5 Red Flags to Look Out for in Job Descriptions

5 Red Flags to Look Out for in Job Descriptions5 Red Flags to Look Out for in Job Descriptions Lets face it Many of us are guilty of being job description skimmers. Once we see a title that were interested in, scan a few of the qualifications and check out the salary, we often want to apply as quickly as possible to get ahead of the competition.But doing so will only set you up for disappointment down the line. Either recruiters will ignore your application because youre not truly a fit, or worse - youll end up at a job thats not right for you.To avoid that hassle, its best to look out for subtle clues ahead of time. Fortunately, they can often be identified right from the very beginning within job descriptions themselves - here are a few key indicators to be mindful of.Job descriptions should always give job seekers a specific idea of what the role involves and what background and skills are required, so that job seekers can determine whether they are well -suited for the position.If the potential employer cant describe what a job entails, how will they operate as a manager? A vague job description should be a major red flag for job seekers, as it suggests an unfocused employer and a job that will lack structured goals, says Daniel Shoch, recruiter at RippleMatch .Nebulous job requirements may also signal that the opportunity is a scam .Scammers will list job requirements that are simple and easily qualify a large group of people. The requirements may be as simple as being 18 years old, a citizen and having internet access, without listing prerequisite years of experience or levels of education, explains Justin Lavelle, Chief Communications Officer of BeenVerified .While job seekers should be wary of insufficient requirements , they should also keep an eye out for job descriptions with too many requirements.Job descriptions with TONS of basic qualifications indicate that the employer truly has no clue what they are seeking, or wha t it actually takes to get the job done, says Jennifer Tardy, founder of Jennifer Tardy Consulting, LLC .This will either make it near-impossible to get through the screening process, or challenging to meet expectations if hired .Ideally, job descriptions should be a two-way street, describing not just a laundry list of what the company needs, but also how the role and company stand to benefit you.If the job spec only talks about what they expect from you and nothing about what they can offer in return, this is a definite red flag for a poor company culture that wont invest in you and your development, says Karly May Green, HR Manager at Builtvisible . A good job description should offer a balance of both and leave you in no doubt that this is a company in which you can grow, develop and be appreciated .A few pieces of company information to look out for in particular include mentions of competitive salaries, generous benefits and/or the companys mission and values.The old say ing, If its too good to be true, it probably is definitely applies to job listings, especially when companies mention earning potential instead of a concrete salary.Job descriptions that state an earning potential of a wide range (i.e., $45,000-$200,000) are jobs to STAY AWAY FROM. This almost always means that its commission-based, and youd expect to make the lower end of this range, but they want to entice applicants by putting six figures as a possibility on the listing, explains Val Streif of Pramp , a mock interview platform for job-seeking engineers, software developers and product managers. Much like a multi-level marketing scheme, very few (if any at all) of the people in this position are earning the top potential. fruchtwein make the lesser number.Commission-based jobs arent always a bad thing, but its something to be wary of when you first start - especially if they exaggerate your likely commission, Streif adds.Cleverly-disguised references to a companys poor work-life balance are rampant in job descriptions - for example, its common for a job description to list flexibility as a helpful trait, but if flexibility is over-emphasized in a description through repeated references to qualities like able to change directions quickly, able to work independently immediately or agile or nimble, it may be a sign of chaos in the workplace, says Amy M. Gardner, Certified Career and Career Transitions Coach with Apochromatik .Another sketchy phrase? Must be willing to wear multiple hats or must be able to handle highly stressful environments.These can be indicators that the company is short-staffed and doesnt value work/life blend, says Kyle Elliott, founder and career coach behind CaffeinatedKyle.com .Moral of the story? Pay close attention to those job descriptions. You dont have to thoroughly inspect every single job post with the right title, but if theres a position youre seriously considering applying to, its well worth taking the time to read the description through in its entirety. Remember A few minutes of extra effort today could pay off in spades down the road.

The Race for Space Weapons Speeds Up

The Race for Space Weapons Speeds Up The Race for Space Weapons Speeds Up The Race for Space Weapons Speeds UpOn March 27, 2019, India tested an antisatellite weapon by destroying one of its own satellites. While a similar Chinese test in 2007 sparked widespread protests, the Indian exercise seems to have largely escaped front-page headlines.Yet observers believe its aftermath will be debated for years to come and may eventually concern people who never think about such things. This is not just because it created a rapidly moving cloud of space junk that could threaten commercial satellites and ISS astronauts. Instead, they see it as another disturbing escalation in the slow advance toward war in space.Despite the popular belief that space is peaceful, the military has always played a role in its exploration. The first rocket to breach the 100-kilometer-high Karman Line, which defines the beginning of outer space, was a German military V2 fired in 1944. The first satellite, Sputnik, soared into orbit atop a modified Soviet intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) in 1957.NASA, founded one year later, established Americas space program as strictly civilian. Still, the military went along for the ride. Its officers piloted fruchtwein Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo spacecraft, which its rockets boosted into space. Behind the scenes, the Pentagon planned its own secret space missions, coordinated by an agency later renamed DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency).Yet space remained free of actual weapons during the Cold War. While military surveillance devices existed, most satellites were instruments of national prestige or scientific curiosity. With the United States and Soviet Unionthe only nations with spaceflight capabilityalready confronting each other with nuclear-tipped ICBMs, extending arms into space seemed superfluous.Today, however, space is far mora crowded and more economically and militarily valuable. It is filled with vast constellations of s atellites that link together communications and computer networks, monitor weather, search for natural resources, and provide GPS data for smartphones and navigation aids. There are also many more military satellites.Nor is space the dominion of just two powers. More and more countriesand private corporationshave developed launch capabilities. Today, even a private company in Thailand can aspire to launch its own satellite aboard a 3D-printed rocket.Editors Pick Top 10 Space Missions Set to Explore New FrontiersThe space environment has become increasingly congested, competitive and contested, Frank Rose, a senior fellow for security and strategy at the Brookings Institution and former assistant secretary of state for arms control, explained to Congress in March 2019.That means more diverging objectives, opposing interests, and even open conflicts. This is especially true when modern militaries depend on satellites to communicate with remote forces and target drone and smart bomb st rikes. Defending that capabilityand knocking out the military networks other nations depend uponbecomes essential.War has not yet invaded space, but it could. The X-37B is a reusable space plane operated by the U.S. Air Force. Image NASA/MSFC Dual Use From the abflug, the military rationale for space weapons was to control the high ground and shoot down enemies. Such an attack, generals and politicians argued, would be impossible to stop.While such post-Sputnik ravings about missile gaps and Soviet satellites raining down H-bombs may have frightened voters, experts knew it was hogwash. As engineers perfected ICBMs, it became cheaper and far easier to attack another countrys territory from the ground instead of from space.Space-based weapons fare poorly when compared with other long-sortiment means of attacking ground targets, a 2005 study by the American Academy of Arts Sciences concluded.Yet as space began to fill with militarily (and economically) valuable missiles and satellites, militaries around the world pondered how to attack them from the ground and in space.Both the United States and the Soviet Union have planned, tested, and even partially deployed various types of antiballistic missiles (ABM) and anti-satellite (ASAT) weapon systems for decades.These range from ground-based missiles to rocket interceptors fired from high-altitude aircraft and space-based nuclear weapons. At first glance, an antiballistic missile, like the U.S. SM-3 deployed against North Korea, seems an unlikely weapon to take out satellites. It is designed to destroy an incoming ICBM by crashing into it.The same missile could also target some satellites, as the United States has already proved in tests. In fact, it is much easier to hit a satellite, which follows a known and predictable orbit, than a missile whose trajectory must be computed in real time.Missile defense interceptors make excellent antisatellite weapons, at least hit-to-kill ones do, said Jeffrey Lew is of the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies.This functional dichotomy causes enormous practical, political, and military complications. An antiballistic missile is defensive by definition, used only against incoming ICBMs. But an anti-satellite weapon is primarily offensive when used to attack an enemys satellite. If the same system can defend and attack, how can a potential adversary gauge your intentions? Due to the dual-use nature of many space technologies, even benign space capabilities can be viewed by others as counter-space weapons, a 2018 report from the Center for Strategic International Studies noted.Indeed, one does not even need an actual antiballistic missile to take out satellites.If youre a nation that has the capability of routinely launching satellites, then you also have the ability to destroy satellites, said Ted Postol, an MIT emeritus prof of physics and former Pentagon nuclear security expert.While antiballistic missiles attack by direct assent , launching from ground or near ground-level into space, antisatellite weapons can strike by co-orbiting, which is sneakier and, in some ways, simpler.The problem with direct ascent is you have to be able to see your target at significant range and line yourself up to hit it, Postol explained. When you co-orbit, you can just sort of cozy up to your target. You dont have the problem with acquiring your target and precisely positioning yourself until you get close to it.A co-orbiting ASAT simply moves in and either hits the target or explodes next to it.Beam WeaponsBoth antiballistic missiles and co-orbiting antisatellite weapons use kinetic attacks that apply physical force to disable or destroy a satellite. They are far from the only options in the counter-space arsenal.Nonkinetic approaches were studied intensively since the early 1960s and then revived during President Ronald Reagans Strategic Defense Initiative in the 1980s. They seek to disable or destroy vital components or sen sors with lasers, particle beams, or high-powered microwaves, either from space or ground stations. Such methods are difficult, expensive, and require great amounts of power, but the United States and other nations have tested them.A more subtleand perhaps more deniablenonkinetic approach might involve electronic warfare. This might range from such time-honored techniques as jamming or spoofing an adversarys satellite communications to cyberwarfare that targets computer systems that control satellites or process their data.Recommended for You Help Wanted Aerospace Engineering JobsNonkinetic weapons also avoid den augapfel betreffend debris. The 2007 Chinese test, for example, produced a rapidly moving cloud of thousands of razor-sharp fragments in a highly-traveled high orbital zone. Those fragments will remain in orbit for decades before decaying and burning up in Earths atmosphere. The Indian government claims its recent test created less debris in a lower orbit that will burn up faster, but it is still high enough to possibly threaten the International Space Station and its crew.Even random orbital debris created unintentionally from decades of space activities is a danger, especially with no available means of cleaning it all up. Intentionally adding to it with kinetic weapons would only make the situation worse and endanger an aggressors own satellites. Military and commercial surveillance satellites, such as the WorldView-4, make potential targets for space weapons. Image Lockheed Martin So far, only the United States, Russia, China, and now India have demonstrated any sort of viable anti-satellite capabilities. The United States maintains a firmbut by no means unchallengedtechnological lead, thanks to its commanding advantage in sensors to detect, acquire, and home in on targets, MITs Postol said.Take, for example, light sensors. Antisatellite systems that rely on visible light cannot attack in the dark, a big problem when satellites spen d half their time in Earths shadow. U.S. engineers have developed mercury-cadmium-telluride arrays and other advanced devices, which they can tune precisely to detect specific infrared wavelengths.Its very closely guarded technology that allows you to home in at long range with an interceptor, Postol said. You cant use radar because you cant put a giant radar on top of a small interceptor. So it must be something like an infrared homing device.Such technologies no doubt fuel U.S. military dreams of space superiority or counter-space dominance. Judging by their own publications and statements, Russian and Chinese strategists clearly share such reveries. Nascent space powers like India and North Korea may do so as well. Yet technology advantages often prove fleeting. After all, the U.S. military once had an exclusive hold on atomic weapons, jet aircraft, ICBMs, semiconductors, cyberwarfare, and artificial intelligence. It may still lead in those fields, but it is clearly no longer alo ne.Besides, space, by its very nature, will be hard to transform into just another theater of military operations.The most important thing to keep in mind about space is that its a commons, said Martin Nonproliferation Centers Lewis. Space, he explained, is a shared domain. Land can be fenced in and guarded and shorelines, sea lanes, and airspace patrolled. But space has no natural boundaries or regions that can be marked off and claimed by anyone. Any orbiting object can move anywhere. The space debris issue underscores this commonality and the need for a common approach.We need the cooperation of all spacefaring countries to reduce the amount of debris and to help mitigate it, Lewis said. The biggest threat to satellites right now is getting hit by a piece of debris. We cant use threats of force to deter countries from creating debris, we actually have to actively engage with them.The commons of space also creates another show-stopper Theres no place to hide.Satellites are easy to attack, Postol said. Theyre in known orbits, so acquiring them with a visible light sensor is doable, although you may have to be restricted when you can attack them.But to defend them is essentially not possible for all practical purposes. The obvious ways you defend things is to use armor, which is not viable because it costs so much to lift anything into space, Postol said.Nor is it easy to evade an attack If you have a satellite thats important, its lifetime in space is usually determined by the fuel it carries, Postol said. You need propellant to keep an orbit from decaying. And if you have to expend that propellant trying to evade attacking interceptors, your satellite is going to become useless very fast.Even the United States, which boasts the worlds most sophisticated space surveillance and tracking capabilities, cannot get around such problems.The U.S. has the advantage of the best sensors that modern engineering can produce, which work near the limits of what science say s can happen, Postol said. We also have a lot of allies who let us put facilities on their soil so we can track things. We get to look at things from all different locations, using different kinds of sensors. So were in a much better position to know were under attack if things get bad. But we cant do much about it.The Union of Concerned Scientists agrees. As it observed, No foreseeable space-based technologies would allow one country to prevent another from deploying space weapons or would allow it to reliably protect its satellites.CooperationThats why Postol claims anyone with two neurons to rub together would support the international effort to make space a sanctuary against weapons.In fact, efforts to keep space a weapons-free zone dates back to the Outer Space Treaty of 1967. Among other things, it prohibited weapons of mass destruction and the establishment of military bases in space or on any celestial body.Yetperhaps because there were so few orbital targets in 1967the trea ty permitted conventional weapons, such as antisatellite weapons. Subsequent arms control treaties, such as SALT and START, forbade interference with surveillance satellites used for treaty verification, but did not cover communications and global positioning satellites.Plugging such loopholes will require new diplomatic efforts to address space infrastructure issues that barely existed decades ago. New treaties may limit space weapons, but they will also have to improve international cooperation.When people start the conversation about protecting space assets by assuming that the main threat is someone attacking them, theyre missing 90 percent of the problem, Lewis said.There are all kinds of real challengesallocating slots for communications satellites in geostationary orbit, deconflicting frequencies so that they dont inadvertently jam one another, and mitigating debristhat require cooperation.Postol argues that any agreement could be verified The United States is certainly in a position to provide the data. You can have a treaty regime that is very solid and all of the countries involved have a big incentive to follow it.Yet todays international climate seems less welcoming for intensive diplomatic negotiations and new international treaties. Some organizations, such as the Stimson Center and the Union of Concerned Scientists, have drafted codes of conduct and proposals for spacefaring nations to avoid space conflict. Even if nations adopt them, they do not carry the same force as a binding treaty.As the technologies of space warfare continue to become ever more sophisticated, the Earth seems trapped in a slow spiral of escalation toward open conflict in space. In some ways, it seems like a rerun of the Cold War, but with more players and less predictability. In this realm of move and countermove, Indias recent antisatellite exercise is merely the latest symptom.We need to do everything we can to reduce the fear that were going to use these weapons against other countries satellites, because that fear is whats generating a reaction, Postol asserted. This is nuclear deterrence without the nuclear weapons.Mark Wolverton is a freelance science writer and author of Burning the Sky Operation Argus and the Untold Story of the Cold War Nuclear Tests in Outer Space.You May Like Navy Sails into Supply Chain with Metal 3D Printing

Tim Cook Says Youll Never Feel Ready, But Its OK - The Muse

Tim Cook Says Youll Never Feel Ready, But Its OK - The MuseTim Cook Says Youll Never Feel Ready, But Its OK Tim Cook stands at the helm of one of the largest and most valuable public companies in the world. Hes been the CEO of Apple for nearly eight years, but he didnt feel ready for the job when he took it on, he told the class of 2019 at Stanford University on Sunday, June 16, and thats to be expected.Your mentors may leave you prepared, but they cant leave you ready, he told graduates. Its a lesson he learned firsthand when he took the reins from his predecessor, Steve Jobs, just weeks before Jobs died. By then Cook had already put in more than a decade at the company, with six of them spent as COO, but the transition was nevertheless a difficult one. When Steve got sick, I had hardwired my thinking to the belief that he would get better. I not only thought he would hold on, I was convinced down to my core that hed still be guiding Apple long after I myself was gone, Cook said. Wh en he was gone, truly gone, I learned the real visceral difference between preparation and readiness. It was the loneliest Ive ever felt in my life by an order of magnitude.People were watching and their expectations were high. Cook could sense as much. When the dust settled, all I knew was that I was going to have to be the best version of myself that I could be, he said. He also knew, however, that if you got out of bed every morning and set your watch by what other people expect or demand itll drive you crazy.Its only fitting that this was a lesson that came from Jobs, who famously told Stanfords class of 2005 that your time is limited, so dont waste it living someone elses life. Standing in the same spot 14 years later, Cook paid homage to his own mentor, who left him prepared but not ready, yet certain that he should forge his own path instead of hewing to others expectations or blindly emulating those who came before him.Here was a giant in the world of business and technology admitting to the world how daunting it was to take on that role and reminding everyone else how normal it is to feel that way. No matter what field youre in or what next step youre embarking on, moving up is not only exciting, but also intimidating. Your bosses and mentors can teach and guide you, but then its your job to learn from your own experiences and develop your own way forward. Graduates, the fact is when your time comes- and it will- youll never be ready. But youre not supposed to be, Cook said. Find the hope in the unexpected. Find the courage in the challenge. Find your vision on the solitary road.He urged people to spend their time creating and building in service of some greater cause they believe in. That, presumably, is what will help guide you even when youre not aya youre ready for what lies ahead- and help you face the challenge with integrity. While Cooks speech offered comfort and encouragement for anyone figuring out their path, it also came with a warning. To o many seem to think that good intentions excuse away harmful outcomes, but whether you like it or not, what you build and what you create define who you are, he said. If you want to take credit, first learn to take responsibility. In other words, fear is natural, but that doesnt mean you can be careless. So when you dont feel ready, remember that even a famous CEO felt that way too. His advice? Let yourself chart your own course, have the courage to think things through, and take responsibility as readily as you take credit.