Interesting Facts

Football star, Jermain Defoe is advertising for an executive personal assistant. (For £60,000 a year, he is looking for someone who is flexible, hands on, capable of multi-tasking, and who demonstrates a high level of discretion and confidentiality. Do you think you fit the bill? Well, you will be on call 24/7, and able to travel worldwide at a moment's notice. You will also be expected to organise his and his family's (including his pets) private, social and business calendars. You will be maintaining his itinerary, arranging all public appearances and travel arrangements, working on business projects including creating a global brand for the Jermin Defoe name, including his clothing line and fragrance, spotting sponsorship opportunities, and growing the online database for his website, Twitter, Facebook, and other social networking platforms, oh and producing his iPhone app. On top of that the lucky applicant will be tasked with organising his wardrobe wi...

According to research carried out by The Debrett’s Foundation, 7 in 10 young people use family connections to get ahead. (One in four claimed their peers have a clear advantage if blessed with a double-barrelled surname, one in five felt the type of school they went to counts, and one in six say their accent “really matters”. I grew up with the saying, "It's not what you know, it's who you know. So it's no surprise to me to see nothing has changed.)

According to a study compiled for the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, couples with two children  now need just under £40,600 between them to afford a decent lifestyle. (The biggest problem is, the actual cost of living in the UK has risen five times as much as earnings since before the recession. So, £40,600 is enough to provide ordinary food, clothes, and leisure activities, for a small family, as well as items judged necessary to survive in modern Britain, without extravagance.)

According to a study conducted by the Department for Education, the traditional family meal appears to be making a comeback in the UK. (In the study, 52% of children said they had shared a meal with their parents six times in the last week compared with 42 per cent in 2004. Now, I wonder if they sat at the table, or ate in front of the TV.)

According to a survey by the TV Channel Gold, men turn into their fathers at the age of 38. (The top signs that this might be happening to you are:- 1. You fall asleep in the living room. 2. You have ‘a chair’ 3. You enjoy Dad dancing 4. You spend time in the shed 5. You tell jokes that only you find funny 6. You don't know any artists in the top 40 7. You are spending longer on the toilet 8. You keep an eye on the thermostat 9. You get excited about white good sales 10. You enjoy embarrassing younger members of the family Oh dear - apart from number 3 and number 7, I think I'm turning into my dad!)

According to figures released by the Office for National Statistics, in the UK, the number of women who don't have children has almost doubled over the past 30 years. (The most common family size in Britain is two children, but nearly one in five of women who had reached the end of their child-bearing years last year had no children, compared with just over one in ten of their mothers. On average a woman born in 1940 had 2.36 children, while her daughter’s generation had 1.91. No jokes about .36 and .19 of a child please.  That's just the joy of averages.)

According to a report by the National Association of Colleges and Employers, 60 to 80% of job seekers used personal connections to get their current job. (Now these connections could be friends and family, or online connections and acquaintances. So, if you're looking for a job, get networking. John Bennett, from the McColl School of Business said, "So much of the social networking today is more about people within a smaller network, so you’re talking with the same people over and over,” Bennett says. “Good networking skills involve reaching into new networks, not just the ones that we know." And you know what we say in the UK, don't you?  "It's not what you know, it's who you know.")