For your recruiting entertainment, today’s Roundup opens with a quiz: What do lumberjacks, newspaper reporters, garbage collectors, and flight attendants have in common?
They are among the 10 worst jobs in the U.S., insists CareerCast, operator of a global network of job boards. The reasons are straightforward: diminishing job prospects, low pay, or high stress levels or danger. Or a combination of these. All crunched together in some fashion to come up with scores.
At the other extreme, the No. 1 best job for 2014 is mathematician. Good job prospects; average pay of $101,350; not much risk of injury; and, unless you mistake inches for centimeters, not a lot of stress.
Just behind mathematician on the “best jobs” top 10 is university professor. Or, more precisely, “University Professor – Tenured.” Average pay at $68,970 is decent, especially for working only part of the year. But that job security! Can’t beat tenure.
It’s a wacky list, to be sure. Janitor ranks just above school principal; HR manager makes the top 20, while clergy ranks in the bottom half. Registered nurse, the job that seems perpetually to occupy the top of the “hardest to fill” lists, ranks 106, behind Home Health Aide and Carpet/Tile Installer. Recruiter ties with doctor at 78, right after Typist and Online Sales Manager.
What the method to this madness is we won’t know. The “Methodology” link is broken.
Social media, as you will see from these next two items, can be a curse and a, well, “blessing” might be going too far, but it certainly is making Martha Cobb famous. Patience. Before we get to her, it’s the curse part first. Strong language, that curse word there, but what else would you call a Facebook post that cost $80k?
The $80,000 Facebook Post
Patrick Snay, former headmaster (rank 99) at Miami, Florida’s Guillver Preparatory School, sued for age discrimination after his contract was not renewed. He settled for $80k with the usual confidentiality provisions. He could talk to his lawyers and his wife about it, but no one else. His mistake was telling his daughter who immediately posted the news to Facebook that he won.
Gulliver refused to pay, and the court agreed that he had violated the confidentiality agreement.
Lesson #1: Everyone already knows this but, what the heck, I’ll say it anyway, be careful what you post online. Anywhere. Including email.
Lesson #2: Confidentiality in the digital age? Two words: Edward Snowden.
Lesson #3: Make sure instead of saying spouse, your confidentiality agreement says you discuss it with “family.”
Mile High Celebrity
Now, on to Martha Cobb, long time flight attendant with Southwest Airlines, who probably didn’t know CareerCast thinks her job is only slight better than lumberjack when she made the video that has now gone wildly viral.
Marty, as everyone calls her, and that includes something like 9 million people on You Tube, might be pitching for a second career as stand-up comic (unrated by CareerCast, though actor comes in at 151) with her safety announcement. Within days her video had millions of views and so many requests for interviews that the airline gave her a few days off to play celebrity. Alas, her jonsing for a guest shot on Ellen and on Jimmy Fallon’s new gig, has so far gone unrequited.