on unintended consequences
today i had the opportunity to observe a job club* that was facilitated by a colleague that works at rectangle, inc. in melrose, mass. since today's curriculum focused on perfecting the art of the follow-up call it was unsurprising that my colleague opened the lesson with the following lead: "today we are going to talk about what you should say when you follow-up on a lead, so i thought it would be fun if we began this teaching by discussing what we should not say when placing a follow up call."

"ok, you heard me. what are some things we should never say when we are following up on an application?"

in response to the facilitator's rather clumsy cajoling the surprisingly diverse group of job seekers responded** in the following manner:

a) "you got my job?!"
b) "um, hi?"
c) "what's up, my nigga?"

needless to say, the latter comment precipitated a five minute break.

* did you know that in comparison with an individual job seeker job club members are 23% less likely to quit their job search within the first month and 33% more likely to locate a job within three months? did you really give a damn? i didn't think so.
** i shit you not.