Is beauty in the eye of the hiring manager?

I am writing this post with great trepidation - why, because NEWSWEEK Magazine recently surveyed hiring managers and job seekers about the role of beauty in the workplace. The bottom line? It pays to be good-looking. According to the report, paying attention to your looks isn't just about vanity but economic survival.

According to the NEWSWEEK article handsome men earn on average 5 percent more than their less-attractive counterparts (good-looking women earn 4 percent more). NEWSWEEK surveyed 202 corporate hiring managers, from human-resources staff to senior-level vice presidents, as well as 964 members of the public. Fifty-seven percent of hiring managers told NEWSWEEK that qualified but unattractive candidates are likely to have a harder time landing a job, while more than half advised spending as much time and money on “making sure they look attractive” as on perfecting a résumé. Read the full results of the survey here:
http://www.newsweek.com/2010/07/19/poll-how-much-is-beauty-worth-at-work.html

Is there a cultural bias here - is this only in America? In his blog oyungapala.com, Oyunga wrote about "Why good looks count". He says "beauty is a premium and the multi-billion dollar beauty industry is proof. Women will always be judged by their looks first and all else after that. Ouch! At the end of the day when someone looks good their self esteem goes up but is it fair that because you won the "dashing looks" lottery at birth you have the right to make more money than your colleague who fell out of the ugly tree. A positive image can overcome any perceived deficiencies in the looks department. A positive image can transmit confidence, competence, reassurance and responsibility. It is important to realise our strengths and weaknesses, so that we can maximise the positive and minimise the negative.

What the.......

If you have sat through or given a PowerPoint presentation you may relate to this



Even the sharpest military minds in American were left baffled by this PowerPoint slide, a mind-boggling attempt to explain the situation in Afghanistan.

See full story here http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/julian-borger-global-security-blog/2010/apr/27/afghanistan-microsoft

'When we understand that slide, we'll have won the war,' General Stanley McChrystal, the former US and NATO force commander, remarked wryly when confronted by the sprawling spaghetti diagram in a briefing. PowerPoint has become public enemy number one for many US officers who find themselves battling slide presentations rather than insurgents. Some have gone as far as to declare all-out war on the software after the military command was over-run with mind-numbing 30-slide presentations.

There is really only one secret to good slides and that is simplicity. Each slide should be used to make one point only. Slides which contain too much information, or illustration, look cluttered and are difficult to follow. Too many words make the text small and difficult to read. As a general guideline it is best to have only six lines of text per slide and six words per line. Graphs and diagrams should be similarly uncluttered. If you feel that it is really important for your audience to have information in the form of complicated tables or diagrams, it is better to give them a hard copy. Above all remember this – PowerPoint is there to help the audience comprehend the message, and it should not be used as a prompt for the speaker.

How impressionable are you?

First impressions have to be taken seriously because they are very difficult to lose. If the impression is negative, it will stay with us for a long time, making it very difficult to create a positive image. We make up ninety per cent of our minds about someone in the first twenty or thirty seconds of meeting them. Analysts claim that our reaction to others is judged thus:
* 58% how we look
* 35% how we sound
* 7% what we say
There are many things that can make you stand out. The way you walk, the way you stand, the way you talk, the way you introduce yourself. We are naturally attracted to people similar to ourselves; it is a bit like an animal recognising friend or foe by the colour of its fur and the smell of its skin. While we don’t usually go round sniffing each other, the subconscious is very powerful, and that is one reason so much money is spent on research into perfumes and colour, for instance. The way someone dresses, speaks, the way they walk, the way they eat all helps to build a picture of that person.

If you run your own company or manage a department in a large organisation, you have to make sure that your images match. So what about the image of a company itself? If you work in grotty, scruffy premises and dress as though you do, you are more likely to under perform than if you dress to a high standard. All those things help to consciously and sub-consciously project a positive image. Whether we like it or not, the way we look influences the way we are perceived and received by others. Police reports all describe people’s dress and size as these are the first things we notice. You have to decide what image you want to impress upon people and try to make sure that you achieve it. Whoever you are, wherever you are and whatever you are doing, you are creating an impression. In business, impression is playing an increasing part in whether you are successful in getting a job and whether you are recognised as being suitable to continue holding that position and the likelihood of promotion.

Here is recent clip from K24 on teaching business etiquette with yours truly

"Our athletes should get smarter to conquer the world"

Sports Illustrated magazine announced the top earning sportsmen of 2010. There are not enough zero's on a calculator to show in Kenya shillings what some of these top athletes earn in dollars. And it's in the endorsements that the big bucks kick in. Even after being dropped by Gatorade, AT&T and Accenture for his philandering, Tiger Woods still made $70,000,000 in endorsing products from companies like Nike and Tag Heuer. Sportsmen like Woods are a marketers dream as they have the holy trinity of good looks and style, good communication skills and of course are proven winners.

Donald Kipkorir in an article he wrote in the Nation called "Our athletes should get smarter to conquer the world" said "Bolt, Woods, Williams, Beckham and Paquiao receive multi million dollar endorsements for few reasons - their eloquence, fashion style, poise, charisma and presence. Kipkorir says our athletes main language of communication is mother tongue or a smattering of Kiswahili or deep sheng - to most of them English might as well be Mandarin. After winning races they are hardly interviewed by international media and in the few instances when asked their strategy for winning they say something like this: "I run, I run, I run, I prayed and I win". He goes on to say with the money some of our top athletes earn spending a little part of it to be polished and presentable is worth every cent. When our athletes wear mitumba or suits made in River Road, their global reach will be beyond them. Unless they improve their style and image, social and communication skills and media relations, Coca-Cola, Pepsi, Nike and Puma will not call on them. The few millions in Kenya shillings they earn in a year will never be millions of dollars.'

What do your shoes say about you?

Did you know when we are judging someone on a professional level we often look at their shoes first before the rest of what they are wearing? Shoes can tell someone a great deal about you and how seriously you wish to be taken especially in a city like Nairobi where the twin forces of dust and public transportation can be lethal to the state your footwear. Here is a great video about how to shine a pair of shoes - watch this guy really go to town on buffing these brogues.

State to give cabbies, auto drivers lessons in etiquette

Don't get too excited its not happening here in Kenya but in India. I found this great article posted on etiquette expert Cynthia Letts website. I thought it was particularly timely given we are expecting an influx of international visitors when the African Athletic Championship begins next week on July 28th. We regularly host large international events and this is training that would not go amiss.

State to give cabbies, auto drivers lessons in etiquette
Parvathi Ramanathan, Hindustan Times
Email Author
Mumbai, July 19, 2010

As part of an effort to turn Maharashtra into a tourism powerhouse in its 50th year, the state government has taken on a project that its citizens had been waiting for - training in courtesy and etiquette for taxi and rickshaw drivers. The programme will kick off on Monday and will cover 2 lakh drivers, of which, 50,000 are from Mumbai. It will be part of the Visit Golden Maharashtra project, conceived by the Maharashtra Economic Development Council (MEDC) and supported by the Maharashtra Tourism Development Corporation and state government.

The authorities hope that it will help create a positive image of the state among tourists who come to visit. The state has engaged ‘For She Travels and Logistics’, that started the first taxi service exclusively for ladies in Mumbai and Delhi, to impart the training during the eight-month programme.

Each class will have 100 to 150 drivers and will last three to four hours.At the end, the drivers will be given certificates that they can display in their taxis.
The primary aim is to impart soft skills, such as how to address people respectfully. Drivers will also be taught safety norms, fuel conservation techniques and put through a refresher course on road signs.

Apart from this, they will be provided with information on tourist interests that they can pass on to visitors. “Often, we feel the need for this kind of information. Training in basic etiquette will do us all good,” said Mahim-based taxi driver Mohammad Ziaulla (43).

MEDC Vice-President (International) Vinod Gupta said the programme will help raise drivers’ business prospects and help the tourism industry.

“Taxi and rickshaw drivers are the first point of interaction for tourists. Their behaviour can create a lasting impression on visitors’ minds and affect how they feel about the city .”

The response from taxi drivers has been good.

Waiting for goosebumps

I’ve wanted to write about this for quite sometime now. This comes from watching and sometimes snoozing through one too many speeches by leaders (in politics and business) coming across as flat, uninspiring and being read. As a leader, speeches should aim be inspiring. When you aim to inspire, people should feel sincerity. Reading speeches is not leading – where inspiration is critical. For once I’d like to have a goosebump moment or have the hairs on the back of my neck stand up listening to a speech from a leader in Kenya instead of from a fictional one played on TV.

Whereas reading a speech may not necessarily mean you aren’t speaking from the heart, politicians like Obama or Blair are naturally good performers who are adept at using speech prompters, which make them look as though they have learned the speech, which is very seldom the case. They also have excellent speech writers and researchers who work with them on creating their speeches. But they also have a large amount of input so they are not just reading the words of someone else. It is always more convincing to speak without notes, but to learn a speech takes time and it means rehearsing. However all is not lost - Martin Luther King and John F. Kennedy most memorable and inspirational lines didn’t come from extemporaneous speeches but from written speeches. “I have a dream…..” and “ask not what your country can do for you…..” both came from speeches in all likelihood written by someone else.