That's the way to open a shopping mall!

This story caught my eye today. It took place in Leeds, in the U.K. Most of us know the town from the Who  Live at Leeds album. Well they have a new shopping mall and this is a  story with a video from opening day.

 

I wonder where she's going to wear that dress?

Editor's note: College memories.

Yahoo's edict on working at home

Most of us have been following the brouhaha concerning the CEO of Yahoo, Marissa Mayer, and her edict that all the staff of Yahoo have to show up for work everyday. In the flesh. No more goofing off in your undies and logging unto the Internet in your kitchen. Being a woman and a mother, she is twice scolded for being against women working in a way amenable to  handling  family responsibilities. Now, even the Times has chimed in on the controversy.

In a previous job I worked from home, albeit without pay, just as a way to keep up with the things I couldn't fit in at work. To many of us, however, working at home perhaps seems more like the above picture. Here the babies are typing in the documents with Mom. Perhaps this picture is not as efficient as it could be in a time work continuum.

We are presented by Ms. Mayer an ideal of workers networking on tasks and coming up with creative ideas as they hang out in the coffee break room. My experience is that more bellyaching and gossiping takes place in such environments than light bulbs going off on top of people's heads, but perhaps that is just my own, largely civil service experience. If I was a betting man I would say more and more people are going to continue to work at home in the workplace.

So it's March, the ordinary month

March is the ordinary month. The temperatures are higher than February but it's still windy and the trees are still bare. There are no legal holidays normally, except this year Easter is early so that makes Good Friday a holiday, at least in some states. March sort of is the month of continuations. Yes spring technically starts in March, but in reality spring comes in stages, and  then there is Saint Patrick's Day, which can be fun but for non Irishmen is no big deal.

One nice thing about March is, if you want to take a chance on the weather, it's a good time to travel. Sure everything isn't open in most tourist areas but the prices are lower, the kids are in school, and you get to see the locals living life as life is really lived, before the streets are cluttered with tourists with cameras. When I worked in a public library I always took my vacations in March partly because that is tax season,

Editor's note: Many states also celebrate Maple syrup weekends in March and Michigan has declared March maple syrup month. Ho hum.

Microsoft wants to be hip

The past week I have noticed an influx of  Microsoft Surface commercials on the tv. Everything we thought about Microsoft is now wrong, apparently. No longer the the realm of men who wear pocket protectors while using DOS, now it is attempting to appeal to young hip types. I don't know if it is working or not.
I guess the kid below looks happy, though. :

So what do I think of Girls

Ever since it went on the air, the (hipster) media has been awash with stories about Girls. Being too cheap to get HBO I have become more and more curious about the show that has supposedly changed modern television. Recently I noticed it was on Netflix, so I got to view the first season of the show.

Girls is loosely based on Sex in the City, except the women are younger and don't have their careers together like they did on SITC. The show is of interest to baby boomers, methinks, who have fond memories of their early twenties (living at home and selling hot dogs at Two Guys?) Well, at least we are curious to see how things have changed. In some ways things are similar (nobody had any money in the late 70's and life after college sucked) except there seems to be more sex going on nowadays.

Girls shows what it is like for women who don't have to live at home and live in an exciting if grungy place. The show centers around the trials and tribulations of Hannah. The main revolutionary thing I can see about the show is that it has a female star who isn't pretty. Ugly Betty wasn't pretty, either, but that's another story.

Because she isn't pretty, Hannah appears to be destined to have a crappy boyfriend (Adam) and go through a series of crappy jobs (although the sexual harassment job had its points). If she was pretty she could get a job as a go go dancer or a more influential boyfriend could get her a job as a gaffer.

Not wanting to be too revolutionary, the show has three comely co-stars. The other women are interesting, intelligent, but tend to have drippy boyfriends. I guess shows that are aimed at women audiences, (Parenthood comes to mind) tend to have strong women and pathetic male leads. Maybe this is how the world really is or maybe it is a female fantasy to live where all the women are strong and the men are good looking.

It looks like Season 2 is promising. Hope to see it soon on Netflix.

Change in the workplace

We have all gone to those reorganization meetings where the managers talk about change and how we all are going to have new job titles and responsibilities. We are quoted from people like Woodrow Wilson who said 

“If you want to make enemies, try to change something.”  At the meeting everyone is smiling and cooperative, but in the break room the grumbling begins. Catherine's Career corner has a nice piece on why workers resist change. 

Spoiler alert: If you supervise more than five people, please close the blog now. The rest of this blog is not for your eyes. 

The workplace is, for most of us, a series of negotiated advantages and disadvantages that are developed over the years that changes and realignments can eliminate. Say for example, Sally always comes in fifteen minutes late and so Cathy has to open the safe every morning. In return Cathy gets Christmas week and the day after Thanksgiving off. If Cathy is transferred there will be no one to open the safe. 

Perhaps after repeated attempts to show Al the new computer program he still doesn't get it. He is quietly moved to a different task where that can be hidden. Change can expose Al's deficiencies. 

Lucy distrusts Mary.  This can be traced to the fact that Lucy remarried and still takes Communion on Sunday mornings. Mary hides this knowledge in her pew. The new reorganization will cause the two to work together on the same shift. 

In other words, change can upset the applecart. Higher ups often are not aware of how delicately apple carts are assembled in a workplace and should tread lightly when bringing about change. 

Happy Valentine's Day

Here is a classic from a few years ago. Happy Valentine's Day. Don't drink too much champagne.