The Laid-Off Life: Old Logos Never Die, They Just Get Rebranded

A lady once asked renowned industrial graphic designer Raymond Loewy, "Why did you put two 'X's in 'Exxon'?"
"Why ask?" he replied in return.
"Because," she said, "I couldn't help noticing."
"Well," he responded, "that's the answer."
- Alan Fletcher, The Art Of Looking Sideways

We speak a lot about personal branding when we’re positioning ourselves for job hunting. Whatever we present ourselves as – our résumé, our portfolio, our cover letter, what we wear to an interview – becomes our 'brand', the impression people remember about us in a concise thought.

Social Media expert Lon Safko once said, "We don't control our brand; our customers do." And that’s the truth. We can present ourselves any way we choose, but it’s not the impression we give, it’s the impression those we’re trying to affect receive, and those could be very different messages. Because, believe me, once your brand is out of your hands, it's like trying to take pee out of the pool - you can't undo it.

Companies spend millions and millions of dollars trying to affect our impressions of them, to solidify their brand in our eyes, minds, and, almost more importantly, in our hearts. Sometimes we control our message, sometimes our competitors control it. It’s all about perception. Macs are for hip, trendy people; PC’s are for stodgy business people. Dunkin’ Donuts is for the working man; Starbucks is for tree-huggers. Red Roof Inns are for thrifty travelers; Super 8 Motels are for the transient. University of Phoenix is a progressive new form of education; ITT Tech is for dropouts. Do your best, but what people feel a company’s brand is – or what your personal brand is – is the impression you leave.

You may not have a personal logo (unless you’re a creative like a graphic designer or typeset artist, you may), but a corporate logo is often the lasting impression a consumer gets from a company. A logo can express so much in one design, be it the Golden Arches of McDonald’s, the dot-matrix simplicity of IBM, or the colorful text of Google. And that’s why companies change logos with the times to reflect new environments, new design sensitivities, or new directions (or occasionally to distance themselves from old public impressions – see: Altria née Phillip-Morris, or eliminating, well, stupid names – see: Yahoo née Jerry and David's Guide to the World Wide Web).

All of the well-established companies in the grid below have extraordinarily world-wide recognized logos, but they have taken a winding path to where they are now. How many of the companies below can you recognize from their original logos?

(Note: Some logos altered to remove the company name. Click on the graphic to see a larger version. The answers are at the bottom of this page.)

Quiz: What Companies Original Logos Are These?

In completing this quiz, what impression did you get from the logos above? How different are the impressions you get from the old logos than the ones you get from the current, established, recognizable logos? It’s no wonder that companies spend a fortune on logo design and implementation – and protection.

So think about how this relates to you: what impression does your personal brand give potential employers? How much of the impression you wish to impart is in your control and how much of it do others control? You may not have a logo, but everything you do and everything you present constitutes your personal brand. Read over your resume, your cover letters, your attachments and additional materials you’d use to apply for a job and ask yourself what is your brand and how does your brand stick out above your competitors?

Because - trust me - you don't want your brand in someone else's hands:


(Logo quiz answers at bottom).

Michael Hochman
LaidOffLife@yahoo.com ◙ Laid-Off Life on Twitter ◙ Laid-Off Life on Facebook

Michael is a Copywriter, Creative Marketer, and Broadcasting Professional still in search of full-time employment after 15 months of full-time job hunting, thanks to an "involuntary career sabbatical". A Philly native and Syracuse graduate, Michael will gladly accept any job offer you may have for him. Any. Really. Please give me a job??

"Oh, you hate your job? Why didn't you say so? There's a support group for that. It's called everybody, and they meet at the bar." - Drew Carey

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(Click on company name for current logo)

a: IBM (International Business Machines)
b: Shell Oil
c: Kodak (initials of Eastman-Kodak Corporation)
d: Pepsi-Cola
e: Starbucks
f: Canon cameras and copiers (in the original Japanese: 'Kwanon')
g: Xerox
h: Nokia
i: Apple Computers (Isaac Newton sitting under a tree)
j: Ford Motor Company
k: LG (in it’s original 'Lucky Cream' Lak-Hui logo before merger with Goldstar)
l: Microsoft
m: FedEx (the full name 'Federal Express' was dropped in 2000)
n: Walmart (the one-word-no-hyphen name was official as of 2008)
o: Volkswagen
p: Mercedes
q: General Electric (note the original stylized G-E)
r: Boeing
s: Mazda
t: Firefox from Mozilla

The Laid-Off Life: Browser Envy

"The Internet browser is the piece of software that puts a message on your computer screen informing you that the Internet is currently busy and you should try again later." – Dave Barry, humorist/columnist

Is your Internet slow? Is your Internet busy? Have you reached the end of the Internet and need to start over? Well, just go to giveusallyourpersonalinfo.com and we'll fix your computer right up over our personal Internettes.

The problem with most computer users is that their computer is not slow and confusing, it is that they are slow and confused. Despite calls for a return to sending 'classic' mail and filling out applications in person, 99% of your job hunting will be online. And if you're gonna spend that amount of time online (and of course not on Facebook or YouTube or ICanHasCheezburger), you need to browse smarter and better.

Have you been using the power of your browser to help you search for jobs more efficiently and with greater organization? No? Well, you have no excuses. Let's talk browsers, job hunter.

First, quick: what browser are you using?

If you don't know, I'm sorry but a) how did you find this website and b) why are you wearing leg-warmers and Jams?

If you answered Microsoft Internet Explorer, please go to the back of the line. Unless you have a specific reason for using IE (like you work at Microsoft or you’re online at the public library), you should not be using the grandma of browsers. Ever. No, not then. Never. Just stop now before your IE crashes both our computers.

If you answered Safari, you’re a Mac person (or a crazy person, or likely both). I’m sorry, but you’re in a minority since only 4.3% of you out there use Macs. On the good side, most viruses aren’t created for Macs since there’s so few of you. The bad news, developers don’t care about you.

If you answered Opera, you’re either an anarchist or you’re web browsing on your Wii and I can’t help you.

But if you are one of the 63% of web users using Mozilla’s Firefox or Google’s Chrome browsers, then you know about the power of add-ons. Third-party add-ons are probably among the top reasons that the market-share for Internet Explorer has dwindled from nearly 85% in 2004 (when Firefox was introduced) to merely 30% as of August 2010. I don’t care what industry you’re in, that’s a huge loss of share.

Like applications in the Apple Store, for most anything you need, there’s a Firefox add-on for that, whether it be to make your browsing faster and easier, or to make your layout look prettier. And there are several great add-ons or extensions made just for job hunting. If you go to the Firefox Add-On homepage, you can search add-ons for 'job search' or 'employment' or 'jobs' and find a bevy of helpful extensions and toolbars like JobSpeaker (a search organizer), Indeed Job Search (a job aggregator), DoNanza (for freelancers), Search4Jobs (an extension for Monster.com), oDeskJobs, and JobsBridge. And these add-ons work great to help you aggregate from your favorite job-search sites like PhillyJobs.com.

There’s also a myriad of tools to help your social media job search with add-ons for LinkedIn (Companion for Firefox), Craigslist (CraigZilla), and of course Twitter (TwitJobSearch, JobTweet, and more). There are also a plethora of extensions for Google Chrome as well. Not as many, but as Chrome’s popularity increases, more and more third-party developers will create versions of their add-ons for Chrome.

Do yourself a favor… first, if you’re not using Firefox or Chrome, start doing so now. Secondly, take a browse through the Mozilla add-on site and give a few of these job search helpers a try. And don’t stop there. There are so many tools in add-ons that make life on the web so much easier and smoother, like Hyperwords, CoolPreviews, Paste Email, Undo Closed Tabs, Stop AutoPlay, Ad Block Plus, and my favorite, Lazarus (which I’d be lost without). Making your browsing experience simpler, faster, and less frustrating will only lead you to more job opportunities for you because you'll be browsing just that much smarter.

(PS: I also highly highly suggest installing a utility program to clean unwanted files and registry errors to speed up your computer and your browser. My recommendation is the wonderfully-useful 'CCleaner' program from Piriform, as well as their defragmenter called 'Defraggler'. Do it now.)

And in the end, that's the goal, for things to be simple so you don…


Michael Hochman
LaidOffLife@yahoo.com ◙ Laid-Off Life on Twitter ◙ Laid-Off Life on Facebook

Michael is a Copywriter, Creative Marketer, and Broadcasting Professional still in search of full-time employment after 15 months of full-time job hunting, thanks to an "involuntary career sabbatical". A Philly native and Syracuse graduate, Michael will gladly accept any job offer you may have for him. Any. Really. Please give me a job??

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"Oh, you hate your job? Why didn't you say so? There's a support group for that. It's called everybody, and they meet at the bar." - Drew Carey

The Laid-Off Life: Burnt Offerings

"The hardest thing in life is to know which bridge to cross and which to burn." – David Russell, Scottish classical musician

It’s that time of the month to break open the Laid-Off Life mailbag. I received this question from a fan (long time listener, first time caller) in Philly:

"I find myself a leading candidate for a position I'm pretty sure I'm not qualified for. I haven't lied on my résumé or to any questions asked of me in any interview. But in getting to understand the position, I'm pretty sure I am under-qualified for the job, and there's a lot I'd be expected to do that I don't know how to do. Maybe they think that they're pretty sure I'd be able to do anything I knew how and figure out anything I didn't, but if that was the case, I'm not sure I'd agree with them. I haven’t brought up these concerns to the interviewer (obviously). Would I be wrong to take the job if offered? Lord knows, I need the money, and I need a job, but I'm stressed as to what I should do. Should I accept a job offer for a position for which I'm pretty sure I'm not qualified?"

(Editor's Note: above letter not actually from Kevin Kolb. But it could be.)

Wow, I don’t even know where to start. First, I would suggest asking someone much smarter and with more experience in these matters. I don’t have human resources experience, nor any inside-knowledge above my own personal understanding.

However, that previous paragraph starts to answer the question itself. I have sat here for 23 weeks now writing pseudo-advice columns about job hunting even though I’m "under-qualified for the job" and even though there’s a lot about writing this that "I’d be expected to do that I don’t know how to do". My only expertise is my own life experience. And I would suggest that follow that same advice. Take that life experience – or work experience – and use it to learn as-you-go. Use the skills you have, and develop the ones you don’t.

I’m going to try to expand on this, coming from both sides of the equation. First, I suggest you take the job, no reservations. You say you didn’t lie on your résumé or in your interviews. I’m going to go out on a limb and also say that you didn’t lie-by-omission either. I’m not suggesting that you give your interviewer a laundry list of all the things you don’t know how to do, but there’s a fine line between making yourself look good and perjuring yourself, between under- and over-selling yourself. I trust when you say you didn’t lie, you didn’t fail to mention any huge elephants in the room. It’s a moral question, I suppose, and only you know if that is the case.

One would have to think that given all of the information on hand available to a potential employer – your résumé, your interview, follow-up conversations, background checks, social media searches, LinkedIn listings, industry contacts, recommendations, references, psychic readings – that the onus at the end falls on the employer. Caveat emptor can go both ways (caveat employertor?).

There are two ways that this can go at this point:

They were right (and clearly very visionary) and you wind up thriving in your new job, learning quickly as you go, and using your already-established skills to excel at the position. The things that you didn’t know how to do you learned, and they weren’t the hurdles you thought they would be. Your new employers were aware of your theoretical shortcomings, even if you didn’t think they were. See, you had nothing to worry about.

They were wrong (and clearly without insight) and you wound up over-your-head in your new job, fell behind before you even started, and it was a bad match for all involved. You were assigned tasks you didn’t know how to accomplish, and needed to ask for help so often, you were starting to get a reputation as a time-waster and a liability. Your shortcomings became quickly apparent, and it was true that they had expectations of you that were unrealistic. There were things they thought you knew and skills they presumed you to have. If you’re lucky, they’ll realize they overestimated you but know how much time and effort they’ve already enlisted in your hiring. Maybe they’ll have patience and allow you to learn the skills you didn’t before and give you the chance to catch up. If you’re less lucky, they will decide it is best for all to part ways, no-harm-no-foul. They know it was their fault (again, assuming you didn’t lie about yourself), and they just have to bite-the-bullet. You were just an employee that didn’t work out, and you go your separate ways.

Regardless of whether you are over- or under-qualified for a job, the burden is on the company to shuffle through the haystack to find the right needle for the job. Despite all the analytics and research that goes in to filling a key position, it’s a crapshoot. Sometimes the house wins, sometimes the house loses. They’re going on a small percentage of information they’ve gleaned from you, and making a best-guess. Most of the time, they’ve hired the right person for the position, and things proceed seamlessly. Sometimes that doesn’t happen, and a smart company will know that it’s not your fault (again, if you haven’t lied) and sometimes crap happens. Then it’s up to them whether or not to continue the experiment or cut their losses. And hopefully they won’t be bitter or retaliatory if you aren’t the right fit (or, more directly, just can’t do the job).

Which brings me to the other alternative: Don’t take the job. If you really honestly think that you cannot perform the duties as assigned, even if the employer seems to think you can, pass. You know you much better than a company will ever know you before you start. They’re opinion is based on a one or two page résumé and a couple hours of speaking with you. There’s bound to be a lot of things about you and your skills that just don’t come up, or aren’t delved into deeply enough. Even if you’re the greatest idea person in the world, it will never come through if you don’t have the skills to implement them. Only you can be the proper barometer as to whether you can really do the job or not.

"But Michael," you ask, "why not just give the job a shot and if it doesn’t pan out, then you admit the error and quietly have the job annulled?" Good question, you. If you take a job and fail, you’re affecting three different sets of people: you, your employer (or lack thereof), and other job seekers.

If you take a job you shouldn’t have, picture the impact on the person that finished second. It’s possible they were actually the perfect person for the position, they just didn’t express that as well as you apparently did. In the time between you decide to take the job and possibly fail at the job, that person may have taken another not-as-good job, or they may have moved on to something else unknowing how that will end. Maybe they were generally excited about the job, and could have taken the company to much higher places. And maybe losing this job was their last straw and they’ve just had enough and… well, I’ll let you fill in the rest.

What about how it impacts the employer. They’ve spent money, time, and resources hiring you, training you, and accommodating you. They’ve planned work and projects around the assumption that you’ll be there and doing the job well. Your failure or departure leaves a big hole in their plans and could have a ripple effect on the work produced by having to cover your sudden not-there-anymoreness. Depending on how far in to the job you would get, all other appropriate candidates may have moved on and they’ll have to start the process all over again. And one guess who they’ll blame.

And of course, there’s the affect on you. Primarily on your reputation. Whether or not it’s true, the perception will be that you sold them a bill of goods, you bait-and-switched, that you’ve Rick-Rolled them. And remember how small a world this is, especially in the social network cloud. You never know when your perceived transgressions are going to follow you, and you never know who will pop up again in the future at a different company. The person you let down at Initech might very well show up when you’re interviewing at Taggart Transcontinental. Be careful reaping where you’re sowing.

So there are the various states of affair on both sides of the coin. I have no specific advice further than do what you feel is right and best for you. You can decide that if the company sees something in you, who are you to argue, or you can decide that walking in to a job you have no business having is bad business for everyone. But no matter your choice, the outcome will come back on you.

But like I said, I’m not an expert, I just play one on TV.



Michael Hochman
LaidOffLife@yahoo.com ◙ Laid-Off Life on Twitter ◙ Laid-Off Life on Facebook

Michael is a Copywriter, Creative Marketer, and Broadcasting Professional still in search of full-time employment after 15 months of full-time job hunting, thanks to an "involuntary career sabbatical". A Philly native and Syracuse graduate, Michael will gladly accept any job offer you may have for him. Any. Really. Please give me a job??

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"Oh, you hate your job? Why didn't you say so? There's a support group for that. It's called everybody, and they meet at the bar." - Drew Carey