2002: a job oddity

By JULIE MIDDLETON

There are always careers, colleagues and office cultures weirder than yours.

Blue suede shoes versus blue uniform

Wellington policeman Brian Childs' career got all shook up after his bosses objected to his part-time, off-duty role as an Elvis Presley impersonator. Childs, the champion of Australasian Elvis impersonators, resigned after being ordered to choose between his blue uniform and his blue suede shoes.

Crime never ... gets you a job

A burglar seeking to (eventually) earn an honest living was arrested by police after leaving his resume at the scene of a crime. Police in Switzerland found the resume inside a cardboard folder while investigating the theft of $6700 worth of camera equipment from a home.

Another good reason to be kind to colleagues Twelve Halifax Bank workers in South London resigned after discovering, four weeks after the fact, that their Lotto syndicate had won £625,000 ($1.96 million) each. They buy a month's worth of tickets at a time but never check until buying the next lot. When the syndicate's leader returned after collecting a cheque for more than $23 million, all 12 staff quit and left immediately. Volunteers filled the holes the next day.

Think before you drink

A Southland woman whose boss lost his dentures when he allegedly tried to bite her on the backside while they were out drinking lost her sexual harassment case. Alanna Barrett claimed constructive dismissal from the Bright Wood sawmill in Otautau but the Employment Tribunal said that as the incident happened outside work, it was nothing to do with the company.

So this is what they mean by downsizing Executives at a nine-staffer chartered surveying company in Edinburgh, Scotland, replaced their four fleet cars (an Audi, Mercedes and two VW Golfs) with 100cc scooters after running costs, parking tickets and traffic congestion became too much. The scooters use petrol by the thimbleful and company chief John McGregor says they may order another one.



John Davy has competition

An Austrian cleaner who set himself up as a dentist after he tired of sweeping the floors of dental surgeries has been jailed for burglary, causing bodily harm and making false claims. Wolfgang G, 28, treated more than 60 people using equipment and documents he had stolen. At least half his patients have complained of lasting damage to their mouths.

Take that and post it

Australia Post call-centre worker Cori Girondoudas lost out on $3200 in pay rises because she had four "personal items" on her desk instead of the permitted three. The fourth was a photo of her with friends. She says it's madness; her employer says hot-desking means personal items must be limited, and that she is the only one of 100 staff to complain.

The devil's in the detail

A travel company which advertised for a "friendly" catering manager to provide food for its staff was told it was discriminating against unfriendly people. The Job Centre in Bolton told Travel Counsellors it would have to remove the offending word before the ad could be accepted. The company's managing director was told that the words "motivated" and "enthusiastic" has also been banned in the past.

Now, this is innovation

A Thai company is providing people to cry at funerals, scream at concerts ($25) and slap faces ($50). It also runs a call centre so customers can have an argument or throw a tantrum. Founder Viriya Likitvong set up the business and gave it a name that translates as "anything you can think of" to help laid-off friends. But the Japanese are rent-a-crowd veterans. A company paying strangers to come to private homes, pretend they are the occupants' relatives, and exchange family gossip was first reported in 1995. Kazushi Ookynitani's "convenience agency" supplies "friends" for weddings and funerals and even "students" to attend lectures to keep up the lecturer's spirits. Recent wedding "friends" of one bride were given biographies so they could mingle more interestingly with real relatives.

Sick Bic trick nixed

Corporate financier John Carey, of Brighton, England, started hypnosis to stop him chewing through about 50 ballpoint pens a week. He was spending about $160 a month on pens after his company refused to buy him any more, and says stress started it all about five years ago.

Insurely not A Greater Manchester publican has insured his 24-year-old barmaid's greatest assets for £100,000 ($313,360) because they are good for business. Jane Booth, a 34D who earns £8000 annually at the Bricklayers Arms, in Altrincham, was shocked and embarrassed when she first heard about the policy, but seems to have taken it in good grace: "Now I have to be extra careful not to damage myself. I can only collect two glasses at a time."

A bad case of taking work home with you

In Germany, a man was charged with attempted murder for bringing top-grade plutonium home from work, waving it over his girlfriend's food and leaving the radioactive stuff under her bed.

Job opportunity knocks Hong Kong's Asia Television launched a show that offered a full-time job as its prize. On Win a Job, competitors were put through their paces filling out application forms and attending interviews as they competed for positions such as tour guides and dim sum chefs. Argentine and German TV companies have followed suit, despite criticism that the shows are exploiting the desperate.

Ringing the changes

Costco Wholesale Corp's firing of Kimberly Cloutier, 27, for refusing to remove an eyebrow ring at work constituted religious discrimination, according to the United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Cloutier is a member of the Oregon-based Church of Body Modification, which believes that piercings and tattoos are essential "spiritual salvation". Cloutier had filed a lawsuit for not accommodating her religious practice, as required by law.

Few jobs offer accommodation these days ...

The historic Shugborough Home in Staffordshire, England, announced a job for a hermit to live temporarily in a cave on the grounds - running water not available - to scare away trespassers. An administrator was said to be astonished at the large number of applications.

How not to get the attention of the financial controller

Among the personal items that former Tyco International chief executive L. Dennis Kozlowski bought and charged to the company - without permission, it says - were two New York apartments ($48 million), a Boca Raton, Florida, house ($57 million), furnishings and renovations ($14 million), a travel toiletries box ($33,000), an umbrella stand ($29,000), a shower curtain ($11,000) and a pincushion ($884) - plus half the $4.1 million tab for a 40th birthday party for his wife, a former waitress at a restaurant near Tyco HQ in New Hampshire.

This is called creative accounting Executors of a bankrupt Bulgarian company paid off employees in coloured combs - the only remaining asset. Some of the 630 former workers said they had tried to sell the combs, worth about 9c each, at markets.

Can you get ACC for overwork in a brothel? Australian brothel owner Mary-Anne Kenworthy closed for a day on April 30 because an influx of 5500 US Navy personnel on shore leave had left her staff worn out. A newpaper in the Bremerton-Seattle area of Washington state carried the story but later apologised to readers - many Navy families in the area apparently did not appreciate the news.

* Career will take a Christmas break until January 11.