The Water Cooler

Snow

7:16 AM

I have no idea why I'm #1 for the year. Maybe other people have a life...

gnat

8:54 AM

-4

Q: Are drug tests for job with Military Security Clearance require a Hair, Blood, or Urine Test?

Do cannabis drug tests for job with Military Security Clearance require a Hair Blood, or Urine Test? I am curious since, I can pass a urine test for 45 days, and blood test for 60 days, however, I Cannot pass a 90 day hair test (since weed stays longest in hair). Would like to know.

^^^ is this question reposted or my memory tricks me? I feel like I have seen it already about a day ago

Kilisi

@DarkCygnus don't worry, it's fits and starts for me, Right now I have a big project that has me either installing equipment on an airplane and training people, or stuck on the laptop monitoring systems a lot with not much to do. My next project will probably be onsite crawllng through ceiling spaces onsite and I won't be bothering you chaps much for a while.

NotThatGuy

5:37 PM

Maybe this is a bit vague and broad and not answerable in general, but how does one figure out what exactly a job would look like when interviewing?
I read an interesting job description which includes some specific responsibilities, but I don't really know what those things would look like in the real world or whether I'd be able to (or want to) do it, nor can I think of specific questions that will help me with that.

I kind of just want to ask to spend a few hours shadowing someone doing the actual job (or do it myself), but I imagine that request might not go down so well before having accepted the offer.

NotThatGuy

6:05 PM

I've been asked the same question so many times by recruiters, interviewers and coworkers, I could've saved so much time had I just started by recording my response and then playing it back each time.

DarkCygnus

6:27 PM

Sup guys

any mod round here?

@Snow you there?

@Kilisi aww I didn't mean it that way, just noted that you were closing on reps, as you have participated more lately :)

I'm doing some not-so-minor rework to some tags on our Meta

I noticed we don't have a burninate request

and that also our tag synonym and merge are confusing, as other sites have synonym request and retag request, respectively

I created the burninate-request tag

and plan to rename the merge to retag-request and the tag-synonyms to synonym-request

As our tags are somehow a mess I take it that no one will object I organize them a bit :)

damn, we also have a retagging tag ... but I guess that is more of a meta-ish tag....

DarkCygnus

6:46 PM

i see

we were using merge to ask about merging questions

but also to ask for tag merging (aka retag)

DarkCygnus

7:04 PM

wheww.... done

Snow

7:28 PM

@DarkCygnus Yes, I'm here. Did you still want me?

DarkCygnus

8:01 PM

@Snow just to let you know I took several edits to our meta tags. Included a burninate-request one (as we had burninate requests but no tag), did a tag retag (inception) on merge -> retag-request and tag-synonym -> synonym-request

added Excerpts to all of those, and even Wiki to the burninate one

BradC

@NotThatGuy Figuring out what the job is really like, day to day, is often difficult. This might make for a good question on the main site. A few of my thoughts:

1. Asking to shadow an employee for any period of time is probably unrealistic, in my opinion

2. I would try to ask about specifics of the job: "would I typically spend more of my time on (taking support calls) or (writing new code)?"

3. Or perhaps you don't know enough yet to ask about those two options, be more general: "what might a typical day in this position look like"?

4. Should have put this first, but do some research online about similar positions, if you can find anything. Obviously, how each individual company works will still be different, but you will better understand the "norm", or at least be better prepared to ask specific questions

NotThatGuy

8:18 PM

Thanks. I have tried the "typical day" question, but the answers are generally a bit too high level to be useful. I might try to ask them to give me a high-level overview of / walk me through a typical task they do.

BradC

@NotThatGuy Yeah, that's why I prefer the "how much time would I typically spend on (tasks of one type) vs (tasks of another type)". Like, "maintaining existing systems" vs "building new ones" or maybe "working at client sites on billable projects" vs "making sales presentations to get new customers"

or whatever the role demands

They can always say "oh, about this much/that much, but also (task of a third type you didn't know to ask about)"

See also: working in teams vs working alone

Or working from home vs working in the office

Or almost anything

There are some roles for which you go in for an hour-long interview, and then go home. There are others for which you might have 2 or 3 or more extended interviews, some of them several hours long. In the latter case, it might be plausible for you to ask about meeting some of your (possible) team members, or to see the office space in which you might be working.

But if it was just a single pop-in interview, I wouldn't feel comfortable asking that.

So your mileage will definitely vary. But even in short interviews, "where would I be working?" (office vs cube vs telecommuting) is a very relevant question

Feeds

8:34 PM

-1

Q: Is using comments to point out flaws in answers frowned upon here?

As a Stack Overflow user who wanders over to Workplace sometimes via the Hot Network Questions section, I'm not sure I understand the commenting norms here, and would like to present a case study. I recently commented, twice, on the answer at https://workplace.stackexchange.com/a/119260/25356 to...

discussion comments

Ronnie W.

9:45 PM

I know this may be late or off topic. And I don't know if this is possible - but can we have a rule about avoiding political discussions at the water cooler? Just like a real workplace, I don't feel like they ever end well. I feel that is a primary contributing factor for the recent exits.

I understand we may need to discuss them in context of a question, but beyond that it just feels like bad news.

DarkCygnus

@RonnieW. hey there, I missed such discussion, care pointing me to it?

I've never seen such thing discussed here... or perhaps yes but lightly...

Still, this is the Watercooler for a reason :), just like a real workplace, the watercooler is a place to relax from the professional setting

Ronnie W.

Well it was many moons ago. I don't think I want to dig up old threads. There is a chance this discussion has already taken place.

Kilisi

@RonnieW. we might already have that rule... I'll experiment. Chiefdoms seem the best political system to me....

Or perhaps monarchy

Lilienthal

As per my comment earlier I am in strong favour of dictatorship. Or perhaps a Cult of Personality. God Emperor Lilienthal does have a certain ring to it.

Kilisi

Anarchy would be preferable to most of what we have these days

DarkCygnus

9:54 PM

Most of what we have these days is in fact Anarchy :/

NotThatGuy

Catarchy for life! (that's like a monarchy, but with a cat at the head, or an anarchy with lots of cats everywhere)

Kilisi

na... most of what we have these days is basically Mafia

DarkCygnus

God, I miss Pharaohs (which I suppose is what Lil was talking about)

Kilisi

Catarchy sounds cooly... but I'm leaning towards 'Lethargy'

Ronnie W.

My idea of a perfect government is one guy who sits in a small room at a desk, and the only thing he’s allowed to decide is who to nuke.

-Ron Swanson

Lilienthal

9:56 PM

@DarkCygnus Well, it's more of a Warhammer 40K reference than one to Egyptology but that also works. :)

Kilisi

Pahroahs had pretty cool outfits

Pharoahs too

NotThatGuy

Let's create a new form of government where we just roll dice to make all decisions. "Oh, no, a 6, guess we're going to war :("

Lilienthal

Kind of breezy though, no? Can't help but think you'll have some interesting tan marks walking around half-naked with a few million bob worth of gold on you in assorted shapes.

BradC

There were definitely some heated political discussions in here, most of the time they got split out into standalone chatrooms

Last one I was part of was quite a while ago

Lilienthal

I can't find a meta post, but I know the topic has come up in this chat a few times. Semi-related is this:

DarkCygnus

9:57 PM

@NotThatGuy but with 20d

Lilienthal

8

Q: Should we allow political opinion to be part of the questions and answers?

Leader of a small, public project. Hired employee and later discovered that he supports a widely despised public figure While I tried to clean it up, I think the questions and answers have too much political content to remain. Thus I think this question should be deleted. If we start allowing p...

discussion

Kilisi

I love gold

Lilienthal

Which sort of covers our stance on politics, in that it should be avoided as a topic on main.

That largely goes for this chat as well, though as always there's fewer rules here.

DarkCygnus

@BradC so it seems... fun left this chat some months ago, and we've been working on the new version of fun :)

Lilienthal

As a rule I'd suggest avoiding getting into a political discussion. It's indeed not what the chat is for and doesn't tend to ever end well.

Kilisi

9:59 PM

Celtic anarchy would be cool, awesome outfits, and they look pretty warm... solid gold torque has always appealed to me...

and you can have the cult of personality as well

Lilienthal

I believe other moderators have requested people drop discussions in-progress before, but anyone in chat can speak and ask people to drop a discussion when it becomes problematic. I would hope that most regulars would respond to that and realise that things are getting to heated.

If things spiral out of control, that's what chat flags are for.

Kilisi

you can flag in chat?

DarkCygnus

yes

Lilienthal

You can yes, and those are handled by all online moderators.

So it's cross-site.

BradC

Yep, I think spinning off into separate chatrooms is the right approach. My old "BLM and Feminism" chat room got closed eventually for disuse

DarkCygnus

10:01 PM

Is that different from the chat flag handling sometimes I see appear?

I thought all users on chat could sometimes receive a flag review

Lilienthal

Yes, that's also true.

Kilisi

say something I can flag

Lilienthal

I'm not too sure on the distinction, but people with blue names are moderators and those tend to get them more often.

DarkCygnus

The funny part is that I've never seen a review that actually had rude or off-topic content

@Kilisi lol :( almost fell for it hahahaha

Kilisi

hehe

Lilienthal

10:03 PM

I'm sure I don't need to remind everyone that they're not there so you can flag people who disagree with you... But if things are devolving into bickering, flag it as such and you'll probably see a handful of mods appear in the member list fairly soon. Just don't be surprised if they end up freezing the room to calm things down.

Kilisi

we don't have a handful of mods left

DarkCygnus

@Kilisi Lil was saying that other mods can come here to bring order

Like some time ago, with that ... incident we had with that other chat room I won't mention

Kilisi

oh sad, don't want to air our dirty laundry n front of everyone!

Lilienthal

It's why I'm not going to say something you can flag either. Chat flags tend to disrupt people and people who handle them volunteer their time. :)

Anyway, @RonnieW. you may want to bring the topic up on meta instead of chat if it's bothering you. It's a better medium to address site culture as you'll only get a handful of people in this room at once.

But I need to sign off, take care all.

Kilisi

take it easy

DarkCygnus

10:06 PM

@Lilienthal you too Lil, see you later

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