I’m traveling to Canada to visit Chad’s family. It’s actually quite exciting, and I hear British Columbia is rather beautiful. I’m armed with my fancy *electronic* passport and my carry-on.

Here’s hoping my steward(ess) doesn’t bail on me pre-flight.

Hopefully I just struck a couple old CFOs dead with that statement. Enjoy the Fourth Circle*!

Notice that I said sole purpose – in truth, business never has one sole purpose, but many purposes. It’s the unfortunate reality that most business owners focus solely on profit. I’ve worked in small businesses before, and it’s usually the same line: sales and marketing are the darling departments, with the product development house a close second, and other departments and functions regarded like an appendix: they’re part of the structure, but no one really knows what they do, and people believe they’d be better off without it (*ahem* HR).

My point is thus, and to be fair, it isn’t anything new: profits are a means to an end. To exactly what end, however, is where I disagree with so many. Good business, in my opinion, is predicated not only profit, but employees and social responsibility. Think about it: we treat businesses like real people. They have legal rights and responsibilities, can defend itself in court, and so on. So why does the maxim “business is business” continue, when the stark reality is “business is people”?

Taking this metaphor a bit further, like any person a business can do a lot of bad to itself and still manage to function. A business with a C-Suite at the helm that’s concerned blindly on the balance sheet is like the fat person eating McDonald’s everyday: unhealthy, counter-productive, and ultimately, it’ll kill you. You need a balanced diet. And let’s think a bit further on this. We read countless articles on how we must give back to others, to our communities, and that through giving we get back more. And yet, so many businesses do not do this, usually in the holy name of the “bottom line” (piecemeal be upon it).

I firmly believe that a good business is built on three things: profit, reinvestment in employees, and reinvestment in the community. Profit’s a no-brainer: have a solid product and appropriate strategies to sell it. Then re-invest that profit into your employees. No, I’m not talking about expanding the marketing department to drive the sales engine; that’s reinvestment in the organization. Reinvesting in employees is giving your staff the opportunity to develop, either by providing training for new skills, wellness programs – anything that will increase employee engagement and trust. Reinvesting in the organization is ultimately a part of reinvesting in your employees, because you’re increasing the amount of organizational resources available to your employees.

Social responsibility, or reinvesting in the community, is the business giving back to the community in which it resides. A lot of companies have charities they donate to, and I advocate that the charities and causes be local to the business. Being an active philanthropist as a business helps build community trust, and when the community trusts your business, the community will in turn invest in the business by purchasing those services and products.

The key to building a business isn’t just in the product and the price it’s sold for. A good business knows its greatest assets are its employees, and its best supporters are the community around it.

* The Fourth Circle is a reference to Dante’s Inferno, where the greedy were consigned to their punishment.

What I enjoy most about this ruling is that Judge Walker’s decision rested on the premise that the measure didn’t pass the “Rational Basis” test (in addition to violating the equal protection and due process). This essentially means that, yes, there’s no good reason to keep homosexual couples from marrying. Yes, it took a court case for the truth of the matter to come out.

I think the vast majority of Americans, McDonald’s-eating dullards that they are, don’t understand the inherent wisdom in the Founding Fathers and the writing of the Constitution. I’m not saying that Thomas Jefferson or Benjamin Franklin would have accepted or advocated for or against gay marriage, or any of the civil liberties that have come into existence since they’ve died. What I am saying is that these men had the foresight to know that society changes, and as society changes, they wanted a document that could adapt to those changes, while preserving what they considered to be basic, inalienable rights due to everyone in that society.

This isn’t about a right to marry in a church, to have the same Catholic marriage rites afforded to us as they are to heterosexual couples. This is about equal treatment in hospitals, equal treatment under the law, and equal access to the same services and benefits awarded to heterosexual couples. Get it right folks, and stop using the cloak of religion to mask what is nothing more than virulent bigotry. No amount of prayer can absolve you of ignorance and stupidity.

I have a YouTube account. With a video of me, cooking while camping. So you’ll forgive the lack of hair and makeup.

One of the most important things to me is authenticity, which goes hand-in-hand with truth and other qualities like it. Authenticity is important to building an audience and building credibility, but I’ve witnessed a lot of people building authenticity and had myself thinking, “How in the world can they be doing this?” I thought about it, cursed a few times, had a beer, and then it came to me. Well, really, it just came to me, but whatever.

Community. In other words, these “authentic” people (Bloggers, Tweeters, what-have-you) have essentially found others willing to agree with their ideas and opinions. In this world of social media, those folks are also (usually) willing to reshare the content. And so the cycle goes, turning into a self-sustaining circle jerk of like-minded personalities that does nothing but recycle and re-hash the same content and ideas.

Cliques, anyone? My, how little changes from high school…

The next step, of course, is the “community” self-styling itself as a collective of experts. This works, by the way, because of how “authenticity” is constructed; it’s akin to a virus, really. And bingo: you’ve got a load of bullshit coming down the pipeline, probably 2/3′s of which is more self-serving drivel to position the community as experts, and the other 1/3 consisting of the recycled content.

So in the beginning of my post, I singled out the HR/Recruitment social media space. My bottom line opinion about it is just what I’ve written here: a bunch of self-styled (and self-rewarded) influencers who do more collective hot-air blowing than any real change. I can’t even count how many blog posts, Tweets, and statuses have reflected and condemned some of the worst HR practices – discrimination, bad decisions, etc. – and yet, I’ve seen nothing remarkably changed about the industry by all of these “influencers.” So, again, my contention is that their “influence” stops as soon as it hits the computer screen.

And so the illusion of expertise. Expertise on a subject goes beyond just knowing it and talking about it. Expertise would have you effectively sharing these ideas to enact meaningful change. If these “influencers” can’t produce meaningful change in the industry they purport to represent, the only thing they’re influencing is other people’s perceptions of them.

Sorry, I’m just not that into you.

Right now I’m feeling sorry for myself for a variety of things, which has placed me into a mindset where I want to do the following, in exactly this order:

1. Crawl up in a ball with a blanket;
2. Turn on the TV to some History/BIO/Science channel and focus on whatever special they’ve got.

I feel like a lot of bloggers spend a lot of their time advocating using every moment that you have to do something – start a business, find a job, change your life – but sitting on your duff and being depressed? There simply isn’t time! Turn that frown upside down! And so on. Simply put, the American lifestyle does not want to permit you to be sad.

People are like this partly for selfish reasons. Emotions are contagious, so if you’re unhappy, you’ll tend to make others unhappy when they’re around you. Hence, they want to make you happy so they can feel happy. Feeling sorry for yourself, though, to me is like grieving: it happens. It’s a natural part of life. You eventually move on and move forward. People pushing you to “get happy” need to “get fucked” because they’ve been in the same boat of self-pity before.

If you’re feeling sorry for yourself, wallow in it; it’ll get better. If you’ve got a friend or family member in the same condition, support them and help them work through it. There’s no harm in indulging in self-pity every once in a while.

Apparently it does to some people. The Huffington Post featured an article on a company who noted that the unemployed need not apply in their requisition. This sparked a fairly heated debate on there and several reactions across the blogosphere, and this is what I’ve gleaned:

1. Most recruiters are morally sensible enough to know that not hiring someone based on employment status is dispicable;
2. Those that do justify it are douches and tools of the highest order;
3. Somehow, this all has to do with something financial (wee ha, huge surprise);
4. Somehow, this will lead to a disparate impact case. I would hate to be that hiring manager.

I can’t wrap my head around this at all. Maybe it’s because I’m not a recruiter – or maybe I’m just not this stupid – but what does employment status say about a person, especially when so many are unemployed right now? This is infuriating, depressing, and just plain pathetic all in one. It’s maddening to know that there are recruiters out there who would literally not even look at my qualifications because I was laid off. Are you saying the only talent worth employing is the kind worth stealing?

There are those recruiters that tow the line of “Well, it’s what my client wanted, and it’s not discriminatory so…” This line of thinking didn’t work in Nuremberg, and it’s a boat of bullshit here too. Recruiters, have the common (and ethical) sense to tell your client that disqualifying unemployed people is probably a very bad idea. Do you want to be that company or that recruiter? You reap what you sow, folks. If you aren’t willing to help people, and choose to hide behind policies and bureaucracy, don’t tweet your tears when you’re unemployed and nobody wants to help you.

Thank you to the recruiters, hiring managers, and others who understand that for many of us, unemployment wasn’t a choice or something that came about due to bad performance. It’s good to know that there are plenty of good people out there who are willing to help those in their time of need.

Is it really always on?

Perhaps what I mean can best be illustrated with this example: my boyfriend gets mad at me if I don’t answer my cell phone. He will call once, twice, as many times until I pick up with an exasperated “What?”, to which he replies with an equally exasperated “Hello?” My point is that because I have a cell phone, he felt I should be available at all times. Several harsh words and a stern tone later, my boyfriend now understands that just because I’m mobile doesn’t mean I’m available all the time. Do people realize this with social media?

The Internet world is all about speed, and indeed, when a customer makes a complaint online you want to address it with due course and quickness. But does this mean you need to have someone stalking the corporate Twitter feed at 3 AM? I don’t think so. The other facet to social media is that it’s all about relationships, about people – and people don’t operate 24 hours a day. We all need a breather and a moment to step away to gather our energy.

While our mobility – meaning iPhones, Blackberries, etc – have enabled us to access social media on the go, I believe that this brings another layer to the “accessibility” issue. Followers, fans, and friends can all come to expect you to be “there” in an almost omnipresent fashion. Here’s another example. I had a follower on Twitter join my feed, and about four hours later I had a chance to sit down to my email and send him a ‘thank you’ DM. By then, he had already un-followed me.

While I love the fact we can access information from pretty much anywhere in the world, just because you can doesn’t translate to you should. Everyone has priorities away from their social roles and we need to respectful of that part of the relationship we have with those people. I can’t say it any plainer: give me my space!

The conference really began for me on Monday. Arriving in Philadelphia, I had a few hours before I was set to go to the tweet-up that was sponsored by Chevy. I made the delightful acquaintance of the Reading Terminal Market – a place of so many culinary delights it was like entering an amusement park built for food. After a delicious turkey reuben at Herschel’s East Side Deli, I retired to my room for some mindless television. 6:30 rolled around, and I lazily walked my way to the pub where the tweet-up was being held. It was a small crowd to start, but attendees meandered in as the 7 o’clock hour passed. After indulging in what was truly horrendous eats, I had the pleasure of meeting up with I met up with Katherine Holmes – my fellow RecruitingBlogs winner – Jennifer Lewis and Cheryl from SafeNet. After some wonderful conversation, I ended the evening with Katherine at this quaint Italian bistro called Le Baia. Homemade gnocchi and pomodoro sauce makes for a happy Jonathan!

So, the day of the conference. After a 6:30 AM wake-up call, I checked out of my hotel and went to the Convention Center. After registration, I found myself a table and enjoyed a morning bagel. Then the morning sessions began. I found most of them to be quite informative. I sat in on the HR and General tracks, and it was great to listen to the success stories of Monster and UniSys in using social media for recruitment efforts and customer engagement. Valeria Maltoni’s session gave some great, data-driven ideas on how to use social media – it’s all about the conversation.

Then lunch. Another disappointing offering from Aramark: dried out bread (masked as “brioche”), thinly packed with whatever belonged in the middle, along with sides that made you wonder what perverted mother wanted to serve this to her child. Fortunately, Reading Terminal Market saved me once again. This time I had a sandwich from Dinic’s, which offers a variety of Italian-style pork and meat sandwiches. Can we say delicious? I had a sandwich that consisted of roast pork, broccoli rabe, and sharp provolone on a soft sub roll. It was like eating a $25 pork dinner on a $8.75 sandwich.

The afternoon sessions were equally as good as the mornings. Shel Holtz’s presentation on the future of social media was engaging, entertaining, and informative – it looks like there’s a lot of potential in the future. Listening in to Molly Di Bianca’s presentation on the legalities of social media was also informative. It was really interesting to hear about social media from the legal perspective (hint: it’s all about covering your ass!). The day ended with an HR panel with several notable HR names. We mostly discussed social media and how it can be used to build talent pools – or talent communities – and the value of maintaining such a community. I left the panel feeling the overall value of these communities is that you can keep people engaged with your organization and build your credibility.

All of that said, there are a couple things I’d have liked to have seen. First, there weren’t many social and networking opportunities. I think more sessions with a roundtable approach would have been much better. Also, Monster and Unisys both had separate sessions where they discussed their social media program success; I would have loved for a discussion panel session when it would simply been a discussion of social media best practices. Also, I think a networking hour – or some social “hub”, like a charge station for laptops and smart phones – during the conference would have been a good idea. Lastly, I came away feeling that the conference was very Social Media 101 – I’d like to see some kind of “Advanced” track for more seasoned social media users.

And please pick places and vendors who know how to cook.

It was a great experience, seeing so many people I’ve only ever met online and learning so much. I had a great time and I would definitely attend again next year!

…OF DELICIOUSNESS! I was inspired by the classic dish Fried Chicken with Waffles. I’m a pretty big health nut, so I don’t do fried foods and buttery baked goods often. So, I came up with this healthy alternative. I found a recipe for the pancakes via Epicurious, and I did a couple tweaks to build on the health of it:

• I used 1% Milk instead of Whole Milk, which saves about 100 calories and 11 grams of fat.
• I used a tablespoon of honey instead of sugar. I prefer to use honey because it’s unprocessed, and I think the honey makes the batter a little sweeter, softer and silkier in texture.
• I used 1/4 cup of olive oil instead of vegetable oil.

To make the chicken, you’ll need:

• 1 lb of skinless chicken breast
• 3 eggs, beaten
• 2 cups of Panko breadcrumbs
• 1 cup whole wheat flour
• 1/2 Tbsp. salt
• 1/2 Tbsp. pepper
• 1/2 Tbsp. cinnamon

Combine the flour, salt, pepper, and cinnamon on a plate. Place one cup of Panko on another plate. The eggs, seasoned flour, and panko should be lined up in this order: egg, flour, panko. This assembly line setup will make it easy when you dredge the chicken. To dredge the chicken, take one of the breasts in your dominant hand: dip into the egg. Remove from the egg, holding the breast so excess egg drips back into the bowl. Take the breast and coat with the seasoned flour. Dip into the egg again, and then coat with the panko breadcrumbs. Repeat for all pieces of chicken.

You can then either bake the chicken in an oven, or grill it in a saute pan. I used some olive oil Pam and did it in the saute pan. Let me tell you: this is REALLY good. The cinnamon in the seasoned flour gives the chicken a really wonderful warmth that goes well with the crunch of the panko. When you eat a piece of chicken with a piece of waffle, it’s an explosion of crunch in your mouth. The sweetness of the batter mixes with the cinnamon, and it gives an aromatic, sweet crunch that goes down as softly as velvet cake.

Okay, that may sound a bit contrived, but this recipe is freakin’ awesome. So there. And the best part about these waffles is that the peanut butter gives a robust, savory flavor and texture to the waffles which makes them REALLY versatile. I had leftover batter, and I put fresh banana pieces right on top of the batter before I closed the waffle iron. Heaaaavenlyyyy!

So eat up, and enjoy!