22 Nov 2006
Jobs, Blogging, Privacy and Conversations

Well, I'll be offered the job I interviewed for on the 3rd - mentioned previously here and here. So apparently your wishes of luck helped - that, or I was just in the right place at the right time. Or some of both - no matter! The farm is saved, at least for the time being.

Following my usual practice, I shan't so much as mention my new employers name here: you will eventually be able to deduce it if you're sharp enough to Google my name and find my online resume, but I must leave it up to my gentle readers to connect the dots. Which is prudent, but also a bit silly. And a sad commentary on the world in which we find ourselves.

I will tell you a few things - it's coding digital audio projects, and it's local (well, more or less local - I won't have to move anywhere). It's for a very large (Fortune 500) company but the actual department is very small. They're also very sharp engineers - and because of my background I think I'll fit right in and begin to make a contribution. Which is important. And that's about as far as I'm going to go.

Which is a shame, in a way, because good blogging is a lot like good conversation - and good conversation revolves around who you are and what you do. But in todays world your conversations - especially one's conducted in public - are monitored. And I'm not worried about Bush & Co.'s NSA wiretaps here, I'm worried about lawyers. And I'm not the only one.

Think about it: short of outright disclosure of intellectual property, why would a company care about what you say when you're not at work? Why do companies spend millions on drug tests, personality profiles and credit checks for prospective employees? Do you think they really give a rat's ass if you're a bankrupt manic depressive doper as long as you're productive as an employee? Oh, they're worried about safety alright - their safety. Because if you screw up on the job and somebody gets "hurt" (in the legal sense - for example, an individual shareholder if the value of the stock goes down) they get sued. And if they've not performed "due diligence" before they brought you into the fold, they look negligent. And that can lead to more than an economic damage award in court, it can lead to punitive damages. Which can run into the millions.

Any corporate entity has deeper pockets than an individual employee - and lawyers know this. They also know that the law is set up to indemnify individual corporate employees - and you can bet that CEO's and board members love this provision. It's why Hammerstead Farms is incorporated as an LLC - to protect our personal assets if we pass a bad egg.

But think of the costs - this company is going to spend about $500 just to hire me. That's cash out of pocket costs, not counting the time it's current HR employees will spend vetting the information and putting it all together.

There's a flip side to this too, of course. Everybody gets a good reference from former employers these days, even the most egregious screwups. This is because employers are terrified of suits by fired workers alleging libel or slander. Firings are always in dispute, of course - nobody thinks it's their fault if they get canned.

Bottom line: it matters not if you're an individual or a corporation, you've gotta watch what you say and do. Lot's of stuff corps do in the hiring process is evil and invasive, but they have lots of good reasons for doing them. And E Pluribus Unum has been replaced as our national motto by It wasn't my fault! Sue the bastards!.

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