Values!

Yabba-dabba-don't.

Nostalgia’s a funny thing, right. Such is the passage of time and looking back on something you may’ve loved as a kid and held dear - only to revisit it in 2026 and go…. “That was good for a laugh but man, I can’t show my 7-year-old this”.

Wilma-get-in-here-and-make-me-a-brontosaurus-sandwich IS the joke. Fred Flintstone’s misogyny, to some, IS pure comedy. To look at the absurdity of the situation/scenario and find truth used to make us laugh once upon a time. [R.I.P. The Office].

As I push on closer to 40 here, wisdom’s done stuck itself to the inside of my brain cavity. Your joke, may not be someone else’s joke. And you know what? That’s okay. And where it’s especially okay, is at work.

This Résum•eh’s going to pivot from having a recruitment focus, if you’ll indulge me for 2 more minutes of your time.

A pet peeve of mine is employees at organizations who gripe about decisions that were made by their employers. “Can you believe we took this stance on __________?” Or, “I’m having a hard time grappling with the fact that we ___________.” First of all, it assumes that you deserved to know all the intricacies of what went on at a senior management team’s table. Spoiler alert: you don’t know, and don’t assume to.

Secondly (actually ‘finally’ because there’s not a whole lot more to this), if you’re struggling with decisions and stances and postures of your organization so badly that everyone and their sister knows about it, I have a magical solution for you! This is gonna blow your mind, ready for it?

Leave.

Yeah, leave. Easier said than done, Matt! Well duh, like, don’t leave unless you’re in a healthy position to make it happen financially etc. But you can always look to line something else up for yourself. Nobody’s stopping you, except evidently, yourself.

When you’re eyeing that next employer, genuinely ask yourself if they’re doing work that you agree with. Agreeableness is a huge part of someone’s job satisfaction. If you dislike what you do, and dislike what your organization is doing just as much (if not more), time to punch your ticket to the next roller coaster ride.

Values matter. Your integrity, matters. The things that you define yourself by should be reflected in what you do for your organization and what they’re doing for others.

When someone’s loud about their discontentment at work, the happiest ending for them is a resignation. I’ve never once thought ‘good riddance’ for those people when they finally announce their departures. If anything it’s ‘good for you’, ‘this wasn’t the end game for Todd’, ‘Sharon will be happier elsewhere’ - send them on their way with smiles and hopes for their career futures, that their next venture will better sync with their personal code of ethics.

Okay in a way, I guess it was still about Talent Acquisition…. Values based vetting is just as important as technical skills vetting. If you’re a Recruiter and you hire the right skills but wrong attitude, you’re doing your organization a disservice. Todd and Sharon may stick around and make some noise. And a lot of us, detest the noise.

-Matt