Random Thoughts

1. I realized I’ve been in HR too long when I was reading Charlie and the Chocolate Factory to my daughter and when Grandpa Joe tells about how Mr. Wonka just shut down his factory and fired all 10,000 workers and all I can think about is, “You can’t do that! You just violated the WARN act. Being mad at competitors is not a valid reason not to give 60 days notice.”

2. Why is it that if I can’t answer the phone when someone calls, but I call them back within five minutes, they are never at their desks? Ever. It’s like “I must call Evil HR Lady before I leave for that Mount Everest Expedition.” I find this even more bizarre when people call from their cell phones. I mean, did you call me and then accidentally flush your phone or something?

3. And speaking of phones, if you see a number come up on your caller ID and you don’t recognize it, don’t just call it back and say, “someone called this number.” If the person left a message, listen to it before calling back. If no message was left that means it wasn’t important, so don’t bother calling. Besides, you don’t know who it was! Leave it alone.

4. So, it’s 9:30 at night and I’m working. I send e-mails to three different people. All three respond within minutes. Shouldn’t we take at least some time off each day?

5. When I hear massive layoffs announced at companies, my immediate sympathies are with the HR people who have to figure out the whole mess and create the documents for everyone. I realize this is a sickness.

6. Pies for Thanksgiving this year will be: 2 Cherry, 2 Pumpkin, 1 Pecan and 1 Key Lime. The latter is not at all traditional. What can I say? We’re a wild and crazy kind of family.

Leading People. Leading Organizations

I'm a little bit tired and cranky. (Although not as cranky as Mr. Crabby pants who got 5 needles jabbed into his little thighs today. Sorry--just a bit of mommy blogging here.) So, when I read this I wanted to grab some HR VPs and bang their little heads together:

During the past year, several companies, including AT&T Inc., UnitedHealth Group Inc. and Cigna Corp., have been hit with lawsuits in which employees claimed that they were not paid for the 15- to 30-minute task of booting their computers at the start of each day and logging out at the end.

I'll leave the legalities to the lawyers (although for the record, I would never in a million years support such a thing and I believe they will lose the case). Let's talk about the people. Remember them? We're supposed to lead them. This is supposed to cause HR to lead organizations.

Apparently, we were leading them to self destruction. (Where are we and why are we in this handbasket? we might ask ourselves.) Sure, employees aren't "working" while their computers are booting up. They may even be, gasp! talking to their co-workers or drinking coffee. But, they are in the office. They can't be somewhere else. They have to be in the building. Therefore, they are at work and should be paid as such.

How do you even monitor such a thing? What if I come in, turn my computer on and get up to get a cup of coffee (which I wouldn't do because I don't drink coffee), but right then my phone rings. I answer it and it's my boss and I have a 30 minute discussion with him about work stuff. By this time, my computer is all booted up. Then I go get coffee (or rather water, which is what I drink at work). Do I have to clock out? What if I'm just going to the kitchen/cafeteria/water cooler and back? What if I run into Bob from Accounting in the kitchen and we discuss business stuff? Aargh! How would you even administer this?

Oh, I know, it's probably call center people, so everything is clocked on your computer. Still. If I'm required to be in the building, I should be getting paid.

But, let's say, for argument's sake, that AT&T et al are legally right. Computer booting time can be unpaid. Just how much do you hate your people? Do you want them to leave? Do you want to drain the lifeblood out of them? Do you not understand that your best employees will find new jobs and that as a result, the quality of your workforce will gradually decline?

United Healthcare received the lowest rating from hospital executives. This does not surprise me. You cannot run a good business without good employees. You cannot get and keep good employees without good policies. If HR is encouraging this type of policy (please let it be Finance who overrode the HR people on this, please?) then they should be ashamed of themselves.

Trying to save a few bucks will result in you destroying your company. Your people are your company. Stop being stingy.

Gah. Now I'm even more fired up and cranky. I'm going to bed.

Happy Birthday Deb!

See, I remembered! Now you are in a protected class. The thing all of us HR types dream about.

Family Owned Business

My company is a family owned manufacturing business. The owner's son manages the place while the owner has moved to another state. The son hires a friend of his and promises to pay him more than the set amount that entry level employees make. This friend had no prior experience to warrant being paid more, nor has the company ever paid any employee in this position more than another in this same position (as a starting pay). In the past, this boss has also hired all 5 of his children and paid them more than anyone else. Is this legal? Is it ethical? I'm stuck in the HR/ payroll position and feel like I should advise the owner, which of course will bring about problems with this boss, who is not my direct boss. What to do?

I am not a lawyer. I do not offer legal advice. I do not pretend to offer legal advice. I don't even watch Law and Order any more, so I'm not even up on the nuances of NY criminal law. Not that this would matter in this situation.

Not being friends with the boss is not a protected class. This, in my way of thinking, means that you don't have any claim of discrimination if the boss pays his BFF more than he is paying you, or rather the other entry level workers. You may see it as stupid, he may see it as being generous to an old friend.

Hiring your children is not illegal either. Nor would paying them more than other employees be anything less than expected. Is it stupid? Probably. (Although, I wonder if it would be illegal to pay them extreme amounts of money in an attempt to transfer assets to them without IRS problems. Hmmmm, too bad I'm not an accountant either.)

As you are probably already aware, salary information like this gets around very fast although no one is willing to admit that they said the boss's friend/child is getting more money than everyone else. It ruins morale and if in addition to being overpaid, the boss's friends and children aren't stellar performers, it's going to increase turnover.

So, this is why it matters to you. It doesn't matter how much the boss pays someone or who he hires. (Does not matter. Does not matter. Repeat that.) It matters how the workplace is affected.

Should you go to the owner? Only if you regularly report to the owner. If not, then it's a phone call out of the blue to say that sonny-boy is a screw up. They either already know or they are in denial, so what good will it do? You don't even report to the boss, let alone his parents.

You should voice your concerns--to your boss. Your concerns are with employee morale, pay consistency and productivity. If the first and the last are not a concern--frequently people in family owned businesses expect the boss's children/friends to be given special privileges and while they may grumble about it, it doesn't really have an effect on performance--then don't bother. Now, if clueless friend gets promoted out of an entry level job without proper qualifications, then as an HR person it is your responsibility to lay out the problems with this approach.

If you have a regular working relationship with Sonny you may mention your concerns about morale to him. He may think he's a great guy who is helping people while you see him destroying the business. Now, if the owner happens to give you a call and ask what is going on, you can express your concerns, but don't call them up.

Knowledge Poll

Because We Like to Give Advice

I am interviewing for an HR/Information Assistant position this Thursday (October 30). I really really want to get this position, as I am very interested in working for Human Resources. However, I do not have any prior experience in HR, and have heard that it is difficult to get into the department without prior experience. Is there any advice you could provide for someone like me, who really wants to prove to the employer that I am serious about this job, and that I am the perfect candidate?

It is difficult to get a job without experience, but we all did it at some point. I'll ask my readers to give additional advice to you, but here's mine: Don't pretend you can do something when you can't.

I would far rather have someone say, "I have no idea how to do x, but I'm a fast learner and I'm willing to try anything. I'm sure I could learn to do it. In fact, in my last job I [learned x] and became the department expert." So much better than, "yeah, I can do that," and then you really can't.

Also, I'm not sure what an Information Assistant is (but can I have one?), but an HR assistant is an entry level job where you aren't expected to know everything, but you are expected to jump in and try and learn. Also, we expect that you will never make a mistake. (Ha! We know you will, but we will try to prevent you from making mistakes that will show up on the CEO's desk.)

What other advice do you have for this future HR person?

The Problem With HR

In the comments on Policy Problem Just Another HR Lady Wrote:

I would like to just comment that every profession (not just HR) has individuals who are low-performers or who are not the right fit for the job. Because HR deals with every single person in the organization at every level, HR low-performers or those who make mistakes/errors/missteps are much higher profile in the company than someone who only deals with one department.

And with that she sums up a very real problem. Every employee at every level has contact with HR and sometimes with very low level HR people. Add to this that HR isn't the highest paid profession and sometimes you get some real problems.

Any mistake we make is magnified--because it involves people. Let me tell you about a memorable mistake in my past. Once upon a time, I was responsible for running the year end salary increase program--for the entire, very large company. This was in the dark ages, so at the end of the whole thing we sent every manager a piece of paper with a list of their employees and the employee's official increase. Attached to that were individual notification sheets for each employee with their names and new salaries. Did I mention this was a very large company? Did I also mention this was all done on PAPER? Oy.

So, we're handling tens of thousands of sheets of paper. Stuffing them into envelopes and sending them out. It was quite a process. And we made a mistake. No one really knows who--everyone in the department, from admin to VP helped out on this stuffing process, so it could have been anyone. But, we made a mistake and ONE Vice President (note how I said, one out of thousands) got an extra sheet stuck to his list. The extra sheet happened to be for one of his direct reports, so it wasn't as if he saw anything he didn't already have access to. It was just a mistake. And unfortunately, it happened at the top.

Of course, the world came to an end and there were meetings and process re-designs and it was a mess and if you ask me if I ever want to do that again the answer is a resounding no. It made us look terrible and no one recognized that our error rate was well below 0.0002%. You ask me if any other department would get reamed for that error level. Even worse all of HR looked bad, even though staffing, employee relations, benefits, etc. didn't even make the mistake. My group did.

My point is, of course, that we do have to be better. We need to know more than we do. We need to be more accurate than we are. We just need to be better employees.

Which makes sense. After all, if we're in the people business we should be the best people.

Fail

This has nothing to do with HR, but it would be so phenomenally horrible if it happened to you. But it would also be really funny.

Policy Problem

I had asked one of our HR ladies via e-mail 3 different times to supply me with the tuition reimbursement policy our company has. After waiting over 6 months I went to our companies intranet site and searched "tuition reimbursement". I found the policy and sent her the link since she obliviously didn't know where to find it.

A few minutes after finding it I received an e-mail from our evil HR. Manager asking where I found it and that it because it was not to be available to the public. How is that right? How am I supposed to follow policies that I am not privy to? Is he being evil or are HR policies not for employees to view?

Of course he’s being evil. That’s what we HR types do.

You’ve got several different issues going on here. Let’s talk about issue number 1: HR not returning e-mails. You have a simple question—what is the tuition reimbursement policy? Now, depending on the size of your company the person you know as “HR” may not (and judging from the lack of response, does not) know what the policy is. So, she ignored your e-mail. Or she forwarded it and that person ignored it and she didn’t follow up. This is completely unprofessional and downright rude.

If she didn’t know the answer and didn’t know whom to ask, the proper response is to e-mail you back and apologetically tell you she doesn’t know the answer. Then the other proper response is for her boss to fire her because she should either know the answer to that question, know who to ask, or be willing to wade in and find out who knows.

The second issue is that your intranet security stinks. If there is a document that you shouldn’t have access to, you shouldn’t be able to get to it without some serious hacking skills. It sounds like you just surfed around and found it. Bad intranet security.

The third, and really most important point, is that your HR manager is paranoid and wrong. I've never understood the desire to "hide" information from employees. Do you have a tuition reimbursement policy or not? If you do, make it available to everyone. Do you have a vacation policy or not? If you make it available to everyone.

I know, the "little people" can't possibly understand big, complicated policies! Plus, the world will come to an end if we change one of them, so we should keep them secret. Well, we can let managers know because everyone knows managers can handle that information, whereas individual contributors cannot.

If you haven't guessed, I hate this attitude. In any organiztion that doesn't hire teenagers (and even in those that do, but I'll grant you this much), everyone should be able to handle policies and even handle the knowledge that not all policies apply to all people. Get this, people even understand that sometimes policies change.

I'm a big fan of openess. If you can't justify why you have a policy in place, you probably shouldn't have it. If a policy is so complicated that posting it would lead to confusion among the masses, perhaps you should revise your policy so that it makes sense.

I realize that initial posting of policies can cause phone calls. I get that. (I've also been the recipient of many dumb phone calls, including ones that went someone like this: "I'm looking at the tuition reimbursement policy and it says that in order to be reimbursed, I have to get at least a C in the class. So, if I get a D can I be reimubursed?") I also think that if someone's knickers get too twisted after reading a policy you've got a management issue.

And that is why HR is afraid of posting policies. We'd rather avoid the issues of having someone question. We'd rather avoid having managers manage their people. In short, we're wimps.

We shouldn't be. We won't be respected as an organization until we stop being wimps.

Unpaid, Uncompensated Overtime

I have a title, more than two employees, satisfy the salary requirement, and have weight given to my decisions to hire , fire, task assignment, etc... So I'm exempt right?

I am salaried for 40 hr. a week, about half of the work year I repeatedly put in 70 hrs. a week performing predictable,rotational, maintenance labor identical to that of my employees. I work unpaid in the field every Sunday and all summer holidays. My company does not have the budget to hire any staff to perform these tasks that are critical to the deliverables. The employees I supervise are assigned to single service areas and may not work on the broader assignment for which I am responsible. The rotational tasks are weather dependent so regardless of re-arrangements and behind the desk Monday quarterbacking, service must be delivered. The most critical of the tasks can only be performed on weekends when I have accessibility to the sites. HR said you have to work whatever hours it takes to get the job done.

We anticipated this at point of hire, and vague promises were forwarded to compensate with additional paid time off (PTO).

Nothing in writing. I took a vacation after serving these 70 hour weeks for 16 weeks straight. Then received an email upon return informing that I didn't have sufficient PTO, and will go unpaid for the vacation.

I reminded my supervisor of the vague promises, a date was set to draw up language, this has past with no follow up.

Any ideas?

Yes, but the best one is of no use to you. Never, and I mean never, accept a job offer contingent on vague verbal promises. Something like this should have been in writing as part of the offer letter or in the employee handbook as a matter of policy. Working 16 straight 70 hour weeks would send me over the edge and a vacation or 12 weeks of mental FMLA would be required.

So, where do we go from here? First, you need to take responsibility for getting this fixed. Your boss doesn't care. He should, but he doesn't. Nobody cares about your vacation like you do.

You need to make sure you get on his calendar. Go in prepared with what your expectations are. Do not pause for a second if he says, "what do you think is fair?" You know what you think is fair, so make sure you have something to say. Don't leave without a resolution. If he says, "Well, I need to check with HR and the big boss on this," say, "Great. Let's write up a proposal right now and e-mail it to both of them." Otherwise, he won't have gotten around to meeting with them and you'll be working another 16 straight weeks of weekends.

If the vague offer of additional PTO came from him, keep in mind he may not have gotten authorization and he may be getting in trouble. So, it may not be truly possible to give you what he promised you. (My lawyer friends can tell you that in some cases a verbal promise is equal to a written contract, but I don't know if this is such a case and I'm not a lawyer anyway. I did, however, hear a "pro-lawyer" advertisement on the radio the other day. Seriously. It was weird. Yeah lawyers!)

If you cannot get a meeting (people who are avoiding you can miss meetings like you wouldn't believe) then type up what your expectations are in an e-mail. This is a last resort, because many people see this as a passive aggressive move. I hate confrontation so I do as much as possible via e-mail (plus e-mail covers your rear end sometimes). Try, try, try to meet in person. But if not, try something like this:

John,

When you offered me [position x] part of the offer included comp time in exchange for the 70 hour weeks I would be expected to work. I would like to formalize this so there are no more misunderstandings.

For each 70 hour week I work, I will receive an additional [half day, quarter day, hour--whatever was discussed previously] in paid time off.

Please let me know if this is not to your understanding.

Thanks,

[your name]

For the first e-mail, don't copy his boss or HR. We want to stay out of it and it won't help your cause. If his offer was outside of company policy he'll get in trouble and you don't want him to get in trouble if you can help it. (A happy boss is more likely to give you the time off you deserve).

If he doesn't respond, send him a follow up e-mail saying that you understand this is now in place and you are acting accordingly.

Then ask yourself this question, "why am I working for such a place? Do the benefits outweigh all the negatives?" If the answer is no, get your resume updated and start looking. I certainly wouldn't want to work under the conditions you are describing. Of course, I've worked part time for 5 years now, so I've grown soft.

(And PS--before someone comments and says "maybe she's not really exempt!" we're assuming she is exempt. Hire/Fire and supervisory responsibilities tend to make one exempt. If she's doing a lot of the actual work and it's not professional level work, you may be right, but we are assuming this is an exempt position.)

Completely Random Overheard

18 year old Chuck E. Cheese employee to fellow employees: "I'm voting Obama and don't argue with me because no one beats me on politics. I study the stuff. And Joe Biden is hot."

Would You Laugh or Write Up?

If one of your employees wrote a letter like this would you laugh or write the person up?

I laughed. (Not that I work for this law firm. I don't work for a law firm.)

Via lowering the bar.

Fired and Hired

I've had interviews with a prospective employer and multiple discussions over the last month. The prospective employer said they would have an offer to me tomorrow (Thursday) 10/2. I was terminated today (Wednesday) from my current employer (entire career /work history is with this employer, over 10 years) Do I need to make the prospective employer aware of my termination or just sit tight? Do prospective employers ever do reference checks after they've hired to verify positions, or dates of employment? Please help as I am in a panic right now and don't know what to do.

Have they already done the reference check on you? If so, it probably doesn't matter. They are extremely unlikely to do a second check. If not, it might.

I wouldn't panic, though. Get the offer letter. If it says in it that it's contingent on a reference check then mention to the recruiter that today was your last day with your former company and you are eager to start at their company. If the termination was something other than a position elimination (performance or cause) and there is any chance of them calling your old company for a reference, explain. Usually a good explanation is one that doesn't make your previous company sound bad. "My boss was a jerk who couldn't see that I was a genius" is a bad explanation. "My boss wanted to take the department this way and I think we should go that way, which is in accordance with [new company] and so the timing couldn't be better" is a better explanation.

If you were fired for stealing copy paper and toner from the supply closet, well then you're on your own.

Getting fired is not the end of the world. It's extremely common. EXTREMELY common for someone to have a lost job in their past. Yours seemed to have hit at the perfect time. I hope everything goes through with your new job.

Not at all Strange

I get a weekly e-mail from BLR called HR Strange But True. It's usually some fluff about resumes or such. Interesting, but nothing to blog about.

Until the last e-mail. They proclaim that "Sexists Get Paid More!" This, is a "strange" phenomenon. Bah. They have not thought it through.

First of all, let's get rid of the inflammatory language. Sexists connotes someone who thinks women aren't capable of competing with men. That's not what the study says at all. Why don't we say, "Traditional Men Get Paid More!" That, I think, is a bit less biased.

Anyway, BLR is in shock (shock, I tell you!) that men who want a wife that stays at home make more money then those with more "egalitarian views" do. It's all about choices, people.

If a man believes that the best situation is for him to be married and have a wife that does not work, then guess what? He's most likely to marry a woman who will stay at home. And what will that wife be doing? Taking care of the house, the kids, paying the bills, waiting for the plumber, arguing with the phone company, and generally taking responsibility for a million different things.

The man who believes the best situation is for him to be married to a woman who also works will most likely be married to a...drum roll please...a wife who also works. What does this mean? Well, he's got to either share in all those responsibilities listed above, or he is a real jerk who lets his wife, who works as much as he does, take care of all that stuff plus his marriage is shakier because she's angry at him for not helping. What about the woman who works with a working husband? Or the single person? All of these people have essentially two jobs--the one at home and the one at work.

The "traditional" man has someone else taking care of all the outside hassles of life. He, essentially, only works one job--the one he's paid for. Does it not make sense that he should be able to focus more on work? He never has to worry about having clean socks or missing an important meeting because one of the kids is puking.

It's all about choice. And it shouldn't surprise anyone that there are consequences with each choice.

Important Carnival of HR Update!

The Carnival of HR has a new home! Yeah! All the updates and info you need is over there.

Ask A Manager has taken over the responsibility of tracking and guiding the carnival. She's awesome.

Party on!

The Power of [Passive Aggressive] Suggestion

This week, I had an employee come to me and complain about other employees not washing their hands after using the bathroom. They wanted me to put up signs telling people they need to wash their hands before returning to work. Needless to say, I do NOT work at a McDonald's. My (rhetorical) question is this: does putting up a sign telling people to do something or not do something actually work?? If so, I need to rethink our whole office communication plan. It might save me a whole lot of time and trouble.

First question for the person who asked this question: How do you know that people aren't washing their hands? Are you hanging out in the bathroom? Really? Because I believe that studies show that even avowed non-washers wash their hands when someone else is in the bathroom.

My second question is why would anyone think that someone who is brazen enough to walk out of a public restroom, observed by a co-worker, and still not wash their hands would see a sign "reminding" them to wash their hands and go, "Oh! I'm supposed to wash my hands after piddling? I had no idea! Thank you place of work for telling me this. I shall now wash my hands."

Not gonna happen. Not even close.

I will say, though that there is a time and a place for passive aggressive notes. And that place is here, and nowhere else. Otherwise, if you won't say it to their faces, leaving notes won't help. (I was strongly tempted to leave a "If you sprinkle when you tinkle, be a sweetie, wipe the seatie" sign when someone in my office used to hover and then not wipe up after herself. I mean, honestly, are you that delicate that you can't clean up after yourself but expect the rest of the world to do it? Actually what I would have liked to do is put a sign saying, "I don't know who you are, but if we find out, you're going down." I didn't. You shouldn't either. But, geesh, people, have some consideration for others!)

I would be willing to bet (if I were a gambling woman, which I'm not), that the complainer has other problems that need to be addressed. People don't come to HR over this unless there is an underlying issue. Sure, they may say, "Sue in accounts payable doesn't wash her hands!" while they are chatting, with people giving furtive glances at Sue and wondering about the bacteria colonies on her keyboard, but they don't come to HR about it. This is someone who is frustrated over something else and needs a little control in her life. (I just switched from gender neutral into female, because I'll also bet this is a woman. I don't think men care about this and if they did and saw other men not washing their hands they'd say, "Dude, you didn't wash your hands" instead of coming to HR.)

So, no. I don't think a sign will solve any problems. I think the problem isn't handwashing. I think it's something else.

Carnival of HR Reminder

There has been some serious slacking in the Carnival world and we don't want to get bad performance reviews because of it.

If you hurry up and make a submission, you just might make today's carnival at Sharp Brains. Send an e-mail to alvaro at sharpbrains dot com.

Tuition and Quitting

I was reading your blog about Tuition Policies. I'm in a very unique situation and wondered your advice.

My previous company paid for my Tuition for 1 year, then they informed me that they were going to outsource my job, and I wouldn't have to pay this back.

However, they refused to give me a set time frame for my last day of work. Since I was a new home owner, and would only receive 4 weeks severance pay I felt I would be gambling on finding a new job with a small time frame, so I decided to leave once I was offered another job. Now, I put myself in the position to re-pay what they paid for my tuition. I noticed in your blog that you said . . ."it's next to impossible to get that money back if the person doesn't willingly cough up the check", I just wanted to know your thoughts on this topic? What can the company do, if I don't repay this money?

The company can take you to court and sue you and they would win. Yeah! Just what you want to do. You want a court judgment issued against you.

Now, the probably won't, but they might. You don't want it to come to that. You also signed a contract and legally you are obligated to repay, since your resignation was voluntary. Now, since you had already been told that your position was being outsourced, you might be able to argue that this was a version of a constructive discharge. Usually this is applied when your company makes it so miserable that you have to leave. I could argue that by telling you your job is eliminated and not giving you a time frame, the only rational decision was to quit and therefore you were forced into it.

I doubt you could win that argument in court. And as I said, you don't want to go to court anyway. Plus, you are an honest person and want to do the right thing. It's one year of tuition. Step up to the plate and approach the person responsible for such things. Present your case and say, "under the circumstances, I believe it's fair if I repay 1/3 of the tuition. After all, my job was scheduled for outsourcing and I saved you the cost of 4 weeks severance." They'll probably jump at it, given that they don't want to go to court either.

Keep in mind that the person who manages the tuition reimbursement program probably does not have the authority to approve such a thing. So, if she immediately says no, ask who would have the authority to approve a deal and go to them. Frankly, I think they'd be fools not to accept it. You may have to negotiate a little bit and pay a bit more, but I doubt they'll come after you for the whole amount.

Or, you could get someone who is a complete policy nut who will become apoplectic at the mere thought of granting an exception. If so, I'm sorry.

I feel your pain. And for the record, I think you made the right decision. No point staying on when you have an indefinite term date. Companies that do that type of thing to you should be offering stay bonuses, but even those are rarely worth turning down a real job for.

Good luck in your new job.

On that School/Forms Theme

Check this out. It's a parody of a school form. I need to get more creative and make up a new hire form.

Advance Vacation Notice

I am currently looking for employment (I was laid off) and was wondering about how to ask for a few days off that I know I would like to take. I am completing my MBA in December, and the graduation is in a neighboring state, which would require a few days off for driving, plus the actual ceremony and celebration. Since I already know about this desire for time off, when would be the appropriate time to mention this, in the event that I am interviewed and/or offered a position? I am ok with being told it is not possible, if that is the employer's policy, but if I can take the time off (even without pay), I would prefer to do so. I don't want to offend the employer by them thinking I would always be asking for time off, but also feel the kind of employer I want to work for would be understanding for this special occasion.

First, good luck with the job hunt. It's a painful, but hopefully fruitful time. Second, congratulations on the MBA. (Almost! I probably shouldn't congratulate you until you actually receive it.)

Now, as for time off at the end of December, take a deep breath and don't worry about it. Everyone and their dog wants to take vacation at the end of December and no future employer is going to be shocked by the request. (And, FYI, if you came and worked for my company, we shut down between Christmas and New Year's Day anyway, so everybody gets time off!) This is something I wouldn't even bring up in an interview.

I would, however, bring it up in the negotiation phase. Once they've offered you the job, then you can mention, "I'm graduating from [MBA Program] in December and the graduation ceremony is on December 22. I'd really like to take December 21-23rd off. Would that be a problem?"

Chances are the answer will be no. If the answer is yes, then you get to decide if the new job is worth missing your graduation.

This would be a problem if what you wanted was 6 weeks off to tour Africa or something. Two-three days off to attend your own graduation is not an unreasonable request. And a manager would be a fool to not want you to work for them because you have something so reasonable scheduled. (Heck, I once hired someone who said she couldn't start for three weeks because she had a vacation planned between the offer and then and didn't want to request time off. I needed her on board for various reasons and said, "come on and you can take that vacation paid!" So she did and she went on her vacation and 7 years later she's my job share partner, so aren't I glad she came to work?)

You're almost done with your MBA and you've been laid off, so I presume you have work experience to go along with your degree. This means you probably aren't looking for entry level positions where you have to work six months before getting a single day off. Most companies will pro-rate your vacation time anyway. If you were hired in October in a company that offers 2 weeks of vacation per year, you'd have 2.5 days of vacation to use by year end anyway. (10 days/12 months=.833 days per month X 3 months=2.5 days of vacation.)

Good luck with the job hunt. May you land one quickly.