According to the Indiana State Workforce Development Self Service Claimant Unemployment Website, all you have to do – once you’re approved for unemployment benefits – is the following:

• Register, post your resume and have your resume available on line for employers to view in our job matching service (IC 22-4-14) at https://www.IndianaCareerConnect.com within four (4) weeks of filing your claim.
• To fulfill work search requirements, submit one application per week (first line of on-line weekly voucher) and conduct two additional work searches per week (second and third line of on-line weekly voucher) in order to remain eligible for benefits. You may apply for work in person, by mail, or online, and be able to document your job application information to DWD upon request. Mailing or submitting a resume for an open position qualifies as applying.

Failure to complete these requirements will cause benefits to be denied until these requirements have been met.

(source url: https://solutions.dwd.in.gov/uplink/uplink-information.htm#benefitRequirements)

I have fulfilled the obligation, as noted below:

As you can read, my Resume is online and searchable by employers.

Yet when I go to fill out my voucher, the state unemployment site tells me the following:

Confused? Me too.

Since I figured it was just a disconnect between:

• https://uplink.in.gov/CSS/CSSLogon.htm (Indiana state online employment claimant site)
• https://www.indianacareerconnect.com/ (Indiana state job boar)

I didn’t think too much about it.

But then today I went to go catch up on my claims and I couldn’t go past the week of 12/12 claim because of the “STOP! Provide information on all links below!”

Midnight hit, and I was allowed to reactive my claim. REASON:  I didn’t “provide all information” within 30 days according to the state claim site, even though I had it done within a couple days of filing my claim.

And today is Sunday so I can’t call. So I went to the only place I can ask questions about my claim online:

https://askworkone.in.gov/

I asked the following question:

I have been approved for unemployment. i have uploaded a resume to the indiana career connect site. I have done all that is required yet when i go to my claimant homepage, it still tells me: SMARTLINKS – STOP! You must provide information on all links listed below. Go to Job Match What more do I have to do?

The site told emailed me with an autoreply:

We have received your message and will respond to you within 7 days.

You may review your message below. Thank you for asking WorkOne!

7 DAYS? U’mmm, no.

I bitched on Twitter, got a couple of nice replies from Noah Coffey & Douglas Karr. DK said something that triggered a thought:

Who the Hell did design the sites?

So I did a little poking around to discover that at the bottom of https://www.indianacareerconnect.com/ is a note:

Well, who the Hell is Geographic Solutions, Inc?

Come to find out that Geographic Solutions, Inc. is a employer software solution based in the Indiana town of Palm Harbor, Florida. Here’s the Geographic Solutions Press Release about their development of Indiana Career Connect. Now I know there’s the joke that Florida can also be called “South Indiana,” but I don’t think that counts as My Man Mitch keeping the work in-house.

So, my guess:

Indiana state’s archiac unemployment claim site isn’t syncing with the Florida company’s Indian job board site and people like me who need the site are suffering for it.

PROVISO:

I am still not certain that it’s a sync issue. I could have done something wrong with my claim. If that’s the case, then the state’s sites do not properly tell me what more I need to do to correct the problem. Either way there is a disconnect.

I can’t wait to find out and pass that information along.

Check back tomorrow as I give tips in an open letter to the state on how to make the sites suck less.

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(“Never Been to Spain” by Three Dog Night. Video by?????)

Talk of Aaron’s Sorkin’s SportsNight at work lead to a talk to about how Season 1, Episode 19, Eli’s Coming, featured not one but two Three Dog Night songs. Yes, very good. The other being Never Been to Spain.

Never have quited figured out the point of Never Been to Spain, but I think that’s the point. So the song blues’, “What Does it Matter?” (more…)

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the T.O. Show proves that everybody's dreams are different.

I spent most of my weekend within sight of a beautiful day.

I have a corner room and both windows were open. The breeze coming through the windows was as soothing and refreshing as I imagined it during last year’s cabin-fever winter.

At the time of this writing, The T.O. Show is on as I let the stress out. I was surfing and stopped when I saw him and his bodyguard moping about the home after on the day he was cut by the Cowboys. In that moment I could relax and relate with the self-centered jackass. His agony on the show probably lasted as long as his agony in real life – 3 minutes. Then he got signed by Buffalo for X-millions.

This is when I stop relating with him. (more…)

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I can tell my patience is wearing thin regarding my epic wait for the edits to my Book of Blues. The good news is that I talked to my cousin. I talked to him in that Facebook chat-sort-of-way. I don’t blame him. 70-hour work weeks in the blizzardom of Minneapolis has to hurt regardless of whether it’s indoor or outdoor.

To my surprise he said many a good thing about Book of Blues. He says I write very, very well. He doesn’t give out compliments so that was a suprise. Smiles emanate from him when he can get steal time to read. He says that it really goes quick. These are easily better comments than what I was expecting.

He does think there is some fat to trim. I don’t disagree. I just need fresh eyes to determine where the fat needs trimming. He’s also considering my thought of splitting the book in half given it’s girth. He’ll have to consider it. The second job he has a a book store is sadly being given up. But, he’ll have more time to read it.

I’ll have to consider what he thinks about “unnecessary description” because he’s a confessed skimmer when it comes to description. I’ll need a bigger sample size. Let me know if you’re interested.

As for the little things gettin’ to me, I refer to DB and Max Power at the Whoredom. I need to write more for them.

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image can be fond on flicker.com. username: keks.au

This week I got put on the Social Media Team at work. In my case, it was officially putting me in something I already was unofficially doing. A little Social, a little SEO Copywriter Chicago, a little PR, a little analytics…

We talked about how we were going to be transparent. I like the idea. I’m always in favor of the idea. People get mad at me because, unless they tell me to keep something a secret, I’m a proponent to the “freedom of information” act.

It got me thinking about how to ensure protection on the company’s brand. (Bare with me. You might need to Finndex these thoughts.) (more…)

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