More of What Not to Do

When seeking employment, it is probably not the brightest of ideas to ask potential employers if they do criminal background checks as part of the application process. Someone called me, trying to get a hold of one of my managers and asked that question. I honestly couldn't tell her, but I think it's a safe bet that IBM would. Of course, I barely squeaked out a response to her question, since I couldn't believe she was asking me. Thank God I didn't go with my first sarcastic response of "Why? Are you hiding a felony?" She seemed like a nice enough person - except for the fact that she kept calling me even after I told her the manager was busy for the next half hour in a meeting. And she had another employment question (Do I look like the human resources department?), so I finally transferred her to human resources and let them deal with her. But let me tell you where her application would have gone if I were the one to decide such things: circular file.

Then one of the ladies I work with mentioned how she had a coworker that was arrested for drugs and will always be denied employment at certain places because of it - even though she's turned her life around and the felony is a decade or more in her past. And how sad would that be if the lady that kept calling me had screwed up in the past and now has picked herself up off the ground and really made something of her life? But she can only get certain jobs because of a mistake in the past. That would really suck.