Just because you sing about chemistry doesn’t mean you can inspire people to study chemistry.

Chemistry was crazy from the get-go
Neither one of us knew why
We didn’t build nothing overnight
Cuz a love like this takes some time
People swore it off as a phase
Said we can’t see that
Now from top to bottom
They see that we did that (yes)
It’s so true that (yes)
We’ve been through it (yes)
We got real sh** (yes)
See baby we been…
~ Lyrics from Mary J. Blige’s “Be Without You”

I’ve been scratching my head over NASA’s choice to use incredibly talented R&B singer Mary J. Blige as their spokeswoman to help inspire young girls to go into math and science.

Don’t get me wrong, I love that NASA is trying to do something to alter the pathetic participation rate of women in the so-called STEM industries — science, technology, engineering and mathematics. I’ve written about the lack of women in STEM for a while now.

Only about 17 percent of girls take advanced placement tests in computer science while in high school, the lowest level of females among all such exams, according to the National Center for Women & Information Technology. And in 2008, women earned only 18 percent of computer science degrees, compared to 37 percent in 1985.

But why would NASA pick Blige of all people to turn this around? (more…)

The yellow buses have started to appear around town as kids go back to school, and suddenly we’re all thinking about books and learning.

Lately I’ve been getting more questions than usual from readers asking whether going back to school would help their job search, and many of you are considering online degrees because of the flexibility they can provide.

Well, cyber degrees, even from accredited schools, still don’t get respect from hiring managers, especially if you’re established in your career. (more…)

Next week we’ll be into September, and I know a lot of you have been waiting for the fall to arrive so you can really crank up your job search.

For some reason, no matter how old we get, we all seem to be on a school time clock. We sort of go into lazy mode in the summer, whether we have been in the work force for years or just graduated.

You shouldn’t kick yourself over this. The summer is typically a slow hiring season, and this summer was particularly crummy.

Since I won’t be blogging as much as usual this week, I didn’t want to leave you all in a lurch.

So, I figured I’d include a host of job-hunting article links here for you guys to look over in the meantime. Some stories are written by me and others are written by career folks I respect: (more…)

Someone should make an app for my iPhone that allows you to search a data base of employers who have come under fire by the government for employee mistreatment. If there were, fewer people would probably get sick from tainted food.

One of the biggest food recalls in history is going on right now. And guess what? The company responsible has a history of treating it’s workers badly.

Wright County Egg, an Iowa company, has had to recall more than 300 million eggs nationwide because of salmonella. The owner of the firm, Jack DeCoster, was called the “poster child” of worker mistreatment in a 2006 article in Boston magazine titled: “The Invisible Harvest Exploitation. Coercion. Poverty wages. New England has its own Grapes of Wrath, and it’s happening now. Inside the hidden world of the migrant farm workers who put food on your table.”

If any of you knew this, would you have eaten his eggs? (more…)

Recently I got an earful from my husband who thinks I can go over the top when it comes to work and family.

“Why can’t we just thaw chicken nuggets for dinner?” he sometimes asks when I’m in the midst of cooking a gourmet meal during the week and simultaneously complaining that I don’t have time to do anything. Preparing such a meal I don’t really have time to prepare typically means I end up working late at night on a story as a result.

“Everything doesn’t have to be perfect,” he has stressed to me more than once.

Well, I’m going to admit something to all of you. I need help. This stupid be-perfect battle often goes on in my head and it ain’t fun. Maybe it’s a super mommy thing, or maybe I’m just not right. Either way, it can sometimes cause great work-life balance strife.

In the end, everything suffers. It causes stress and who do you think will get the brunt of that, the family I tried so hard to take care of. And it doesn’t really help my work productivity level in the long run because at some point I begin to feel hopelessly overwhelmed.

That’s why I decided to run a guest blog post from a fellow career writer who doesn’t have this perfectionist problem. (Although I’d argue she seems pretty perfect.)

Yes, sometimes even the CareerDiva needs a career diva. (more…)

I’ve been getting endless pitches from PR folks about Steven Slater, the JetBlue airline attendant who quit recently in a spectacular fashion.

If you haven’t heard about him, he got so frustrated with a mean passenger that he cursed over the loud speaker, grabbed some beers, and then illegally unfurled the plane’s emergency slide, jumped on it and headed home.

Everyone, including me I suppose, is trying to jump on Slater’s new-found fame to advance their own agendas — getting press for a client, getting people to read stories and blog posts, etc. But much of the coverage has centered on how frustrated workers are today.

It is so true. I think a word may be added to our lexicon “Slatering,” essentially meaning, “take this job and shove it.”

It’s a great story and one that touches everyone because so many have daydreamed about slatering, but quitting the way Slater did is probably only acceptable once. So should the rest of us try to leave more gracefully? (more…)

It’s the same old tired anti-work-flexibility excuse I hear over and over again:

Most jobs need to take up most of your non-sleeping life; and you need to put aside your family and your personal life if you’re going to climb the ladder of success.

Well, I think that’s just bull.

I wrote a story for MSNBC.com that ran this morning on how women are redefining the meaning of success, and I know a lot of women and men will take me to task because not everyone has the opportunities to have a more flexible schedule. And yes, there is still bias against women, especially working moms, in the workplace. And yes, it’s still a man’s world and men still hold the majority of top seats at most every company.

But hey gals, how’s anything going to change if we just sit on our butts and complain? (more…)

I was a meeting on health care reform in Wilmington, DE, yesterday and U.S. Senator Thomas Carper, a Democrat representing the state, was on hand to tell us what was in store given the new legislation.

There’s so much in the law that bits and pieces have been coming out slowly, but one key part that caught my interest yesterday was discounts for employees who get healthy, up to 30 percent off their insurance premiums, the senator said.

Carper, a trim man who’s often seen jogging around Wilmington, seemed very excited about this provision in reform. If you lose weight, or bring down your blood pressure, he said, you can get a break on your insurance.

But what about the unhealthy workers among us who struggle with weight and medical issues? Is offering breaks on insurance, or financial rewards of any kind, actually a sneaky tax on the fat and unhealthy among us? (more…)

The job market is still struggling, but many economists believe employers are just reluctant to hire new workers even though many firms are doing better and could probably put out the help wanted sign.

But why should they hire any more workers? You guys are doing the work of two or three employees these days, and you’re not asking for more money.

Glassdoor.com, a job site, recently conducted a survey on employee confidence and the data was quite depressing:

* 29% are making less money than they have historically.
* Almost one in three (31%) have taken on more work without more compensation or advancement.
* And in the past 12 months, salaries reported by employees on Glassdoor.com have fallen an average of 8 percent since the prior year.

I know, workers are running scared thanks to employers who want you all running scared because if you are, you won’t ask for more money and you won’t complain that you’re doing too much work.

Well, many corporations are doing just fine my friends and it’s time workers realized that. (more…)

Look how relaxed Michelle Obama looks. Maybe more of us should be taking a page from her vacation bonanza.

There’s been all this outrage over the First Lady’s lavish trip to Spain. Yes, it was a dumb idea given the bad economy.

But I’m more outraged at another piece of vacation news that got little attention this week — a poll showing a huge number of Americans deciding not to take vacation this summer.

This is a really dumb idea and it won’t help you find a job faster or keep your existing one. (more…)