May 2, 2008 12:00

And the most adoption-friendly workplace is...

Every year, the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption announces its picks for the most adoption-friendly employers. Here's what it says about its 2008 winner, Wendy's:

Headquartered in Dublin, Ohio, Wendy's International, Inc. offers up to $23,300 in financial reimbursement and up to six weeks of paid leave for employees who adopt. Wendy's was among more than 50 companies who enhanced or established adoption benefits as a result of what they learned from the Foundation's first Best Adoption-Friendly Workplace list in 2007.

But wait a minute, you say. Dave Thomas was the founder of Wendy's. So isn't this award a little nepotistic?

Sure. But so what, I say. If the founder of your corporation was a strong advocate of a good cause, it makes sense that he imbued his company with his own values. (Thomas, in fact, grew up in the foster-care system.) I wrote about how more employers were helping workers adopt children by offering financial help, time off or employee networks in this article last year. It's an important benefit to the growing numbers of working parents who want to grow their families this way.

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May 2, 2008 11:00

Show me your paystub, I'll show you mine

In this week's issue of TIME, I presented a modest proposal for the persisting problem of pay inequity. The piece begins:

I have no clue what my colleagues make. I suspect some earn more than I do and others take home less. Like most American workers, I consider my salary my own damn business. Turns out that could be a big mistake--at least in the opinion of a petite grandmother with an Alabama drawl.

The article centers on Lilly Ledbetter, whom you've already read about in this earlier post. When I spoke to her again last week, she was disappointed that her eponymous bill had failed to pass muster in the Senate—but still determined not to let the issue die.

My proposal:

What if employers made all employee salaries known? If you think about it, who is served by all the secrecy? Not you.

Read the article for the full argument. And do buy the issue, why dontcha. It's the TIME 100, you know. And spend some time on Time.com's fabulous web extravaganza. The biggest news: neither Rain nor Stephen Colbert won the Time.com public poll.

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May 2, 2008 8:54

What to do when a colleague stinks

...and by that I mean an officemate who smells. Badly. Of body odor. Or Wal-Mart perfume. Or ambition.

In my husband's line of work, this is a serious issue. Not because classical musicians tend not to bathe, but because if you can't breathe, you can't play. In an opera or Broadway pit, someone who saunters in reeking of cologne is likely to cause a union-backed revolt.

Since I met him 800 years ago, I too stopped using perfume. And since I became pregnant 8,000 months ago, I too have become hypersensitive to scents. Riding the bus to work the other day, I looked up in time to see a woman across the aisle spritzing herself. In the bus! She was too far away for me to protest, and anyway, the damage was done. But then the lady who sat down next to me pulled out a bottle of nail polish, and it was on, baby.

"Excuse me," I said. "Please don't use that in here." She looked at me like I was insane. But then I looked back at her like I would chew her manicured hands off. She put the bottle away.

Lisa Belkin writes about people who are allergic to work in yesterday's New York Times. No punchline: many workers report that their workplaces trigger or heighten allergies, sometimes to a serious degree. This blog, BreatheFreeorDie, is written in passionate defense of the olfactorily sensitive. But others, like this blogger writing on the topic, feel this is one more example of the neurotic few dictating the individual rights of the masses.

What do you think? Should I suck it up when my officemate reeks? Or should all offices make like orchestra pits and ban the use of smelly potions and lotions?

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