apparently, on my new minion's planet, the answer is to have his new boss call him twice by 9:42 a.m., wondering where he was! he called me back a couple of minutes ago, saying he thought he was supposed to report at 10:30, when he was meeting with the payroll supervisor. i told him, 'no, you were supposed to report at the start of the work day, which is 8 o'clock.'

yesterday, my boss and i were meeting after we'd interviewed one of the minion candidates, and she asked me how things were going with the temp. as i paused to think for a minute about how to tactfully describe things, my boss said, 'you know, we can get you another temp.' 'well, i don't want to be difficult,' i said.... 'well, today's your last day; the agency was supposed to let you know that.... i suggested that she learn more about the basic principles of design; that she practice creating comps more quickly; that she get more experience using the software programs so that she could work faster, and i suggested that perhaps she should focus on trying to find other types of work that better played to her strengths.

so i gave it to the temp as her first project on wednesday, and i said i wanted it done by the end of the day -- i figured 8 hours was plenty of time, and i was being really generous, allowing for time to go get a parking pass and name badge on campus, get lost on the way to work, have an hour-long lunch, have an hour or so of questions.... extrapolate two-and-a-half-hours of those kinds of conversations, and by the time 4:45 rolls around, you can imagine the mood i'm in. she has done only two mildly different comps of the same flyer.... i tell her about Molasses, and she laughs and reminds me not to expect too much from the temp; and to just give her tedious, time-consuming projects.

i'd gotten through the one-on-one portion of the interview, when i asked the candidate if the HR person had mentioned that there'd be a skills test, she said, 'oh god.'... i walked into your office, looking for you, asked where you were, and she said she thought you were out and around, and that she'd decided she was done with the test.'... [EDIT] a couple of minutes ago, the payroll director down the hall came to me to let me know that this same candidate had been snarky to her, and to someone else down the hall -- the candidate snapped at them while she was looking for me.

i leave the room, figuring that A-having me in there will only stress them out more, B-i want to write up my observations in private, and C-i might as well make it an ethics test.... i close the interview, take the test from them, and wish them luck as i hand them my card. i look at the test, and notice that the candidate got the layout question correct, which i thought was odd, for someone who didn't have a lot of print experience.