5 Tips for Job Searching and Your Credit History - FlexJobs

5 Tips for Job Searching and Your Credit History - FlexJobs5 Tips for Job Searching and Your Credit History -31Each step of the job search process is nerve-wracking. From hitting send on your application, to sitting down for a job interview, and finally waiting to receive a job offer, job seekers experience a lot of nervous tension. Add to that the ever-growing requirement of a background check including your leistungspunkt history, and job seekers feel like they might burst.Why do employers ask for your leistungspunkt history as part of a background check? Gregory B. Meyer, Community Relations Manager with Meriwest Credit Union, says the leistungspunkt check is all about responsibility. The credit report can tell us a lot about our tauglichkeit employee. It gives us insight into how responsible they are with their money and credit. The thinking is, if someone is responsible with their own money, they will be accountable and reliable when given responsibility for your money.But what if the potential employees credit history is less than solid? Especially with the recent recession and continuing economic difficulties that many of us are facing, even the most responsible people may have bumps and bruises on their credit histories. Says Meyer, Right now, it can be difficult to find someone who has been unemployed for a while with perfect credit. We are seeing people with a number of credit issues applying for jobs.So, how can a job seeker handle this delicate situation and still be in the running for a job?Here are some expert tips on job searching and your credit historyExpect to be asked for your authorization to pull your credit report.Typically, an employer does not ask to review a prospective employees credit history until the latter stages of the hiring process. Any prospective employer who asks for your Social Security number early should be regarded with caution, as the job offer may be a scam. Generally speaking, a hiring manager will conduct the entire j ob interview process and only ask permission to run a credit check after youve been offered a position or are being seriously considered, explains Andrew Schrage of MoneyCrashers.However, This information is often requested at the point of application sometimes, even before the interview. And by law, it must be authorized by the applicant, says Mitchell D. Weiss of the University of Hartford Barney School of Business and author of Life Happens A Practical Guide to Personal Finance from College to Career. So even though its most common to be asked after the interview during the final stages of the hiring process, expect to be asked at any point during the job application process, depending on the industry and specific job.Know your right to refuse an employers request.According to the Fair Credit Reporting Act, any potential employer is required to obtain written authorization to conduct a credit check. Therefore, you do have the option to decline a request for a credit check. Also, if you agree to a credit check and are denied employment because of it, you have the right to request your own copy, recommends Schrage.Be upfront and honest about any credit troubles you have, and your plan to correct them.Meyer believes that, Honesty is the best policy. My HR team appreciates when an applicant is upfront about their credit status and speaks to us about the deficiencies in their report. In example, I have been out of work for six months and had to make several concessions to my budget to make ends meet for my family. I have one Visa account that is 30 days in arrears and I am two months behind on my mortgage. I should be able to bring these items current within two months of being hired. If someone were to be upfront with us regarding their past credit, we would appreciate their honesty. It is best to know ahead of time and not be surprised than the other way around.Ive always asked if the job seeker wanted me to know something about their credit report beforehand . Those who said nothing at first and feigned surprise later on, or worse those who said they didnt expect their report to be as comprehensive as it was, didnt get invited back, warns Weiss.Amend your credit reports to explain your situation.Adding a note to your credit reports is a good idea, according to Meyer. A rolle has the right to add a 100 word statement to their credit report at anytime should they feel the need. In the case of someone being unemployed or underemployed for a length of time, one could place a message on their credit report with all three credit bureaus that they were unemployed and had to allow some bills fall into arrears. The message will stay on the report for seven years. These messages will not help you access further credit, but may be helpful in accessing employment.Pull your own credit reports ahead of time so you know what employers will see.You cant plead ignorance when it comes to your credit report, and doing so will hurt your employment chances just as much as an actual bad report.Youre entitled to an honest-to-goodness free credit report through www.AnnualCreditReport.com, a site managed by the three principal credit bureaus Experian Equifax, and Transunion. You should also rehearse what youre going to say about it when the time comes. Thinking on your feet about something as important as this, or worse, praying that your future boss doesnt notice the charge-offs, closed accounts, and bankruptcies, is just plain dumb, says Weiss. members receive a 7-day free trial and save 20% on a monthly membership to FreeCreditScore.com, which offers credit monitoring, alerts, and fraud resolution. Check out Member Savings Section for full detailsSo, if youre worried about being asked for access to your credit reports during a job search, you have good reason its almost definitely going to happen. The key is to prepare ahead of time, know your right to refuse, offer an explanation of your financial situation and how you intend to re ctify it, and pull your own credit report BEFORE a potential employer does. When it comes to an employment background check, take some advice from the Boy Scouts and always be prepared.

Plan and Implement a Take Your Child to Work Day

Plan and Implement a Take Your Child to Work DayPlan and Implement a Take Your Child to Work DayOn the fourth Thursday in April, you may show up to work to see a bunch of children running around your office. Hopefully, its elend due to a weather-related school shut down, but instead, to the annual Take Your Child to Work Day. Begun in 1993 by Gloria Steinem as Take Your Daughter to Work day, boys were included later, and the official title is Take Your Sons and Daughters to Work Day. Regardless of the name, its all about teaching your kids about life at work. Steinem began the day to illustrate how invisible women were in the office and to help girls understand that they could aspire to this visibility even if their mothers hadnt. Should Your Workplace Participate in Take Your Child to Work Day? The answer is maybe. What do you do? If youre running a restaurant, trying to bring kindergartners in to see how mom and dad work could createan unmitigated disaster. On the other hand, i f youre a hedge fund management team, allowing backfischagers to come in for a few hours could open their eyes to what work is like. Its fine, either way. People will not choose to work for you or not work for you based on whether you participate in Take Your Child to Work day each year. If youre on the fence about it, ask your employees. You may find out that people dislike having to put together the activities for the children or pulling their children out of school. Or you may find out that people look forward to this day all year. Each company is different. Ask your employees what they want to do. Think Through These Issues If Youre Considering a Take Your Child to Work Day Before signing up for Take Your Child to Work Day, you need to sit down and consider the following issues Whats your goal? To teach students about what work life is like? To have a fun event that makes parents and children happy? To post pictures on your website, so that job candidates gain positive feeli ngs about your company?What age children should you allow? Some businesses focus only on teens some focus only on elementary age children. In any case, you should probably exclude babies and toddlers.What activities should you have? If youre bringing in teenagers, perhaps having a short continental breakfast with a peppy talk from the HR manager and then letting the teens shadow their parents, is perfect. If youre bringing in younger children, maybe you need a bunch of activities, from taking a tour of the facilities to doing puzzles and games that deal with the company, followed up by lunch with mom or dad. How long should the daylast? Is this an all-day event? If so, you should not invite young children. A couple of hours is probably best for this group, but remember, the parents will then have to take the kids back to school when youre finished with the Take Your Child to Work Day activities. When youve thought through all of these issues, you can begin to plan your activities. R emind departments of the date so that they can prepare. If you have a huge deadline coming up in marketing on that day, they probably wont want to do a fun presentation for the children, and thats okay. The business still needs to operate profitably. Remember that productivity will likely be low that day. No parent will get as much done with a child or teen shadowing them. If you skip the shadowing and just have planned activities for the children, youll need to pull people from various departments to run the activities. You Need to Invite Everyone to Participate in Take Your Child to Work Day This is an all or nothing event. If you are going to invite children, you get to set up the age parameters and plan the activities. You cannot say, well, if you work in the factory, you cant bring your child to work because thats dangerous, but you can if you are an office worker. While you dont want children running around the factory floor, making distinctions like this will breed resent ment. If the CEOs child gets to come in, then the newest hire making the lowest salary also gets to bring her child. You need to treat all of the children the same. If you allow children to shadow their parents, consider also allowing them to shadow people in other departments. Just because mom is an accountant doesnt mean that Jane wants to become an accountant. She may have more interest in research and development. People without participating children may or may not want to become a part of the day. Just ask. But dont require participation. People were hired to do their jobs, not to entertain children.(Unless, of course, your companys work isto entertain children.) Done right, Take Your Child to Work Day can provide a lot of fun, build good relationships, and perhaps even generate some good PR, which is not a bad accomplishment for a few hours once a year. - Suzanne Lucas is a freelance writer who spent 10 years in corporate human resources, where she hired, fired, managed the n umbers, and double-checked with the lawyers.

Rejection letters to female engineers in 1919 show how far women have come

Rejection letters to female engineers in 1919 show how far women have comeRejection letters to female engineers in 1919 show how far women have comeWomen engineers often drop out of the field even before they graduate college - to the tune of 40% of female engineering majors dropping out of the industry - but the discouragements of today were once brutally direct rejections telling women in science that theyd never amount to anything.To honor its founding this month, the Society of Women Engineers released historic academic rejection letters U.S. women engineers got to show how far women engineers have come and how far they still need to go to be accepted.Soft rejection versus the hard kind is just as discouragingIn 1919, Lou Alta Melton and Hilda Counts wanted to test academicassumptions and make their own society of women engineers. That year, they sent letters to every engineering department they could find to find out their policies on women joining, and if any women had taken their classes.What the two hopeful engineering studentsgot were rejections from men in power that ranged from firmly dismissive to kindly dismissive.This type of stigmatization and dismissal persists to this day. Engineering remains a male-dominated field. Women are only 13% of the engineering workforce. Far too many aspiring female engineers never enter the job market.40% of women engineers quit the field or never use their degree.We do notlage expect to have in the near future, any women studentsSome rejections read like a door firmly shut in ones face.Dear Madam, Thorndike Saville, a University of North Carolina professor, told Melton. We have not now, have never had, and do not expect to have in the near future, any women students registered in our engineering department.Other professors thought not enough women would be interested.You ask for information or suggestions. I have only this say, that I suspect the number of women who have undertaken general engineering courses is s o few that you will hardly be able to form an organization, William Raymond, a dean at the State University of Iowa, wrotein his dismissal.But at least he noted that his was not the only opinion that mattered However, I may be mistaken, he concluded.Other academic officials recognized that times were changing, but they also recognized that they wouldnt be the pioneers holding the door open.Up to the present, women students have not been admitted to GA Tech. Yesterday, the City of Atlanta conferred suffrage on women in City Affairs, so no knowing what may happen J.S. Boon, a mechanical engineering professor told Melton.In other, words, best of luck, but youll get no help from me.The most positive response came from Helen Smith, a female engineering student at the University of Michigan who told Melton and Counts that the women there had formed their own society, T-Square, with the universitys approval.Smith said her and the rest of T-Square werepleased to hear from women studying the same things in Colorado. Smith ended up giving the two prospective students advice on how to start their own society, which never got off the ground.The story still has a good ending Melton and Counts, at least, persevered in spite of all the men telling them no.Melton became the only female graduate in her civil engineering class at the University of Colorado, and later went on to take an engineering job at the U.S. Bureau of Public Roads. Countsbecame the first women to graduate with an electrical engineering degree in Colorado, which she put to use in her job at theRural Electrification Administration. Thirty years later, Counts became one of the founding members of the Society of Women Engineers.