At Least There's Bourbon to Get Us Through Training

• Feathers rants
• New Review
• Warren's Sick and Twisted Pet Project Update
• 2023 Tax Time Blues
• Warren Gets Triggered
• Training Blues

Transcript

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Announcer 0:02

Had you actually read the email, you would know that the podcast you are about to listen to could contain explicit language and offensive content. These HR experts' views are not representative of their past, present, or future employers. If you've ever heard, my manager is unfair to me, I need you to reset my HR portal password, or can I right up my employee for crying too much? Welcome to our little stable. Welcome to HHR.

Warren 0:56

I can't even start. Welcome to Jaded HR, the podcast by two ADD HR professionals who want to help you get through the workday by saying all the things you're thinking, but say them out loud. I'm Warren. And I don't know if I like being called ADD, but this is feathers. I got distracted. It was like squirrel just as we're starting.

Feathers 1:20

And uh I completely lost. Hey, we're doing a podcast. But I'm also trying to think like, do I actually have a like my attention locked in all day long? God no. Absolutely not. I don't even need a squirrel. I'm just like, ooh, shiny thing.

Warren 1:38

Shiny subject. Yes. Yes, I I can't.

Feathers 1:43

Especially especially the older I've gotten. It's like the more crap that goes on like during the day with just the crap of idiot people. I mean, I now I keep I'm just like I want to go back to my own rant of like I really hate people. Um yeah, I just find myself even more sidetracked now because I'm just like, I no, I don't want to talk to you. No, because I told you what's last week, and you still haven't fucking done it yet. Like, yeah.

Warren 2:11

Yeah. But but that that's life of HR. We've got the glamorous, glamorous life of uh of doing dealing with those things constantly, constantly. I told you to do this. Did you do it? No.

Feathers 2:23

I I can't my favorite is I gave you the talking points. Like and you still effed it up. Like, like, how how can I gift their app this more? Because I'm not gonna do it. It's not my job. It's your job to actually explain this to your employee. Exactly. It's been a while since I've ran it. Yeah. Ranging feels good. Oh, it sure does. I need I need a therapist. I need my own EAP. I just need feathers EAP. I need FAP.

Warren 3:02

And that's called bourbon, is what that is called.

Feathers 3:05

Well, yeah, that's in the fridge. When I went to go get my water before the podcast, I thought about actually grabbing a bourbon.

Warren 3:11

I was like, no, no.

Feathers 3:13

My friend has a there might be a nightcap before the evening's over.

Warren 3:19

My friend has his little sort of a roller tray with their drinks on it, and it says, you know, their name, Therapy Center. And it was so I I'm I'm getting that for my house uh one day, therapy center.

Feathers 3:32

So uh maybe that might be my our our housewarming gift. Yeah, when you complete your new house.

Warren 3:39

Oh yeah, gosh. Can't wait. It's it's coming, it's coming. Well, now that we've uh wasted our time, thanks for joining us. I want to get kick things off here. As always, thank Hallie, our Patreon supporter, the original Jaded HR Rockstar. And oh, we do have a review, and I am going to pull it up as I talk. I should have pulled it up ahead of time, but organization is not my strength. Nobody's ever said I am the best organized person in the world. I hope that's a part of your competency models.

Feathers 4:17

Nope. I when you write your own competency models, you can just be like, nope, organization, nah, I'm good.

Warren 4:23

See, I hide it as I delegate, I hire well and I delegate well. So nobody ever sees that I'm a complete mess. Your odds behind the big screen.

Feathers 4:34

Ignore the person behind the closet. Exactly.

Warren 4:38

Um they're doing in there, but out here I'm good. The appearance is all that matters. Appearances. This is the 21st century. But uh, anyways, I was going to talk about the ways you can support the show. You can be a Patreon supporter like Hallie. You can donate through uh the links in our show notes. You can leave a review, and we just got a new one that I'm about to read, and uh tell a friend or contribute a story, or just come on, ask to be a guest, and uh I'll reach back out to you and see what we got. But we got a review on March 17th, and it is from our link Linkato, real R Linkatoe. I'm sorry for butchering your name, gave us five stars. So we got all five star, 17 five-star reviews, and one one star by a coward who didn't put anything in the comments. But my bad. But Relinkato uh says the title is hilarious and relatable. I'm not a podcast person, but this one is great. Exclamation point. It's hilarious, and the stories are super relatable. As I listen, I find myself remembering some of the nuances I experience in some of my HR jobs. It's nice to hear others have had similar situations. Some are so ridiculous, it's quite hilarious. What I really enjoy is I can actually sit through a whole episode without stopping after five minutes. If you're in the HR world, you really appreciate this podcast. So awesome review. Thank you very much. And you know, our stats show most of y'all listen to like 90% of the episode. So, you know, that's once once y'all push play on us, you're stuck. Or you're just driving and can't you can't grab your phone while you're driving.

Feathers 6:25

Like they listen to more than I listen to.

Warren 6:29

So oh, yeah, it's it's good. It all is good. So it's time for update number one on my pet project, my sick and twisted pet project.

Feathers 6:39

Oh, yeah. Okay.

Warren 6:40

Not much, not much to update it. I did as I planned, but I didn't quite do it the way I planned. I inadvertently scheduled our follow-up phone call with my 30-minute follow-up phone call for a day. I had a dental appointment, and uh I'm actually in the dentist's office, about to go back. I mean, I didn't know I was about to go back, but I just went, oh my God, I gotta blow this guy off. So I I sent him an email, hey, I'll blow off. I'll uh medical emergency. Uh had something come up. I I'll have to reschedule. I said, I'll call you to reschedule. Haven't called yet. He's called me back, and I haven't taken his call, so I will take his call and reschedule him maybe next time he calls. So that's all we are. That's all we uh have in my my pet project, but I'm I'm just I'm actually writing notes on what I'm gonna do to have fun with our guy. So you know, we're we're at the very end of March. This is gonna air on, unless I make a mistake like I did last week and put it out like two days early. Uh this is gonna air on the 29th of the month. So we're coming up on the end of, or coming up on the beginning of tax season or the end of tax season, whatever you want to look call it. And that is just such an annoying time for HR. Uh you know, we had a whole episode on it, and I'm not going to repeat that episode. You can go back and look in our archives for last year. But the things that people want to put on HR for their tax problems, they're not HR problems. They're your problems. Uh and just just this year, blaming HR because they didn't get the return they're expecting. Well, yep, I filled out your W4 for you. It's all my fault. I I did that. Uh blaming us for when they don't get their W-2. Oh, you moved, and when were you gonna tell us that?

Feathers 8:44

Well that's my that's my favorite. I love getting those phone calls and emails. So I haven't got my W-2 yet. Yeah, it's great. Did you move? Yes. Oh, to your point, Warren. Like, when were you gonna let us know?

Warren 8:58

Yeah, I I I didn't get my W-2, and I pull it up on the computer and I say, well, it was sent to 123 Main Street. Is that still your address? No.

Feathers 9:09

I'm like, okay.

Warren 9:10

Yeah, that that's I mean the the post office doesn't update you. Uh and it just kills me. They think among all our wonderful great traits and all the great things HR does that were tax accountants as well. Oh my gosh, we don't know your personal situation. We don't know your spouse's tax situation, we don't know any of that information. We're not gonna know HR person, even if they were once upon a time a CPA and a tax attorney, should ever be giving you tax advice. And so they blame, they blame us. And the fun thing I've I've gotten, unfortunately, recently, if you're familiar with lock letters, where the IRS says, you have been paying enough taxes, so your employee must claim essentially single and zero on their taxes for until we tell them not to. And they are not allowed to change this until we till you say it. And then you send them that letter, and oh my god, I just can't I can't do this. I need more money out of my taxes, I can't be paying this much taxes. Well, that's way out of my realm. So once again, HR is to blame on the taxes. And in the what two years ago, maybe three years ago now, the new W4 form that people fill out is it's kind of complicated. It's much more complicated than the previous one when you fill out for your federal withholdings, but it's not that bad, people. It really, really isn't.

Feathers 10:42

So no offense, Warren. I don't want you doing my taxes.

Warren 10:49

I I don't do my own taxes. I I have uh I actually outsource you outsource your taxes. I do outsource my taxes.

Feathers 10:58

Uh I oh so many jokes, so little time. Yeah. Probably all probably all inappropriate.

Warren 11:05

All will get us canceled.

Feathers 11:07

Uh but 100%. That that's a factual statement.

Warren 11:14

Yes.

Feathers 11:14

No, but I have a contractor. I have a contractor over there. It's fun. Yeah. My favorite is we had a contractor over there who asked us if they could take vacation and work for a month in Germany.

Warren 11:26

You're a contractor, do whatever the hell you want.

Feathers 11:30

It's like, why are you asking us? We are just the person you're contracting through. I don't care where you are. Yeah. Yeah.

Warren 11:38

Yeah.

Feathers 11:39

Yeah. Stuff wracks me up.

Warren 11:41

So no, I actually, a former baseball umpire friend of mine's a CPA, and he gives me a sweetheart deal on my taxes, so he does it. I'd rather just it not that mine are complicated, I'd just rather not deal with it. So anywho. Well, my main topic for today is training woes. And I don't know about you, but training is actually one of my favorite things in HR to do. I I really get into training. I get into preparing and creating training. I I get into reviewing and discovering trainings, like maybe pre-prepared trainings through vendors. I I really get into it. I I really but I'm also very, very, oh, I'm what's the what's the correct word? I'm very picky. I I want good speakers. I want if I'm doing a third-party training, and Lord knows I'm not a good speaker. Sometimes I'm better flying expert extemporaneously in front of a crowd. I'm that not better right now, but uh in front of a crowd and talking. I cannot read off a PowerPoint. Oh my gosh. You will never get death by PowerPoint through me because I just can't sit there and read a PowerPoint. But I I'm into training. It's never been the primary focus of any of my HR jobs. But there's been a lot of training going on, both trainings I have to do, and trainings I'm potentially reviewing for my company to use as uh uh a training service for us. But being in the DOD community, they mandate certain numbers of trainings, and they overall they are what they are. There's nothing great, flashy, incredible about them. But there's this one training, and I forget the title of it. All folks have to take it. It's a mandatory training. It is this dude who has the most monotone voice. And the training, it feels like it's eight hours long and it's not. But he's talking about in the NISPOM section, da da da da da da da da da da da da, subsection as modified by executive order, da da da da da da da da. All this stuff, everything that they speak about, he cites a source, and it's not necessarily because we're not like security officers, facility security officers, or anything like that that need to know the actual code. It's just for your rank and file person that has to do it. And then some of the questions ask you the code numbers. I'm like, I'm not writing down this training. Actually, I'll take that back because the same training for I don't know how many years in a row. I have written it down because you need to get at least a 75 or 80 so you can pass and not take the damn thing again. So I have written down the answers for that one is it's the same question each each year. So cheater. Oh, I'm a cheater. Well, if they don't want me to cheat, they need to change their their uh their uh presentation. They need to warrant proof it. Yeah. Idiot proof it, yes, they need to idiot proof it. But oh the the person's voice, and it it's put on by the government, so you can't give really feedback on well, they do have a questionnaire to ask for feedback, it goes to nowhere. But the guy's voice is so monotone and he does not know what he's saying, and it's just irks my nerves. Horrible, can't do it. But there's another training, and this one actually, it's either they've updated it recently or it's brand new altogether. I just get assigned to my trainings I have to do every year, and I just go through them. But the the speaker is a female, and imagine Harry Carey, like early in the game, like first couple innings before he's sloshed to hell.

Feathers 15:31

Before he's drunk. Yeah.

Warren 15:32

Yeah, before he's drunk.

Feathers 15:33

Oh, we're gonna go on to second base now. Yeah.

Warren 15:36

Yeah. Harry Carey with some like hard candies or hard mints in her mouth. And um, I can't concentrate on the material she's saying because all I can concentrate on is her voice. Wash being washed down with a bourbon. Yeah. She's got the right if if that's what she's doing, it's great. But I need that, I need that role. It's it's horrible to think that I'm thinking that this this woman has a Harry Carey type voice uh as well. And oh my gosh, it was it's hard for I'm cringing the whole way through, and I'm concentrating on her voice versus what she's actually saying. I'm like, it's it's in my head, and I have to listen to it for like an hour. Uh but it that's a new one. I have not had that one before. Either it's newly assigned to me or they just updated it. I don't, I don't know, don't pay that much attention to. I want the certificate, and that's all I want. I'm I'm I'm your typical trainee. I just want to get through this. And you need to do to do that. But also in my my training bonanza, extravaganza, whatever you want to call it the last few weeks, um reviewing some third-party, you know, sort of canned training videos, and one of them I'm reviewing to potentially use is a DEI, harassment, diversity, equity, inclusion, belonging, prepaid presentation. And there's some really good DEI trainings, harassment DEI trainings out there. But this one I watch, and I overall I liked it, and it's interactive, and you get to sort of choose your own adventures in some ways, like should you do this, should you do that, what happens if you do that? So I liked it overall. It's pretty cool as a training thing. However, it got to one thing and you're going through it, and it gives you a trigger warning on the screen. And it says the next section contains a trigger warning. You can press next to advance through the video office, or you can press this button to read a redacted transcript of this part portion of the training. I'm like, whoa, got my attention. Let's see what this is, especially seeing I'm evaluating it for potential use. So the the first trigger warning they put on this video was for lack of a better term, it was the content was objectifying women. And of course, I'm a father of a daughter. I'm married. I don't think women should be objectified in the workplace or anywhere else in the world. But the situation, situation one that was uncovered under this trigger warning was they had this really douchebaggy type of character. You know, they're acting it out. It's acted up. And he says, Oh, uh, check her out. She's so hot, you should check you should ask her out. And the other guy says, She's out of my league. And then it goes on to say, you know, this is inappropriate, da da da. And I'm like, did that really warrant a trigger warning? I I I I just don't get that. And the next situation, uh, it's a lady sitting at her desk, and the lady says, Oh, have a nice day. And this guy in the most put on creepsterish voice you've ever heard, he says, Oh, I'll have a great day if you just smile for me. And it was so hokey, it was so funny. But it also got me thinking, I can see like this little uh 80-year-old man saying something like that with zero malice, zero intent to say, but not maybe not that style the the voice they use for this creepster video. I I I you couldn't have made it up any better that he was being completely uh way over the top creepster voice. But if it's a little old man, I don't know. I guess tone plays a little bit into that as well. But it was it was weird. But then the last trigger warning that they put on was the whole thing was about a person. Uh you I couldn't tell if it was intentionally or unintentionally not using the proper pronouns for the other person. And I was like, I th I see these things as not professional. I see these things as moronic, bad taste, but I can't see anything that I'd want to put a trigger warning on the screen for for something like that. It is it is if if those type of things are going to trigger you, especially in a training type environment, we're not talking like horrible and and of course I I have my privileged white middle-aged guy vibe going on here, but I'm not I I don't see the need to put a a trigger warning on things like that. It's not, you know, rape or violence or anything that's gonna well, maybe maybe we need to not look at this type of thing. It's oh see how hot, you should ask her out, you know, type thing. Uh I don't know. Anyways, it was it it was just weird. And but it got me to pay attention to those sections as oh, trigger warning. Of course, I didn't hit the read the redacted transcript. I ooh, I want to see this. You know, what what train wreck is about to come my way that I get to get to see on this? So that was a little bit unnecessary, if you will.

Feathers 21:16

You keep talking about the old man and like, oh, just make me give me a little smile, maybe feel better. And here's a butterscotch candy. Would you like a worthers? Exactly. Oh gosh. I mean, I'm not many years away from carrying those in my pocket, so I might as well just go. I can't get the worthers out of my pocket.

Warren 21:36

Can you reach in my pocket and four? See, I I'm gonna make my own harassment training video.

Feathers 21:45

Oh I mean, that's not getting fired. We're going to hell.

Warren 21:50

My tickets flag and stop. The resignations are confirmed.

Feathers 21:55

No, I'm on the express train. I already knew that whatsoever. Like, there's no local stops, it's just like I'm jumping.

Warren 22:02

Claire, our listener who was on taught us about the bullet train to hell. And that's oh that's right. Yeah, the bullet train to hell from from Claire. Yep. Yep. I've I've had my reservation punched. Uh I think it goes for all HR professionals. They their uh their rever reservations are basically punched for that one-way trip. So anyhow. But continuing on our training motive, on Thursday, the day I had the appointment, I was working from home until the the appointment. And I was in the room with my wife as she's doing a training. And this training, the title is advanced whatever. She does payroll, didn't pay that much attention to it. And uh I went back after after hearing what she had to go through in this training class. I went back and I read as once again, I'm a geek and I'm a nerd. I'm interested in in training uh at that level. But the description at the beginning where you sign up and the information about says uh this course is for students with a strong foundation. They should be familiar with X, Y, and Z, and they should take into our basic and intermediate classes as well. So it puts that out there. But the first half hour of this training got absolutely nothing done. I don't know what sort of training platform they used for it, if it was a Zoom or whatever, but the presenter letting people getting people in and onto the program, it took at least half an hour to do that. And then as they're going through the training, I'm I'm sort of listening in the background. I do have an interest in in payroll. It's not, oi, I'm not going to do it, but I do have an interest in payroll, and I learned things from her and her trainings. But people who obviously didn't have the first clue about payroll were asking these dumb and ridiculous questions. If you're in an advanced level class, I thoroughly believe the instructor should shut you down. Hey, maybe this isn't the class for you if you don't know whatever it is. Oh, and the instructor was using some really cool terms. Instead of FICA, they were calling it FICA. Uh uh, what else? What other crazy term that they they were you misusing some terms like crazy, and that was once again triggering me to like I can't listen to a presenter who's not who's being that bad. But uh it goes on on. Well, either way, they did not even get halfway through the topics that were supposed to be, and these were for CPEs as well. Uh, they didn't even get through half the topics they were supposed to get through. So the instructor ended up scheduling another class uh the next day, another session to finish it up the next day. And it was just as bad as a dumpster fire. And and her company paid for her to take this training. I'm like, I I would leave. I told my wife, and she's you saw in a text this week of my wife being not so nice, but overall she's too nice of a of a person, and she uh wouldn't leave a nasty review for the person. Oh, it's not her fault. I'm like, yeah, it is. She didn't manage a class. Okay, put put your ass on mute because I can't listen to you uh ask dumb questions during the whole thing. But the instructor was out of her league on that too.

Feathers 25:28

So just just interesting training stuff. You don't know what your FICA score is?

Warren 25:33

My FICA score. That's FICO. That's FICO, yeah. Come on, John Cena, get it right. Right, yeah. That's my FICO score. I have thought about doing some online training of my own. Uh in all seriousness, I've thought maybe I should do some like Sherm certification training online or something like that. I'd I think I could have fun at that. And I believe it or not, I I don't know a thing or two. Yeah. And I've I've passed all those exams at least once. So maybe uh at least once. Well, I lost my I lost all my certifications because a prior employer didn't support them, and then I got to where I am now, and she wanted me to have them, so I I had to, because if they'd lapsed, I had to re-retest. So yeah, it's it was fun. But anyway, training is is a bitch. And I probably wouldn't feel the same way about training if I was a dedicated training person, and that's all I did every day, all day, every day. But for the man I do it, hey, it's sort of it's cool to me. I like it.

Feathers 26:40

So any. I want to s I want to see you facilitate like one of those big conferences. You should be like a Sherm speaker. I would love it. I I would love to, and you know secretly, because we don't know who she is, but like have Jan from Not Sherm approved. I think it'd be incredible if like she was in your class.

Warren 26:59

Oh yeah, yeah. Oh no, she could be a co-presenter with me. Jan, uh, we'll get you back to the.

Feathers 27:05

We can't because she she doesn't want to know who we can't reveal who uh not Sherm approved.

Warren 27:11

She can use a pseudonym and just be my uh co-presenter and we just have a ball rotting or you know, uh going there all out against and I I'm not anti-Sherm, I'm not pro-sherm, but I'm not uh I'm just Sherm. They they do they have some good things, but they have a lot of really stupid things as well. Hashtag HRDVa.

Feathers 27:37

Their online, like their database for articles sucks. Like I can get better stuff in Google than I can like going through their directory of materials.

Warren 27:49

Okay. I I was saving this for a topic for later, but uh ChatGBT for people are now using it for HR for writing job descriptions and things, things like that. And honestly, it's not bad. Actually, today I just got my Google Bard, which is Google's AI. I got to I on the beta tester list, so I got to join in on that, and I had some fun with it. Actually, I had it write a new intro for our show, which maybe I'll use on the next episode, which will be our beginning of season four episode. But I've been having some fun with it. I've it's it's interesting what we can do, but I think we're a long, long way from uh AI taking over a lot of our AHR jobs. I think it can definitely make our jobs easier, but I think we're a long way from any taking over of it. But yeah, it's it's it's fun. So a preview to some another topic I'm working on for a later date. But that's all I've really got for today without going into too much more detail. So remember to support our show. Check the show notes for links to our link tree and other places where you can support the show. Uh our best practice for today is get your shit together if you're going to try and do some training. And drink bourbon with it. Everything goes better with bourbon. Even cheap bourbon.

Feathers 29:16

It's like the it's like the FAP. The Feathers Assistance Program that I call daily. Where are you going at five o'clock? I'm going to FAP. You might call it happy hour, I call it FAP. Feathers Assistance Program.

Warren 29:31

It works.

Feathers 29:36

Yeah. So that should be a new hashtag. Next time you do something on um on social media, just do hashtag FAP.

Warren 29:49

Oh no. I I was thinking that was an inappropriate.

Feathers 29:52

Oh yeah. Yeah. There can be lots of connotations, and yeah, that's that's that's the sad thing now with everything. Everything can be twisted.

Warren 30:01

Um yeah, it it it's it's rough out there. But our disclaimer is read by the awesome uh voice artist Andrew Culpa, and the intro-outro music is Devil with the Devil by the underscore orchestra. As always, I'm Warren. And this is Feathers. And we're helping you survive HR1 what the fuck moment at a time.