Well tech-heads do usually know more than the "experts" because they have passion for it. Like I said, if Apple was serious about recruiting good talent, they would pay $20+/hour and get better people to work as "geniuses."
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So called "Mac Genius" doesn't know anything about Spaces ... or Leopard !
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Well tech-heads do usually know more than the "experts" because they have passion for it. Like I said, if Apple was serious about recruiting good talent, they would pay $20+/hour and get better people to work as "geniuses."
Oh, I've had the unfortunate experience of meeting them. They rock up in their suit and hope that because they wear a suit they'll get instant kudos.
For example, one guy at the ISP I worked at who trotted around (we had a front counter) at the front going through things on a customers laptop, couldn't get it working. Me? I wear jeans, skatey shoes, got a couple of bits of body art, I look over, say a friend hi, had a talk to the customer, fixed the problem in a couple of seconds, and she thanks me.
What does my boss do? "oh, you don't look all that professional wearing that when serving customers" - at what point did the customer give a toss over 'professionalism' by virtue of clothing? she wants her damn computer fixed! she doesn't care I'm wearing. What makes me professional is the fact I actually fixed her damn problem!
I'm not surprised if that is the case. More correctly, how you look rather than what you know defines whether you get hired and how much you get paid.
For me? if I was interviewing people, if you turn up in a suit, you're instantly off the 'short list'. Remember, I don't care what you look like, I hire you for what you know.
I'm not trying to make excuses for the Genius described by the OP, but how many of us are actually using Spaces? I haven't touched it and haven't been tempted. Has there been a poll on this--I'd love to see the results!
If you're a Genius, the least you can do is tap F6 one time to check your spaces, after you enable them of course.
Exactly... except F6 is Numlock on the older systems, they all default to F8 as the Spaces key... well... some of them default to F8 as the Spaces key... I guess the least you could do is enable spaces (off by default) and then remembering which key it is, hit that key to check the spaces.
I'm setting up a business at the moment and I could do with people like yourself, it's a pity you live in California ...
I agree with what you say about looks not being important but ... am I missing something here or do those two sentences you wrote contradict each other?
Are you kidding me? Spaces was one of the major new features of Leopard and you didn't even want to try it? It's one of the main reasons I upgraded!
Agreed, before Leopard was released I didn't think I would give it a second thought, now after installing Leopard on my iMac I can't believe how much more I use it over any feature in Leopard. Spaces is great for my work and it I no longer have to reduce the size of windows in order to share space on one screen. I just hate hiding and minimizing windows in order to use another app.
My email is full screen on space, I keep 2 or 3 web pages open in different spaces, I work a lot in iMovie and now it has it's own space. It's endless for me.
Also, most important, I can watch football in another space on my EyeTV!
My email is full screen on space, I keep 2 or 3 web pages open in different spaces, I work a lot in iMovie and now it has it's own space. It's endless for me.
Also, most important, I can watch football in another space on my EyeTV!
Agreed. On my 13" MB its proven worth the upgrade just for Spaces. Not so much on the iMacs but still useful.
...then...
You may not, but some people feel more comfortable working in a suit. If you were to start with an equal view of the man in suit, shorts or leather thong, then you'd be applying your sentiment consistently.
Having said this, in some places the dressing is part of the experience[tm], so working well is not good enough - you also have to look good. Otherwise your iMac would be sold as a functionally equivalent beige box.
"Has memorised lots of stuff" is rarely a good reason to employ someone; way too much emphasis is put on it in the hiring process. Better to have someone keen with well developed problem-solving skills who can learn new techniques and information as required.
In the specific case of a salesmen/tech support, the last thing I care about is whether they know a small difference in Apple's quoted battery lifetime - a figure that'll be estimated anyway based on the "average" new battery taking on the "average" load, where neither term will have been defined anywhere. But if they can helpfully look up the numbers for me when asked, then give me a detailed explanation of why I shouldn't take the exact figure too seriously, comparing with their real-world experience - then I'll be satisfied. A human is not a talking database.
Having said all this, last Apple Authorised Reseller I spent significant time playing in, I had free reign without being once accosted by a salesman thanks to a coquettish French girl coming in after about 5 minutes, attracting the complete swarm of assistants (all young men, coincidentally). I was more interested in the hardware, so it was to my great advantage that I could work unharassed
, scribbling little scripts to compare performance of various operations etc., where normally I'd have got an "uh, what ya doin'?" It was another example of humans responding to appearance.
This is good information to have--this is why I said I'd like to see a poll on this.
Did anyone else hear the MacWorld podcast on Leopard where every one of the panelists agreed that Spaces would be the biggest feature of Leopard that no one ever used? I really wasn't trying to be polemical; I just would like to know how many people actually use this feature
I don't quite follow this logic.
Why would Apple offering $20+(£10+)/hour make it more likely that so called tech 'experts' would respond to the job advert?
I completely agree with what has been said here by koobcamuk. The amount of information Apple store staff are required to memorise is minimal, and every single one of them should be 100% up to date with Apple technology and products.
I would even go a step further to say that those who can't are quite pathetic and shouldn't be working for Apple. The bottom line? You shouldn't apply for a job as an Apple salesman/genius/personal shopper unless you are 100% committed to the job.
David
That's illogical. It's not up to the employees it's up to Apple. If Apple's job requisition entails neat and clean employees with a high school education and good customer relations then that's all that you are going to get. If they don't require the employees to be tech heads then a person shouldn't back out of applying for a job if the company doesn't require him to be a Mac head techie.
Yes, it sweetens the pot if people applying are die hard Mac users. At first I thought most of the employees were but I have talked to a few of them and some are die hard Windows fanboys. It's no excuse, as a consumer I would greatly appreciate Apple training their employees to be very Mac centric but for some stupid reason they don't.
But the keyword here is "Training". It's not about someone applying that's 100% dedicated to the platform or the job, the company has to offer training.
No, so that higher quality employees would respond. The employee doesn't need to come in knowing every thing about Macs; as long as they're intelligent and focused on customer service, they'll be great for both the customer and for Apple.
The simple fact is, you aren't going to find too many good people at minimum (or close to it) wage. I've seen this time and again at different retailers. The ones that pay better have better employees; the ones that pay worse tend to have the laziest and most apathetic ones.
It seems to me that Apple is suffering from this same problem. The "geniuses" aren't being paid enough to care about their job, so they do a crappy job. Like most things, with retail workers, you get what you pay for.
Don't disagree with this, but when a genius hasn't even used Leopard yet, I blame Apple. Training is on the onus of the employer; I'm not expecting someone making a low wage to volunteer to buy a new OS and then use it, just so he can provide a benefit for Apple's customers. If Apple wants this (and it should) it should provide the training. If the "genius" doesn't follow through and remember enough, then it's a problem with that "genius." However, this "genius" indicated that he hadn't even touched Leopard yet, which is Apple's fault.
Yes, while they're on duty. How many hours do you suppose Apple puts towards training and educating their workers? Seems to be minimal to me. As long as the employee puts forth his/her best efforts to learn what's presented to him/her, we can't ask any more of them. If Apple wants to provide better customer service, it's on Apple to provide the training.
I agree with what you say about looks not being important but ... am I missing something here or do those two sentences you wrote contradict each other?
The point was getting across is this; don't rock up to an interview assuming that by virtue of wearing a suit, you're going to be instantly put onto the short list. Results and knowledge get one on the short list, not how you look. If you're a programmer, and you have 200 piercing's but write the worlds most beautiful code, you'll be hired based on those skill's, not what you look like.
But as a customer, when I go into a store, I want to be served by a person who knows what I need to know. Again, no use having a nicely dressed idiot - the customer leaving going, "well, that was a waste of bloody time!"
Who said anything about memorising? knowing you stuff is a generic term, I don't know how the hell you got 'memorisation' from that.
Average being, well, average. The fact the process is not always going to be at peak, it is assuming that you're not having things running full in the background, like encoding, that you take regular breaks and thus the laptop goes into low power mode etc.
Why not take it seriously? because everyones work habits are difference.
Having said all this, last Apple Authorised Reseller I spent significant time playing in, I had free reign without being once accosted by a salesman thanks to a coquettish French girl coming in after about 5 minutes, attracting the complete swarm of assistants (all young men, coincidentally). I was more interested in the hardware, so it was to my great advantage that I could work unharassed
Well, you wouldn't have that problem with me
As a customer, I'd like someone who is both knowledgeable AND well dressed
Believe it or not, dress is very important. Don't cast it aside as a secondary or tertiary attribute; the better dressed the employee, the more commitment he/she shows to being professional.
Another poster remarked that every single employee should know every single possible battery life spec.
Well, you wouldn't have that problem with me
Asexual eh?
JK
As a customer, I'd like someone who is both knowledgeable AND well dressed
Believe it or not, dress is very important. Don't cast it aside as a secondary or tertiary attribute; the better dressed the employee, the more commitment he/she shows to being professional.
I wish that were true - but having spent many years with people who assume clothing makes up for needing to do research and hardwork, you would be surprised.
I'm not saying that one should be grotty but at the same time, over attention to looks rather than substance will wear thin with the customer in the end.
When the customer leaves, what would you rather have, "he was well dressed but clueless - I'll never come back" or "he had a unique style, but he knew what he was talking about, I'm definitely going to come back here again".
Oh, well, if that were the case, it would be unreasonable. I don't mind if someone doesn't know something, its when they try to fudge things, that when I get peeved of.
Asexual eh?
"you take the french girl, I'll take the hunk checking out the laptop"
Don't get me wrong; I do value good work. However, I also value being well-dressed. If you have a unique style, that's great, but it belongs on your time. When you're on the clock, you represent the company, and the company will choose accordingly. Even if 90% of customers wouldn't care if you had a purple mohawk, that 10% is what worries the company. They don't want to offend anyone, and that's why they go with the better-dressed person (most of the time).
Yes, I wrote this too. It doesn't bother me if they say, "I think I need to double check, but it might be around..." That's much better than trying to impress me and giving me the wrong info.
"you take the french girl, I'll take the hunk checking out the laptop"
Ahh, but see, that means that you would be tripping over the hot computer nerds
You said "that won't be a problem with me," implying that no one would distract youTrust me, I know exactly what you mean. Here in SLC, I went up to somebody, after looking for a mini-DVI to VGA Adapter for a few minutes. He handed me a DVI to VGA, and walked off. I found somebody else and they handed me the same thing. I re-explained that I need a MINI-DVI to VGA. He then called somebody else over, and went to the back to grab one. He was back in 5 minutes. I was shocked that it took 3 people to get me 1 cable. x_x The crazy thing is that they hire people that have absolutely NO CLUE what Apple is, and turn down the people that can tell you anything you want to know about them. I applied, and they didn't even tell me that I had been turned down. Seriously, the Apple Store here REALLY needs to work on their customer service skills, and staff training.
You know what they say about first impressions ...
Also, this wasn't just any guy, he was supposed to be a "Mac Genius" - you'd expect someone special with a name like that! Or maybe Apple were just being a tad optimistic when they came up with that name ...
The greater risk for the business is that the customer will walk out before he's even begun to ask a question. Or you will solve the problem, but the customer feels uncomfortable around you and chooses to go elsewhere next time. (I've been guilty of this. To identify my error required a third party who knew both me and the customer.) Given a more complex problem, without the right combination of dress, tone, and language you might not get the customer to open up sufficiently - imagine a doctor dressed as a gothic vampire asking to listen to your heart
. The uncompromising man may be required when revolution is in order, but the average business would do better accommodating for its clients, not battling social norms.The point about being able to be talented and well-dressed has already been discussed. When my brother was about 6 years old, I remember his visiting a friend's house and being asked by the quite proper mother, "Would you like ice cream or cake?" Confidently he answered, "Both!" The response was shock. As we grow we fill our minds with false dichotomies, to the extent that it's almost considered rude to expect that someone perceives a wider set of possibilities.
Indeed, a divined substitute for a competent answer is the worst possible response. As CalBoy's example illustrated, I was simply arguing against assessment on the basis of precise knowledge of imprecise details; I should probably have quoted more than just your post
.As for those who work with me day-to-day, I couldn't give two hoots about how they dress around me, but I'm talking from the PoV that people don't just have to interact with me (a blessing for them, I'm sure
). Even then, people's choice of public dress is a priori based on how they wish to be perceived, which in turn reflects their character, so I'll usually find vague correlations between choices of dress and attitudes.Minimal?? That is simply insulting. The Apple Store doesn't just sell Macs and iPods, they have a whole bunch of third party accessories and software they can't remember or know everything. They also need to remeber their customer relations skills and sale techniques, store policies, POS systems, reservation systems. And as for Mac Geniuses i would hardly consider the knowledge they need to know to be minimal. They need to know everything the sales staff needs to know, they need to know every single component of every mac made since the PowerPC age and how every operation system since OS 9 works and how it could be relating to any troubles a customer has. They also need to know how to repair every iPod every released and every Mac released since the OS 9 age. I would hardly consider this kind amount of knowledge to be minimal.
Well this genius was clearly not living up to the name. It's understandable for him to forget a minor fact, or to misquote some fact about a machine. Not having used an OS that has been out for more than a month is something else entirely (again, which I blame Apple for).
And I just moved back.I'm setting up a business at the moment and I could do with people like yourself, it's a pity you live in California ...
It's expensive enough here, definitely won't be moving there any time soon. But seriously, hire people who put customer service just as high, if not higher, than knowledge. If I don't know something, and no one knows everything, I can just look it up or find out through some other means. Of course, you don't want to hire idiots either, but if they are, at least make sure they're friendly. Also, while a decent wage is nice, respecting your employees, especially if you're overworking them, goes a long way.
You'd think it would be kinda obvious. Pay better, get better people. If they can can paid more elsewhere, they will. My company did this, hired a bunch of people at a lower rate promising they'd get raises eventually. A lot of people just didn't take the job, some who did didn't want to keep waiting, some who actually did eventually get paid more groused that it wasn't as much as they were led to believe. Lots of turnover. The less competent people stayed because they probably couldn't get much more elsewhere. The stress didn't help either, as some didn't think it was worth it.
You get what you pay for, and if Apple can't pay a decent wage, less is what they get.
It happened to him, so it obviously must be happening to everyone else all the time.
For some reason, that's a common attitude around here.