Posts Tagged ‘jobs’
‘Hefty Girls Wanted For Police Force’ – the Metropolitan Police seeks ‘fairly good looking’ female officers
London’s Metropolitan Police Force was looking for “Hefty Girls”. “They Must Be Hefty.” They “must never marry or their career with end”. And they must be “fairly good looking”. They will answer to Sir Philip Game, the Met’s Chief Commissioner from 1935 until 1945. His vital statistics are not revealed.
Posted: 23rd, March 2021 | In: Key Posts, Strange But True | Comment
Fatima gives up ballet career to retrain as Boris Johnson’s personal webcam model
Downing Street says the advert suggesting a ballet dancer called Fatima should retrain in cyber security is “not appropriate”. Fatima should not limit herself to working in tech but reach out and consider careers as a personal shopper at Ocado, Covid tester or grave digger.
“Fatima’s next job could be in cyber (she just doesn’t know it yet). Rethink. Reskill. Reboot,” says the advice in an advert as part of CyberFirst, a programme led by the National Cyber Security Centre since 2017. CyberFirst aims to encourage young people to get into tech, and to HM Government. No, not webcam modelling at RedBox.com. Well, not only that.
So here’s to the dancers brave enough to give up all that prancing about and get real jobs in the virtual world. If in the coming days you’re approached by a ballet dancer seeking to broaden their skill base, remember, be kind. These people have spent the larger parts of their lives pretending to be swans.
Note: In real life, “Fatima” is a picture of American dancer Desire’e Kelley, taken by photographer Krys Alex at the Motion Dance Studio in Atlanta, Georgia. Rumours that she now works on the headphones desk at Curry’s in Basildon are unproven.
Lie on your CV if you’re name ends with a vowel or you’re not called John
Funke Abimbola claims she was victim of “bias” when she tried to get into the legal profession. She tells the BBC: “I found a number of barriers to entering the profession because I had an African name and am a black woman, without any doubt. I had to make over 100 phone calls to get a foot in the door. I have experienced bias and situations where, being a black woman, I was judged more harshly over other colleagues. You are more likely to be noticed and are far more likely to have negative judgements made about you if you are part of an ethnic minority.”
Should you put a false name on your CV if it ends in a vowel or sounds ‘foreign’ to employers’ ears? My own family changed their name twice – once because the officials at the gates misspelt it and once from the Sephardic Benhamu to the more anglicised Benham.
Change your name or leave it off your CV? “Your name no longer matters on your CV,” the Daily Telegraph announced in 2015. CVs are going “name blind”. You can remove age, address, gender and educational background also. This will, at least, make the initial stage of the recruitment process more open, so the thinking goes. Until you get to the diversity box, that is, the one that asks applicants to declare their religion, ethnic roots, sexuality and disability status. Has this box-ticking helped job seekers from minority backgrounds? Has it helped end prejudice or discrimination aimed at someone on the basis of their race?
In 2017, the BBC told us:
A job seeker with an English-sounding name was offered three times the number of interviews than an applicant with a Muslim name, a BBC test found.
Inside Out London sent CVs from two candidates, “Adam” and “Mohamed”, who had identical skills and experience, in response to 100 job opportunities.
Adam was offered 12 interviews, while Mohamed was offered four.
Although the results were based on a small sample size, they tally with the findings of previous academic studies.
Meet ‘Honest John’:
Yogesh Khrishna Davé, 56, is the director for quality at a pharmaceutical company in Slough. It has taken him decades to reach this senior role.
During the journey up the ladder he suspected he was being consistently overlooked for jobs because of his name. So he secretly carried out his own experiment.
“I entered the job market in the 80s. I put my CV in and it was disappointing. I got rejection letters.
“Someone suggested: ‘Why don’t you put a very English name on your CV [as well as sending one in your own name]… and see who they might offer the job to?’ So I had my name, Yogesh, and John Smith. John Smith got the interview. I got rejected for the interview.”
None of this mans you’re going to ge the job, of course. The employer will still want to see you. The results of an independent review by Sir John Parker (that is his real name) into the ethnic diversity of UK boards is out. You can read it here.
Meet ‘Honest John II’ in the Times:
The Parker Review, which was launched in 2017, has found that 37 per cent of FTSE 100 boards still have all-white boards. Although the latest figures are an improvement on the 50 per cent that had no ethnic minority representation three years ago, its latest report said that progress had been slower than hoped.
Sir John Parker, who heads the review — and sits on an all-white board himself as chairman of Pennon Group, the water company — accused businesses of being complacent in their approach.
Look lively. It’s ‘Honest Jon III’:
Separate research by the Financial Reporting Council, the watchdog that sets the UK’s corporate governance code, found that most companies were failing to adequately report and set targets for ethnic diversity. More than half of FTSE 250 companies fail to mention ethnicity in the board diversity policy. Only 14 per cent of FTSE 100 companies and 2 per cent of FTSE 250 companies set measurable ethnicity targets.
Sir Jon Thompson, 55, chief executive of the regulator, said: “The UK’s record on boardroom ethnicity is poor. It is unacceptable that talented people are being excluded from succession and leadership simply because companies are failing to put in place appropriate policies on boardroom ethnicity.”
In conclusion: you can never have enough Johns in charge of fairness…
Posted: 5th, February 2020 | In: Key Posts, Money, News | Comment
Tesco seeks a Christmas Tree light untangler
HELP!
Former boy scouts, listen up. Your skills are needed. Tesco is hiring “Christmas Light Untanglers”. If you are “able to untangle 3 meters of Christmas lights in under three minutes” and are “passionate about Christmas”, you can spend your days elbow-deep in flex.
Your roles and responsiblities will include:
• Man and managing the Christmas Lights Untangling stand
• Taking time to listen and help out wherever you can: Every little helps
• Check lights and bulbs for signs of breakage / broken bulbs and report findings to the customer
• Handle customers Christmas lights carefully to keep everything in tip-top condition
• Talking to colleagues, sharing your enthusiasm and helping to create team spirit
• Getting to know your customers, greet them with a smile and serve them with pride.
• Give a brilliant customer experience, making sure you deliver only the best service and put a smile on customers faces
• Successfully untangle customers Christmas lights neatly, quickly and efficiently and in an orderly fashion
• Abide by our Health and Safety policies
• Always be there on time and properly presented
• Be passionate and knowledgeable about the service you are offering
Try not to slit your wrists. Those bulbs can be sharp! Also: strangling.
London job seeker makes a bad first impression on the Tube
Is it advisable to make a bad first impression and then set about undoing it? We ask in light of the story of the man on the London Underground. Last Mondy, a passenger as blocking his way. Our hero did as the mild-mannered Englishman must: he shoved the blocker out the way and told him to eff-off.
He then continued on his journey for an interview as Python Developer at Forward Partners.
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Posted: 20th, February 2015 | In: Money, Strange But True | Comment
Nuclear Nutjobs In Hinkley Point, Somerset: But Jobs Are A Cost Of Doing Something
IT’S a strange thing to be boasting about goings on in Hinkley Point, Somerset.
David Cameron has hailed as “brilliant news” the £16bn of new investment and 25,000 jobs he says will come to Britain as the Government struck a deal for the country’s first new nuclear plant in a generation on Monday.
Yes, it’s great that they’re finally going to build the damn nuke. It’ll reduce carbon emissions and the likelihood that the lights will go out. But it always astonishes me when politicians tells us how many jobs are going to be created by their plans.
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Cambridge student too ugly to punt
THE Oxbridge universities don’t make it easy for people to like them do they? It is all ties and crests, hazing and fags, bizarre rituals and elitism and worst of all, posh folk in red trousers.
To add to this, they’re also terrifyingly vain as one Cambridge student has claimed that he was turned down for a river punting job because he was “too ugly”.
River punting is not a dirty euphemism.
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Posted: 4th, June 2013 | In: Reviews | Comment (1)
Is this the worst application to be a journalist ever?
SO. You want to work on the Wimbledon Guardian?
Spotter: Omar Oakes
Posted: 24th, May 2013 | In: Money | Comment (1)
Why manufacturing jobs are leaving China
YOU may not know that this is true: but it is. The number of manufacturing jobs in China is falling. The reason why is really very simple:
A 16pc annual rise in Chinese wages over the last decade has changed the game.
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We have not been exporting manufacturing Jobs – it’s the machines, dummy
WE have not been exporting manufacturing jobs. Richard Sennett, a professor of sociology at LSE and professor of social science at MIT, writes in the Guardian:
It’s no mystery why Europe is short of work. Save on its northern rim, Europe 30 years ago began exporting manufacturing jobs to other parts of the world
I do worry about the old Alma Mater at times you know. This is one of the senior professors at the place I did my economics degree. And it is difficult to be more wrong than this and still have the intellect to walk and fart at the same time.
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Posted: 5th, July 2012 | In: Money | Comments (2)
The Easiest And Hardest Jobs In The World: 2 Videos
FROM the people (us) who brought you a video of the Hardest Job in The World (repeated below – and it is a must see), we bring you the Easiest Job in The World – Escalator cleaning at Shanghai Pudong Airport.
You can do this.
And the hardest:
Posted: 30th, September 2010 | In: Key Posts, Money | Comment
The Most Dangerous Job In The World: Video
CLIMBING up a 1768-foot tower to fix transmission lines is the most dangerous job in the world. Although the worker seems to take it in his stride…
Posted: 19th, September 2010 | In: TV & Radio | Comment
Leeds University Advertises For A Lap Dance ‘Research Officer’ For Science Project
LEEDS University is adverting for a “Research Officer” to investigate “The rise and regulation of lap dancing and the place of sexual labour and consumption in the night time economy.”
Replies should be addressed to the Faculty of Education, Social Sciences and Law
School of Sociology and Social Policy.
The job description is gorgeous. Grab a light pen and get ready to take notes:
You will work on an ESRC funded study on the rise and regulation of lap dancing and the place of sexual labour and consumption in the night time economy. The post will involve qualitative and quantitative data collection and analysis. It is based in Leeds, although some travel to other cities may be necessary.
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Posted: 28th, November 2009 | In: Key Posts, Money | Comment (1)
Working Towards Violence Against Women, With Rihanna
RIHANNA might fancy the change. The civil service wants:
You can beat Rihanna here…
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Posted: 25th, February 2009 | In: Politicians | Comment
Job Gains Update (Video)
JOB losses are high. Job gains: Gordon Brown has a new fitness trainer and Arsenal are looking for a holding midfield player…
They Work For You: Foreigners Take Every British Job
DID you know that “1.3 migrants took EVERY Brit vacancy since 2001”? All true. “THEY’VE STOLEN ALL OUR JOBS,” says the front-page headline
The Star, on whose cover this research features, does not list the names of the hard-working immigrants. But they’ve been upping their output.
As the BBC reported way back in October 2007:
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New Jobs For City Boys
MATTHEW Lynn’s list of suggested new ideas for City boys and girls…
Posted: 20th, October 2008 | In: Reviews | Comment (1)
