I’m 100% behind Maggie’s frustration. It’s not entirely her fault; most old (wink wink) people I know are actually quite savvy. It’s just the ones that aren’t savvy but claim that they are, are so friggin vocal and inches away from actually being mentally deficient. When they label themselves gurus, I’m amazed they have a grasp of the necessary sentence structure. They then proceed to spell doom for other old (wink wink) people.

There’s a -real- difference between using social media tools to market and surfing Facebook ad infinitum or even having a Twitter account; it’s marketing that separates the people who know what the hell they’re talking about from the people who claim to be all-knowing.

I graduated with a dual degree in Computer Information Systems and Marketing… and I’ve seen the worst of the worst when it comes to job listings: for the record, marketing is not cold calling or phone sales. I’ve seen job listings for “10 years experience” in programming languages that have only been around for 2. I see a lot of social media job listings with the same requirement (ie, 10 years experience on Twitter… yeah. #FAIL).  And people wonder why I work for myself.

Then again, I work for myself because I couldn’t be trusted to get up at 8AM unless there is some sort of fire alarm going off, and even then it’s a gamble… but I’m with Maggie – screw this myth that only young people know where it’s at.  Some of my age-peers are clueless as the walking dead when it comes to blogs or social media tools (particularly the ones who claim to get it). There’s no reason Maggie, with a little under two more decades of wisdom on her belt, couldn’t do just as good a job as I could whipping up a social media marketing plan.

What’s more, “social media” as most people refer to it is just a collection of tools and (hopefully) a mindset to actually listen to your customers where they’re talking. And are there gurus?  Swamis sent from above, blessed by the gods who just get it?  Hell no.

Are there any telephone gurus in the house? Try saying that out loud with a straight face.

I’ve learned -a lot- from people who are twice my age or more, particularly in the realm of social media and marketing. But I’ve also had to sift through so much crap from so-called gurus that I’m surprised there are any car salesmen, lawyers, or Made-for-TV personalities left.

Social Media is such an inbred field… the A-Lister “gurus” have spent so long pandering to the masses and tooting their own horns that words that actually should mean something, like transparency and authenticity, are now buzz-words for “things you should be doing, and by the way, where’s my check for being awesome?”

More alarming than discriminating against the gray and dusty is the reverse – discrimination against the value of youth, as if young people’s opinions don’t matter or count or that they shouldn’t even have opinions because they haven’t formed the body of experience yet. I think that’s all relative – everyone has something valuable to contribute; trust your wobbly legs and stand up, Bambi!

This boils down to stupid businesses cloning stupidity to new fields.  If they’re that stupid in public forums, such as recruiting, then you can only imagine the drool-inducing sort of conversations occurring in the board room.  Flee as far and as fast as you can and don’t look back.

For something causing the big-wigs in Washington so much trouble, you would think the millennials would have a stronger voice about it.  But, despite multiple RTs by myself and other millennials, no one was willing to step up to the podium.

Turns out, some people who have more time than I do to rub brain cells together have been thinking the same thing.  Justin Quincy of Minus30Ology wrote me an e-mail the next day:

We are crafting potential legislative wishes for millennial healthcare reform and this seems like a great base to start from. We have created a petition entitled “Minus30″ that takes aim at the “60plus” organization funded by conservative-leaning members, to show that millennials also have a big stake in this debate. We’d really appreciate your support!!!

The petition is located here: http://www.thepetitionsite.com/petition/977427388
For more information: http://minus30.ology.com

If you feel strongly enough about our petition, please share it and help it go viral. We’re hoping to really make some sort of splash with the media and Congress.

—

How could I say no to that?  These are millennials who know there’s very little millennial representation in government and want to make themselves heard.  Nevermind the pingpong style politics dominating congress right now, these are changes that will affect old people for the next 20 years and will affect US for the next 70!  Wake up, kids!

Here’s a link to the article where Justin describes the plan.  However you fall on the healthcare debate, you can weigh in.  DO IT.

Many hiring managers are shallow, daft pricks.

For Men, the fashion-based interview killers are:

1. No tie (52% say fire)
2. No jacket (50% say fire)
3. Chinos (50% say fire)
4. Polo shirts (66% say fire)
5. Jeans (82% say fire)
6. T shirts (88% say fire)
7. Leather jackets (70% say fire)

Leather Jackets and T-shirts are reasonable – no one should be so casual unless it’s requested.  But no tie?  No jacket?  Polo shirts?  Please.  The expectations on women are even worse – check out those high %’s!

1. Short skirt (60% say fire)
2. Low necklines (95% say fire)
3. Sports shoes (91% say fire)
4. Dangling jewelery (99% say fire)
5. Bare legs (94% say fire)
6. Big shoulder pads – ala 80’s style – (97% of bosses say big shoulder pads are wrong for interview)

Okay, so Andy had one more figure from the survey which confirms my “daft prick” theory.  “95% of interviewers said orange was an inappropriate colour to wear to an interview, with red (84%) and pink (83%) coming in closely behind orange.”

Pink is many women’s favorite color and, to my knowledge, has never been considered “not businesslike”.  If it’s good enough for the First Lady, it’s good enough for a freakin’ job interview.  Not to mention pink is increasingly promoted as an alternate to white in Men’s fashion.  Red has always been a color associated with confidence, something which is important to demonstrate on an interview.  You’re telling me that 83-84% of you morons would think less of a brilliant prospective employee for wearing pink or red?  Moreover, if a woman shows bare leg, as opposed to wearing tights, 94% of you would turn her away?

Time the hell out, you spoiled, soft-brained, suspender-wearing morons.

Are you really so shallow that the best loser wearing the “perfect suit and tie” will get a job over a more qualified, better suited, better matched, but less fashionable prospective?  This is why our economy SUCKS.  This is why only 20% of 2009’s graduating class got jobs after applying.  This is why 71% of those under 30 want to flee their current jobs when the economy recovers.  When the “Best dressed moron” gets a job over someone who is better suited to the job, your company loses and good people get disheartened and go jobless.  Your company languishes, destitute while the more qualified, yet un-hired prospect wastes more productive time appealing to the “better natures” of other daft pricks.

Screw you, corporate world.

You want the economy to recover?  Let’s start simple.  Stop looking down on people for what they wear – I’d take a talented hobo dressed in soiled clothing ANY DAY over a well-dressed, but arrogant know-nothing Harvard business grad.  I’d take an artsy, hippie-styled graphic artist in thrift-store clothing who would fit the position better over a suit-and-tie designer with 20 years experience and an excellent resume.  Dress codes encourage conformity – conformity discourages creativity – no creativity = no innovation, growth, or profitable future.

Every business must catch up and realize that shallow, vapid lusting over well-dressed candidates at the expense of better-suited but less fashionable candidates has facilitated our current economic problems.  Until then, we’ll keep on putting our talents to use at more enlightened companies where the hiring managers aren’t shallow, daft pricks.

The economy sucks and employers are just looking for excuses to trim the fat.  Especially true if that fat isn’t attached the company yet.  One of the fastest ways to be rejected from a new job or to be fired from your current job is to leak sensitive or objectionable information on your Facebook profile.

Never mind that social media spying is unethical in its own right, no, no, it rests squarely on our shoulders to carry the burden of witless and mistrusting employers.

But because humans are human regardless of what color tie we wear to work or just how nice we look in that suit, we’re all going to post something stupid to Facebook sometime.  Don’t let the corporate fat cats catch you at it.  Put the lock-down on your Facebook this instant.

Step One – Make a List

Now, the typical Facebook user has three groups of people as “friends”.  You have your real friends, the ones who would have your back even against a hoard of Zombie Elmos.  These need no privacy settings and should be your “base group” of friends.  Then you have those jackasses you met once at a party and friended you for the +1 friend stat… or maybe your not-so-nice family members fall into this category.  Then you have everyone else – the outside world or people you know from that concert back when weed was still kinda illegal everywhere.

The latter two groups of friends should be put in their own “list”.  Besides giving you a great way to arbitrarily rank your friends, lists also give you great privacy benefits on Facebook.  You create one by clicking on the “Home” page – the one with the master news feed from all over Facebook.  Then find your “News Feed” sidebar, here:

Click on “More” and at the bottom of the list, just above “Less” you’ll see “Create New List”.  Click on this, it pops up a window asking you who you want to add to this list and what you want to call the list.

Once you’ve sorted out all your friends, you can start limiting what they (and the list they belong to) can see.  First, find this menu option on the toolbar (it’s under Settings next to Logout and Search at the top of the page):

Once you click on this, the Privacy Overview page appears with four options (not to mention, the ever-useful “Block List” – put someone on that, and it’s like you never existed):

Profile is where you should go first.  Click on that and you’ll see each part of your profile has an individual privacy setting (there are two pages).  I have ALL of mine set to “Friends Only”.

What this privacy setting says is “Only my Friends can see my Basic Info section (name, school, etc) – and the people on my Limited Profile list can’t see it.”

If you click on “Edit Custom Settings”, you can change things up a bit, in case you want something harmless to be visible:

You have a lot of freedom here – you can have anyone on Facebook able to access this portion of your profile, Friends of Friends (not necessarily your friends), Friends Only, or Networks. For example, say you just moved from Denver to Chicago, you can add the Chicago network to your profile and make your basic info available to THAT network only and exclude the Denver network.  Useful for screening out “objectionable” bits and pieces if your school or employer has a network.

You can also specifically exclude certain lists (like the ones you just created) OR people from seeing that aspect of your profile.  However, combinations can be tricky.  For example, in order for someone to stop seeing your Status Updates, you have to block them from both your Wall and your Status and Links Updates.

There are TWO pages of privacy settings to set, so get to it.

Step 2 – Applications

Finally, once you’re done with that,  you have to set the applications settings.  Why?  When one of your jackass friends adds one of those jackass-rating applications like “what kind of penguin are you if a clown gets shot out of a cannon quiz” – then according to Facebook:

“When a friend of yours allows an application to access their information, that application may also access any information about you that your friend can already see.”

Great.  So, you can avoid all the crappy applications you want, but still be giving away your information.  How do you block it?

Go back to the Privacy Overview page (the one with four options and the block tool) by clicking on “Settings -> Privacy Settings” from the top menu again and click on “Applications”.  Click on the “Settings” tab, because really – the disclaimer is mostly jibber-jabber and I don’t have time for that crap.

Before I unchecked all these, all of them were active… so who knows what shady businesses have personally identifiable information about me, where they are, or what they intend to do with it.  My suggestion is to turn all of these things off.  All of my applications still work fine.

In order to opt out completely, you have to turn off ALL 3rd party applications individually, which… is frankly a waste of time.  Just find the ones you have no idea about (IE – not Pandora, Twitter, etc…) and selectively turn off what you are afraid to share.  This may break some of your apps.

Because I’m sort of twisted, I imagine that the real purpose for at least one app has been to secretly gather as much info as possible about potential hires and selling it to HR folks for a premium.  If a hiring company has gone to so much trouble that they’re willing to build a Facebook app to spy on me directly or through my friends, then, I really don’t want to work there in the first place.

Step 3 – Feed Updates

Imagine if you will, the most gawdawful picture of yourself – and someone has tagged you in it.  You comment “LOLZ”.  This now appears as a “status update” in the global feed.  Everyone who can see your feed can see the gawdawful picture.

Your friends see it.  Your mom sees it.  Your mom calls your grandma, and she sees it.  You get a call and have to explain why your two-piece bathing suit turned into a one-piece on some beach in Tijuana while mom and grandma sob into the phone.

No more.  Select “News Feed and Wall” from the main Privacy Overview page (the one with the four options):

I have mine set liberally because these aren’t as important to me, but they might be to you, so… lock ‘em down as you want.

Step 4 – Public Search Pages = Good Public Face

The final step in locking down your Facebook profile is to create a public search page for yourself.  This might seem counter-intuitive, but so long as you don’t post random, disturbing, objectionable pictures as your profile picture, this is definitely a good idea to show a company that you know how to hold your cards close to home.

Go back to the Privacy Overview page and select “Search”.  Here’s what you’ll see:

I set my search page visible to EVERYONE because anyone should be able to find me this way – especially an employer snooping on Facebook.  I’ve only turned on the options for things I can control – a friend and message link and my profile picture.  My fan pages and my friends pictures, I can’t control, so I leave those off, lest my employer see I’m friends with Bob Ross or that I’m a fan of medicinal marijuana’s page.  I don’t use it myself, but an employer could easily freak the hell out.

Finally…

Only friend people you know – there’s a big thing on social networks to “find and friend” everyone on the social network and it’s all just BS designed to make someone feel good.  Unfriend people who could potentially hurt you by sharing information you don’t want employers to have – ex girlfriends you don’t have a good report with, for example.  Most of all – keep your profile picture un-objectionable if you make it visible at ANY level besides Just Friends.

Remember that you have no obligation to show your employer your social media profiles – it’s a major invasion of privacy for them to ask.  Respectfully decline.

Good luck – let me know if I’ve missed anything.

Last night the news told me that gold is selling for around $900 an ounce.  People are resorting to panning for gold to pay the bills.

That’s when it struck me.  We’ve come full circle to the time of the Wild West.

The big banks somewhere off in the East keep on doing their thing, but it’s the local, littler banks we all trust now.  Robberies are getting more common and the thieves are more desperate – and what’s more, we can identify with the people doin’ the theivin’!  Honest, hard-working people who hit a low spot and just want to keep food on the table and a house over their heads.  The best we can hope for is an undisturbed spot on the river and a fire to cook our beans with.

The situation in America is pretty damn bad.  A new study showed that less than 20% of 2009 grads are getting jobs they’ve applied for.  A whopping 65% are moving back in with Mom and Dad.  It’s not all doom and gloom, but if only 20% of new grads are getting hired and the boomers just ain’t retiring, the job market seems to be in mighty slim pickins.

Don’t let that get you down.  There’s always grad school – more education can only help you here.  You can even go the route of the entrepreneur – just don’t become a snake oil salesman (though if ya do, Twitter is a great platform).  Be smart and conserve your resources – pay for necessities and skip the niceties if you can go without.

The best you can do is to carve out your own living as best you can.  Hold on to a job you might not enjoy as much as you might like.  Express yourself in your off-time as much as possible if your work doesn’t bring you satisfaction.  Do as much as you can to become a digital gunslinger – make your opinions count and your voice heard.

Remember that in tough times good people tend to face situations that aim to make them bad people.  Don’t let it happen to you.  Keep your head up and keep moving forward as best you can – and look to anyone you can trust to help you.

I’ll help as best I can – free resume reviewing, all the free info and tutorials on the website, and so on.  If you have questions, all you need to do is ask!

Every new generation faces the scorn of the previous generations as those older generations grow old and crabby.

So, why does that make it okay, acceptable, or even expected, that ageist bullsh!t can fly against millennials?  We’re not supposed to get mad about that?  Just because it’s nothing new doesn’t make it acceptable.

The general consensus has always been that in order to get anywhere in this world, you had to be the biggest, baddest rock star that ever was.  Even if you managed this rare feat, you had to claw your way into the limelight, thrashing any competition out of the way so you shone the brightest.  This has been business as usual.

Millennials don’t play this way.  It’s etched into every tool we use, the multiplayer games we embrace, hell – it’s even in how we make friends.  Collaboration – teamwork.  We don’t do the whole competitive thing very often.  Some idiots say this is because we were given trophies win or lose – even just participating.  Well, I don’t know about you – but I got precisely one of those trophies before I stopped losing.  After the one time, I had the desire to win.  So we can do the competitive thing if we need to.  But that’s not our natural environment.

World of Warcraft, Facebook, Halo capture the flag… collaboration the basis of all these methods of (millennial) expression.  Is it really so much to be mad that business as usual is allowed to continue? Is it really so much to think that we ought to be fighting back?

I think not.  And here’s how we do it:

• We seek out mentors who encourage us to follow our goals and give us methods to get to where we want to go,
• We make each and every relationship count,
• We help out our friends if the benefit to the common good would be better than our personal gain, and
• We get involved – no more apathy – whether it’s taking charge at work, volunteering for a charity, or running for office – we take charge.

We can do it.  Together we can reject business as usual and change the world. Who’s with me?

…and the horse you rode in on!

The millennial generation can tell people where to go louder and quicker than any other generation in history.  And why the hell not?

We’re all after that kick-ass chair on the bridge of the Enterprise, aren’t we?  (That’s geekspeek for: “I’m going to own the world someday”.)

Like George Patton said, “Lead, follow, or get out of the way!” So often we’re held back by stodgy business beliefs, generational misunderstanding, slow application processes, competition, personal inhibitions.  It’s all bullsh!t.

Tell your boss that you don’t like him or his stodgy policies anymore. It’s time for a change – and he’s either with you (and the betterment of the company) or he’s against you – and you’re ready to walk.  It takes a lot of balls and a nice little savings account to take this approach.  There’s no reason why you should persist in a meaningless job doing meaningless work for 1/3rd of your day and – if you’re lucky – 1/2 of your waking hours.

You only have one life. Recession or no, you have to take what you want. There’s no point to doing work that isn’t meaningful or worthwhile.  You simply can’t allow yourself to be scared into thinking you’re not worth a better job, a better career, a better life, a better car, a better… whatever.  Businesses must adapt to us, or they will not survive. Our generation is the absolute best at perceiving bullsh!t.  How many times have you walked into a “hip” company only to find out they’re still running Internet Explorer 6? Or that they block Facebook and MySpace?  And how many times a day did you say to yourself and your friends, “why do I work for these monkeys when they don’t trust me to stay on task?”

There’s no excuse – not the recession, not your personal financial situation, not anything – that should hold you back from pursuing your dreams.  Don’t listen to what anyone tells you – you don’t pay your dues by taking it in the rear. If the path to your dreams doesn’t exist, carve it yourself.  Start your own business.  Start your own blog.  Talk about the things you like and the things you hate.  Shout it from the rooftops and through RSS feeds.  Tell your friends and make them tell their friends.  Be loud.

We’ve had enough and we’re gonna turn the f*ckin’ car around!

Seriously. I’m so fired up because I’m tired of this ageist crap. I’ve landed amazing jobs – during this recession and with a major that looked very bleak when I was graduating. If I can do it, you can do it too. Get angry. Get motivated.

Let’s set corporate America on fire!

Dear Old Farts: Will you quiet down your wrinkling for a moment and listen to us?

Today, millennials around the world will take a long, objective look at their careers, and tell their bosses where they can stick their jobs.

This seems to happen at an alarming rate. Whether influenced by graduation, relocation or other life changes, the average millennial between 18 and 29 has held 9 jobs.

NINE!

Try mentioning this to a Baby Boomer or a Gen-X’er.  You’ll hear scoffs and whispered declamations of disloyalty.  It’s apparently gotten so bad that websites like Dolphini are instructing employers how to make sure millennials don’t take off with company goods.  Don’t you think that’s kind of backwards?  Sure, some people (young ones included) just suck.  But can you really say that with increasing rates of voluntary employee turnover, it’s just the entitled, coddled, young dipwads to blame?  Please.

Is it so much to ask that if we give up some of our very limited time on this Earth that we get something more than just a chunk of change every two weeks?  Shouldn’t our work mean something?  Shouldn’t we feel like we’re accomplishing something worthwhile and valuable – not just for ourselves or our companies, but for the world?

Why do we still allow ourselves to be slaves to a system where the rich get richer and the poor get poorer?  Where the average joe has to slave away 8 hours a day doing some menial, meaningless task just to afford a shitty apartment?  Where the bosses get all the credit, all the money, all the fun, all the fame and glory… for things that their minion workers accomplished with blood, sweat, tears, and backbreaking labor?

“Baby Boomers were so about determining who a person was based on how they look, their title, their house and car rather then how they act. Millennials are all about determining who a person is based on how they act. They look past the status, clothes, job title and all the stuff Baby Boomers puff themselves up with and just cut the crap,” Dee Valdez says.  She runs a group to help Millennials and older generations connect with each other. (Transparency: Yes, I do work with her. No, I am not paid for my work. I do it all for the Tribe (interns – but better)!)

You want my take?  The 8 hour work day will be gone within 5 years and work will be more like communal subsistence labor than actual work.

You heard me.  The 8 hour work day will be gone within 5 years. We have the tools, we have the ability – and NO ONE, not a millennial, not a baby boomer, not a gen-x’er… wants to work 8 hours straight, stuck in a 6×6 cube from sun up to sun down.  There’s absolutely no reason for it anymore.  It’s a system that rewards the people who do the least amount of work, who game the system, or who spend lazy afternoons on the golf course trying to figure out how to screw the investors out of a few more $30,000 umbrella holders.

In short, I’m pissed off at you jerks who have “titles” and “experience” and think you can use those things to justify treating the lowest-ranked employees in your company like fodder.  I think it’s time we raise an army.  We might lob our rounds through blog posts and tweets, but get one thing straight: This Means War.

Millennials aren’t entitled brats.  We want our work to mean something.  We want to be proud of what we do – and not be just cogs in the machine.  We’re perfectly fine with paying our dues, but we need to be shown respect while we’re climbing the ladder.  To confuse that for “demanding praise” or “asking to be coddled” is a huge mistake.  We’re not your daughter’s (or grand daughter’s) punk-ass boyfriend.  Leave your ageism and prejudice at home.

Look, there’s a lot of articles out there that make Gen-Y look like a bunch of whiny, narcissistic, lazy buzzkills. But, the truth is – corporate America has never been more scared of what we have to offer. These aging rockstars of high society know they won’t be able to hold on to their wealth once we get onto the scene in force with positive economic winds filling our sails.  We might have once been showered in trophies, but the only trophy that matters to us now is our self respect.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: fear is the currency of the impoverished spirit. It takes a pretty dead and downbeat spirit to not embrace change. Magazines like the Economist and others make Millennials look pretty damn bad.  But we do have our allies – and ourselves.  There’s an entire movement of uplifting Millennial blogs like Modite.com and others.

A war is coming.  A war for new business mentalities, ethics, morality, and worker rights.  We’re all going to be fighting in it and change will be the only constant. Catch up and change with us, or consider yourself an enemy combatant.

If I had a nickel for every time I heard this advice… I would pay them to STFU!

How many times have you heard this?

“If you’re 25, you only need to invest about $3,600 per year to end up with $1 million by the time you’re 65 if your investments return 8 percent per year.”

My personal favorite time I heard this advice was from debt collectors – warning us wayward high school seniors that if we didn’t take our personal finances seriously, we’d lose everything.  They then put up a chart describing compounding interest rates on an overhead projector and gave us the aforementioned advice.

I’ve heard it at least once a year, with the percentage varying everywhere from 7% to 12%.

But… if you’ve ever opened up a savings account or considered a short-term CD at your local bank, you might have noticed the numbers didn’t seem to be in your favor.  According to BankRate.com, most savings accounts – if they even offer interest anymore – offer interest of around 1%.  The highest I’ve seen is ING, at close to 3%.  What’s worse, the average return on a 5 year CD is less than 3%.

So where the hell does this magical 8% interest rate come from?  You guessed it.  The Stock Market.  Everyone knows that the stock market returns an average of 8%.

Your Attention Please: It is complete and utter bullsh!t – the stock market’s average return is NOT 8%.

The average return over the last decade of the Total Stock Market Index Fund was 3.5%, while the International Stock Market Fund returned 7.1%, according to Money. Averaging the two you get around 5%, which – in case you weren’t paying attention – is not the 8% we’ve been told we need over and over and over again.  And, by the way, is only 2% past Inflation… Over the last ten years one could reasonably expect to make 5.5% returns from an annually balanced portfolio on the market.

The goal of having $1 Million by investing responsibly starting at 25 and proceeding on to 65 is a pipe dream.  Short of a minor miracle, insider trading, or bedding someone with a hot stock tip, it’ll probably never happen for the majority of us.  What’s worse – the “returns” we’ve been told to look for often do not include trading fees or other “gotchas”.

In the interest of full disclosure, I’m not a finance person.  I know that the market works in cycles, and someone out there is bound to prove me wrong on some detail here or there, but come on.  When you have a nation of people who’ve been told over and over again that they can have a million dollars by the time they’re 65 if only they put away $300 a month, don’t you think we’d have a whole lot of rich people by now?  Or at least, more than there are?  Why is it that we never get an explanation of where that 8% is supposed to come from?

I call bullsh!t!