Do Not Hire This Woman

If I were a truly good sibling I would have forwarded this link to my sister, Evil HR Lady, so she could use her HR expertise to dissect it. But, it's been a long time since I called someone an idiot, and the person in this article certainly meets that standard, so I'm using it for my own blog. Sorry, EHRL, I guess I'm just selfish that way. (Kisses!)

27-year-old Trina Thompson recently graduated from New York's Monroe College (a learning institution whose existence I have only read about in subway train ads) with a bachelor's degree in business administration. She has been job hunting since April with no luck and is pretty upset at her state of unemployment. So upset, in fact, that she's suing her alma mater for reimbursement of her tuition ($70,000) and an extra $2000 for her pain and suffering, or whatever.

She is sure that any employer would give their eye teeth to hire a graduate of Monroe College (after all, she had a stellar 2.7 GPA and good attendance record!). So it must be someone else's fault she can't find work. She blames the Office of Career Advancement at the college, which, she says, did not try hard enough to help her get a job.

Whine, whine, whine. Wah wah wah. Did this girl miss the memo that the job search is tough right now? People with bachelors degrees from far more prestigious schools than Monroe College (and picture perfect GPAs) are having trouble finding work. And this woman thinks she's being picked on because her school didn't send her a beautifully wrapped job on a gold platter as a graduation present?

But, but, but, she whines, "It doesn't make any sense: [College graduates] went to school for four years, and then they come out working at McDonald's and Payless. That's not what they planned."

Of course it's not what they planned. People don't usually plan to have trouble finding a job. But the solution for joblessness is not to scare off every employer in the country by suing your school for your job-search-related pain and suffering. That just shows you would be willing to sue your employer for being overworked, or being harassed by not being allowed to have every Tuesday off for your weekly pedicure, or having to sit next to the kitchen garbage can. And heaven forbid an employer would ever need to fire this woman! Hold on to those company profits, folks!

So, I would like to say to this idiot: Get out there and work your butt off to find a job. Spend at least 40 hours a week searching. Send your resume to every company you can think of. Offer to intern for free, if it will allow you to get your foot in the door. And go to a temp agency while you are waiting (often a springboard to a great permanent position), or work at, gasp, McDonald's if you have to.

But stop whining, and stop suing.

And come a little closer, so I can slap you.