This is good for my recent college graduate. I have no idea how she got her job, just happy she has one! Maybe her boss had to deal with helicopter parents and so they hired my kid. People need to get a life!
Sure. I’m all over Baghdad.
Short of teaching the kids how to commit armed robbery, there are a lot of things parents not only can do but must do to help their sons get jobs.
You have to be kidding!
This is the first I’ve heard of this. My kids all worked prior and during college so they know how to get jobs and conduct themselves in interviews.
This has to be a joke article.
If a graduate can’t handle their own interview or negotiations, no job. One phone call from a parent is enough to kill the kids chances of a job. End of discussion.
“Thank you for calling and voicing your concerns regarding your child, but based on this phone call you have helped me reach my hiring decision. Good-Bye.”
What happened to that program in school where the kids learn how to interview and get one day a month to go to work and get class credit?
I know in the 9th grade, they would load us into a bus and take us to the mall. We would have had to select a store, call ahead and make arrange to offer them free work for the day. Most of us loved it to get out of school and be at the mall, but also it was cool to go back behind racks at the stores. Oh, and eating at the food court while those ‘suckers’ were eating school lunch was kinda cool too, LOL! I remember I went one year to a shoe store and learned how to die shoes to match prom dresses. That was to prepare us for when we got an AFTERSCHOOL job. And assume also for when we graduate whatever school we completed?
So anyway, we had mock interviews and stuff.
I’m sad to guess they don’t do that anymore? And I’m not ancient, this was just in the late 80’s.
I disagree with the concept. Employers, and especially HR, hate interested parents, because parents can often smell a stinker deal from a mile away. Newly graduated students are naive, and can be taken as suckers by the unscrupulous, and are.
“I’m not sure we can hire another full-time employee right now, unless you were willing to work full-time for say, half-pay, for the first six months. Even though you’re qualified, there’s a lot of qualified people out there. So what do you say to being an unpaid ‘intern’ for a while?”
“We have a probationary period in which new hires work as contract employees. This saves everyone all the paperwork for things like health care and the other benefits of hires until we’re both sure you are becoming part of our ‘family’.”
“With the downturn in the economy, we are looking for personnel more interested in the many intangibles of working here than in just focusing on base salary.”
In other words, a lot of HR people are utter scum, too unethical to make it as used car salesmen for a fly by night dealer selling Katrina cars.
The best advantage of parents, however, is in bypassing HR entirely. They have a friend who knows somebody. And that person knows that a good job is opening, owes a favor, and will give the graduate the benefit of the doubt.
This means the graduate gets further and faster than they would if they did the resume dance, maybe shaving years off the time it would take them to advance at their new job. They have higher pay, and can pay off their student loans faster, which means they can get married and have kids sooner.
“Thanks, folks! It sure is better to be a VP than work my way up from the mail room. That other guy who got the mail room job is still there.”
I’d say anyone above age 15 or 16 who needs “help” getting a job from parents isn’t fit to have a job. (I mean beyond getting a contact name or something.)
I’m surprised at how many college-aged kids I hear about who have never had a job yet, or have their first job during college. I guess times have changed.
My daughter is way smarter than me, so she doesn’t need my “help” at all. I am serious, she will do just fine without dads help and I am ok with that.
Why are the HR people even talking to the parent in the first place?
I wasn't aware that October/November were known to be heavy college graduation months.
I'm retired, now, but when I was working, I hired a number of college grads. I absolutely assure you that a call from a helicopter parent would guarantee rejection of the kid.
I don’t even know where my daughter is. It’s top secret.
People have to be told this? Wow I’m amazed. If I were an HR person and someone’s parents did this I’d be keeping a list with names,addresses, and other pertinent info on it so that that person would never be hired at the place!