"How do I break through the bureaucracy?" "What's the secret handshake?" PS: early process negativity won't get you an interview (quite to the contrary) and the secret handshake/bureaucracy break-through is being the best candidate.

Leave a message! Sometimes I don't pick up the phone because I am in the middle of something, and sometimes I can still see your phone number on caller ID. And sometimes I notice that you keep calling and hanging up without leaving a message (over and...

Is it just me or is GWP one of the most wonderful acronyms ever? Some of you (especially those with a shopping habit like mine, and/or some experience in retail) may know that a GWP,to is a "gift with purchase", a common marketing tool used in the cosmetics...

Oh, I know. I am just complaining. I was in Miami this week at a recruiting conference. I think that I mentioned that I am not big fan of flying (specifically: take-offs and turbulence) and given the fact that there were no direct flights to be found...

And is it really a blog if you have to register to see it? SAP should be thanking Cornelius. Instead, he gets a defensive e-mail from their "Business Community Manager". Yeah, you read that right...the person responsible for managing their business...

Yesterday, I met Christian and friends as host to the building 121 edition of the Microsoft Cafeteria Tour 2006 (MSCT2K6). Frankly, I think the whole thing is a ruse to take a long lunch and talk to people you would never ordinarily meet in your campus...

TheLadders was the reason for my visit to NY last week. That's Dewayne Martin, their VP of Strategic Partnerships (and Notre Dame fan...we forgive him) on the left and Michael Shafrir, their Senior Manager of Business Development (and Michigan Alum.....

here . It might seem ironic (well counter-productive, really) that someone from match.com is telling you all this but keep in mind that match.com makes it's money from single people. Once you get married, you aren't their target market anymore. So they...

I just got back from New York yesterday. I realize that I didn't blog much about my trip to Miami last week. My trip to NYC was awesome. Instead of long blog posts about my trips, I'll add little ones. Partly because New York was an amazing assault on...

Friday, I went to the Bodies Exhibition in New York (at South Street Seaport). Before you click on the link, let me tell you that you are going to see the human body in all it's glory and though I was unoffended, it may gross some people out and it could...

Speaking of being lucky (well, fortunate, really), I had the chance to meet Karen Salmansohn last week in New York. Karen is a real firecracker (hmm, not that I know anything about being referred to in that way) and who I think of as the dynamic author...

I really love these Seahawks ads (3 separate links here...check out the mini-mohawk), despite the fact that I am not really interested in professional football, for a couple of reasons. First, I'll admit. Lofa's a Trojan. So you know...he's part of...

Some things defy understanding. And I'm definitely not saying you should wear them to work.

Here. Hmm, hope some of those Zune folks show up in some meetings I'm in soon. I'd love to get my hands on it and check it out!

We talk about marketing at Microsoft, what my team does (Go team!) and advice on resumes and interviews . This also gives me the chance to consider that I still do have a midwestern accent and consider that people are very kind for not pointing it...

Short and interesting Washington Post article on what some companies really do with your recorded customer service calls. This call may be monitored for quality ourposes...and other stuff.

This is a pretty fascinating post. DaveVr is a User Experience Research Manager and talks about the complexity of cultural sensitivity in software development; specifically about how what you would think to be a simple task (changing land mines to flowers...

They are . Because we are trying.