Who agrees that fronting an interview panel is one of life’s worst experiences? In my view it ranks up there with going to the dentist or waiting for the highway patrolman’s impending chat – knowing that the traffic violation you’ve just committed is going to cost you dearly.

Especially distasteful to me is when it’s a so-called structured interview, you know, the type where every candidate is given the exact same set of questions. Then you have to endure the periods of silence while each member of the panel records their version of how well your answer satisfied the criteria.

On Nov 21 the USA Today published this list of 121 interview questions.

For the tech whizzs out there thinking of trying out for one of the most selective companies on the planet, there’s this list of 140 Google interview questions arranged in 7 job categories. I like this one: How many golf balls fit inside a school bus?

Prominent blogger and social media expert Chris Brogan today tweeted that he has written a FREE ebook to help those out of work use the social media to find a job. The 19 page ebook gives some pointers to using LinkedIn, as well as some ideas on how to build your own social network that you could leverage to find work.

You’ll find a download link to the PDF file at this blogpost that Chris wrote at the end of 2008 in anticipation of a difficult year economically.

With the US unemployment rate now at 10% this equates to 15.4 million Americans out of work at the end of November, 2009. (source: United States Dept of Labor). That jobs report shows that since Chris wrote the ebook the actual number of unemployed has doubled. Of course he wasn’t responsible!

Thanks Chris. And for anyone reading, as well as following him on Twitter I highly recommend his blog so you can read his posts and view his videos. As someone newly setting up my online business, I’ve been particularly impressed with his Overnight Success series.

Welcome to the Love Your Job Or Leave It blog.

Here’s a simple introduction to what this part of Stew Shaw’s website is about.

Obviously paid employment is an integral part of Western capitalism and it’s expected that people find work in some capacity after finishing their education. Traditionally your working life lasts until retirement which is somewhere around aged 65. So that’s 40-50 years of our lives that are dominated by this thing called “work.” I use the term broadly to refer to the way we progressively earn income – whether that be by working for a boss or in self-employment.

In other parts of this website you’ll find stories and videos about the many types of work and careers that I, Stew Shaw, have done over my working life. That’s so you can learn a bit more about me and understand the unique path that brought me to the point at this time in my life where I want to establish an online business.

We are all following unique paths in the work options we choose. That results from a whole range of factors including the circumstances of our upbringing, different educational backgrounds, our individual personalities, the opportunities presented to us, and so on.

What interests me here is highlighting what contributes to job satisfaction. That’s because in looking back over nearly 40 years of being a “worker” I cannot say that any of the work situations I was involved with were truly mentally rewarding. Seldom did I wake up with that “I can’t wait to get to work today” feeling. And if that same outlook pervades staff at most workplaces around the world then that’s a waste of human potential really.

Just imagine your work productivity if you were operating at near peak efficiency most of the time while you were at work!

But what do we find in reality in many employees today? That instead of enthusiastically doing what their bosses pay them for, they are more inclined to check private emails, and tweet, and update their MySpace page, and read what their friends on Facebook are up to, and watch YouTube videos, and pour over Flickr photos of their friend’s latest trip, and listen to online music channels, and on and on and on! Frankly I would hate to be an employer today – such private activities on work computers during work time must cost the bottom line dearly indeed. And yes, I confess to having done some of those things too.

All things being equal (ex, assuming your boss doesn’t constantly look over your shoulder), I suggest that the amount of time you indulge in private computing activity is inversely proportional to how much you enjoy your job!

Which brings me back to the big question “What does it take to love your job?”

Answering that is what this blog will set out to do!