hello first,' said the perplexed recruiter, adding she was talking about pre-arranged calls made at precisely the time the silent breathers had themselves chosen. Also, she was calling from a phone number she had sent them, so they could tell who would be on the line, having just sent an email reminder about the upcoming call. Like others who saw her post, I found this news baffling. I realise a lot of young people find phone use unnerving. I understand this may be because they grew up without a landline in the home, so never got the free phone training from their parents that the rest of us took for granted. I can almost imagine how years of Snapchatting might lead one to feel anxious about a phone call coming out of the blue with no appointment. Almost. But who picks up a call and says nothing? The answer, it seems, is people yet to hit 25. A remarkable 40 per cent of British people aged between 18 and 24 think it is acceptable to answer a phone call without any form of greeting, a UK YouGov poll found last year. Only 27 per cent of those aged between 25 and 34 feel the same way, and support plummets to 14 per cent among those over 45, who I think I can safely say find it weird or just plain rude. Non-greeting is not confined to the United Kingdom or US. 'It's very common,' says Mary Jane Copps, founder of a Canadian communication consultancy called The Phone Lady. One reason for not saying hello, she told me, has nothing to do with phone anxiety and everything to do with the robocalls that have turned so much of modern communication into a joyless cesspit. 'Rather than start the conversation and then discover it is a recorded message or scam, they wait to hear who or what is calling them before they respond.' David McWilliams on how 'big incentives' to build could save Dublin city Listen | 36:51 This chimes with what people told the US recruiter. Depressingly, one person said they had been taught in high school that answering a call with a greeting could allow their voice to be recorded and used for identity fraud, so they always stayed silent until the caller spoke. Another said the rise of artificial-intelligence voice cloning made it natural to avoid answering the phone with a greeting. I sympathise, and have no doubt failed to say anything myself when answering a call from a number I suspect to be spam. Perhaps we all need to think again about using voice recognition as a password for anything crucial, like a bank account. Either way, poor phone manners are a problem in the workplace. Employers now consistently complain about their youngest workers' lack of communication skills. Some say it is one of the reasons newly hired graduates do not last the distance or arrive in the office ill-prepared for the world of work. Poor phone manners are also expensive. Companies pay up to $3,100 (€2,666) a day for training from Mary Jane Copps, who has some astonishing stories about young workers' ideas about phone use. Not long ago, she recalled, a young man in one of her workshops said: 'You know, Mary Jane, if somebody calls me out of the blue, what that says to me is they value their time more than my time, and I am not going to talk to them.' There is one simple solution: hire more old people. Also, teach young people that in the working world, it is not okay to answer a phone with silence, nor shrink from an unscheduled call. On the upside, a young person who knows such simple truths can stand out from the ruck in ways that would have seemed inconceivable just a short while ago. It is such an easy way to excel. Grab it while it lasts. – Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2025
Yahoo
16-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Millennials And Zoomers Are Locked In A Battle Over Phone Etiquette, And I NEED To Know Whose Side You're On
Well... it's happening again. One generation is being called out by another, and for once, millennials are not the target. Gen Z is on the hook (that's a phone pun for those of you who haven't used a landline) this time for the way they answer the phone. Over on Twitter (now known as X), Lex (@jorilextera) shared their recent experience with Gen Z's phone etiquette. "i'm a recruiter so i do a TON of phone interviews and something i've noticed about gen z specifically is that a lot of them answer the phone and don't say anything. like i can hear their breathing and the background noise, but they wait for you to say hello first." Related: Yes, you read that right. Some Zoomers are picking up the phone and then just sitting there, breathing, waiting for the caller to address them. Lex clarified that these are scheduled, planned phone calls, so they shouldn't come as a surprise. But the fact that some Zoomers are totally silent when they pick up — well, that did come as a surprise to most millennials. And of course, they weighed in immediately with their thoughts. "WHY TF WOULD YOU NOT ANSWER A PHONE CALL THAT YOU KNOW IS HAPPENING WITH HELLO????????" this person said. "If you answer a call, YOU say hello so the other person knows you answered omfg" Related: "You mean there's an audio version of the Gen Z stare?" "if you know how to have a normal human interaction with another living person, you are in the top 1% of your cohort..." Gen Z clapped back, saying that rampant spam phone calls make them wait to say anything until the caller has identified themselves. "When 90% of the phone calm you get are scam calls and you hear about AI duping your voice to trick your loved ones into scams you become skeptical of everything" Related: "lmao I do this ... although it sounds pretty conspiracy theoryish , i heard once that callers can record your voice, alter it, then try to call your family to scam them pretending to be you..." "Once those spam calls bots hear voice detected it's game over ... But if you're quiet, they hang up after a few seconds." Others felt like this was just a normal rule. "Isn't it a universal law that the person who's doing the calling should be the one to say hello??" "Respectfully if you called me I expect a hello from you first... Idc if it's a scheduled call whoever makes the call should say the first hello." "Why can't you speak first? You literally called?" this person asked. Related: But millennials just weren't having it. "Why would you answer the call just to breathe in the phone like a weirdo and not say anything. If it's a spam call, just hang up." "If someone calls you, you say hello first. I am stunned at how many people sincerely believe the caller should talk first. Pick up the phone and say hello has been the standard forever." "the whole point of the word 'hello' was to have a SPECIFIC greeting to signal that you picked up the phone." And finally, this person tossed out an inspired suggestion: "this why we gotta bring the 'whussaaaaap' commercials back. so these kids learn a major social contract." Now, I've gotta know: what do you think? Is saying "hello" when you answer the phone the proper etiquette? Or is the caller supposed to be the one who introduces themselves first? Let us know in the comments below: Also in Internet Finds: Also in Internet Finds: Also in Internet Finds:
Forbes
13-07-2025
- Business
- Forbes
3 Huge Screening Interview Mistakes You're Probably Making
3 Huge Screening Interview Mistakes You're Probably Making Don't blow the screening! Before you can move forward in the hiring process, you absolutely must clear the screening interview. So, by all means, avoid these mistakes. What is the screening interview? The screening interview is the first in a series of (two to four) job interviews that applicants go through during the hiring process. It is a brief, introductory meeting or conversation that usually lasts up to 30 minutes. During this type of interview, the recruiter or hiring manager, will likely discuss the company and role in more detail and give you the opportunity to ask questions. Another way to think of it is as the appetizer. If things go well, arrangements may be made to move forward to the main meal (the main job interview). And, if things don't go well at this stage, your candidacy for this job may effectively end. Here are three (3) huge mistakes you're probably making with screening interviews. Mistake 1 - You're undervaluing the purpose of the screening interview. Though it requires less time and less investment, the screening interview is every bit as important as the subsequent ones in the hiring process. Too many undervalue the purpose of this interview because it tends to be branded as light and informal. But make no bones about it—it is not. During the screening interview, the interviewer will be observing you, assessing you and making judgments about you around things such as likeability, communication style, engagement, confidence, interest in the role, connection, etc. Your words, sentences, body language, gestures and comfort level will be collated and used by the interviewer to determine suitability for advancing to the next stage in the hiring process. Give this interview the attention and respect it merits. Take it seriously. Dress professionally, make a great first impression, and tailor your energy, dialogue, responses and questions to align with the purpose of the interview. The interviewer's primary goal and purpose during the screening interview—no matter what's asked or not asked or what's said or not said—is to conduct a preliminary assessment for interest, alignment and fit. Forget this at your own peril. Mistake 2 - You're preparing for the wrong interview or not preparing at all. The screening interview is just that—a screening. You won't have the time to dive very deeply into matters during this interview. You won't be able to make the same compelling case and do the same storytelling that you would during the regular (more extensive) interview. And, you shouldn't want to because that doesn't fit with the interviewer's goal and purpose for the conversation. Employers—when doing it right—use screening interviews to conduct a preliminary assessment of candidate interest, qualification and salary alignment, and culture and team fit. Prepare for this interview by taking the interviewer's perspective. The interviewer will want to learn: Sidebar: Many highly qualified applicants never get called because employers have more than they need. Getting a call for an interview (even the screening interview) is an accomplishment even when you don't get the job offer. Mistake 3 - You're failing to elevate the likability factor during the screening interview. You got the call for the screening interview, and now you can't wait to let them know how qualified you are for the job. If you do this—spend your interview time touting qualifications—you will fail. Once you get a call for an interview, you've already passed the 'qualified' test. Now, in the rawest possible framing, the screening interview is the likeability test. The interviewer's goal (again) is to use the screening interview to assess interest, alignment and fit so as to determine which candidates are best to move forward for the deeper—more integrated—interviews. Yes, by all means, weave your experience, education and training in, but do it in such a way that you elevate the likeability factor. Why? Because they already knew your qualifications before they called you. They don't yet know how likeable you are. Your number one goal with a screening interview is to get the green light for the next interview. Make it a priority to be likeable because interviewers aren't likely to move someone forward whom they don't like no matter how credentialed and experienced they are. Likeable people are likable because they: Likability matters, and it matters way more than many people realize. When you elevate your likeability factor, others want to advocate for you. They want to cheer you. They want to be around you because they trust that you will have their back. As a result, they want to have your back as well. Some really good screening interview questions. No doubt, the entire hiring process can feel daunting. From the cover letter, to the resume or CV, to the job applications, to the no-calls and then the rounds of interviews after you finally get called, it's a lot—and it can feel heavy. To help you focus your thinking, here is a list of questions that I've used and many recruiters and hiring managers use during screening interviews. These questions are great for evaluating or assessing key areas of interest, alignment and fit. After the screening interview: next steps. After the screening interview, you should expect to hear back from the employer on the status of your candidacy for moving forward to second interview. It's appropriate for you to ask the following questions during (or at the conclusion of) the interview so that you can leave with an understanding of next steps. If the interviewer doesn't mention these three (3) things during the interview, I recommend you ask: Recommended reading: Nail The Interview: Answer 'Why Should We Hire You' Like A Pro 7 Skills You Must Build To Propel Your Career Forward In 2025 This Is The Phrase That Instantly Damages Your Leadership Integrity
