Judge B. Carlton Terry, Jr., of North Carolina was recently reprimanded by the state’s Judicial Standards Commission for “friending” a lawyer on Facebook.

At some point during a pending child custody case, Terry found Charles Shieck, the lawyer representing the defendant, on the site and added him to his list of friends.

The two “friends” posted messages about the case to each other, the Lexington Dispatch reports. Comments included a discussion about proving whether the plaintiff had been having an affair and Terry’s statement that he had “two good parents to choose from.”

Eventually, Terry was disqualified from the case and a new trial was granted. He was then reprimanded by the state — interacting with counsel during a pending trial violates the state’s judicial code of conduct.

A new Web site, www.HowIGotLaidOff.com, lets the recently unemployed post layoff horror stories. Most of them involve poor timing, or management’s complete ineptitude at breaking bad news.

Here’s the worst of the bunch:

1. One users tells about being transferred by her employer to a location in Manhattan. After moving all of her belongings into a tiny, expensive studio apartment, she reported for her first day in the new office — only to be told right away that her job had been eliminated.
2. Every employee for a telecommunications company was called into a meeting and were told the firm needed to cut staff. How would they find out who was getting the axe? Laid off employees would be notified through e-mail. The vice president told everyone to go back to their desks and wait to see if they received the dreaded message.
3. While an employee was on medical leave getting cancer treatment, five members of his department were laid off. Several months later, he learned it was supposed to have been six. In December of 2008, he got a letter which read: “Due to administrative error, your employment is terminated, effective Sept. 5, 2008.”
4. After working at a bank for 23 years, an employee got a new supervisor, who quickly unveiled an updated org chart — which didn’t include the employee’s name. Not surprisingly, he was let go shortly after.

The companies with the most visitor-friendly sites, according to the job candidates surveyed by Potentialpark:

1. Bertelsmann
2. Deutsche Bank
3. Accenture
4. Shell
5. BCG
6. Microsoft
7. McKinsey
8. Goldman Sachs
9. Ernst & Young
10. Bain & Company

(See the rest of the top 30 list here.)

What do the best sites have in common? The top-rated sites guide candidates through every step of the hiring process, from providing general information about the company to helping them prepare for the interview to describing what employees’ first days are like.

The best ones also make sure no questions go unanswered, no matter who’s asking, Potentialpark says.

Craigslist ads are free in many metropolitan areas and relatively cheap in others (ranging from $25 to $75). But blogger and recruiting expert Jim Stroud says Craigslist and similar sites are more time consuming than more expensive job sites — and sometimes even less cost-effective.

The reasons, oddly enough, are Craigslist’s own popularity and low- or no-cost approach. Sure, a lot of applicants view the site every day, but competing advertisers also post a lot of new listings every day.

Since listings are arranged in reverse chronological order, you could put up an ad, and within a day or two, it could be buried far down the list. In most markets, Craigslist ads don’t receive much response after the day they’re posted, Stroud says.

In areas where posting is free, the end result is lost time spent to re-post the ad regularly. But when Craigslist charges, the costs of re-posting can add up.

Have you used Craigslist to advertise open jobs? Was it worth your while? Tell us about your experience in the comments section below.

It’s a site called Voolkan, and it’s a stripped-down take on the online job board. The best part: It’s free for both employers and job seekers.

The look and feel is similar to Craigslist — no fancy graphics or ads, with all the job listings based on the date they’re posted. Voolkan is all about jobs, though. It uses a matching technology to recommend jobs to registered applicants based on their qualifications and the jobs they’ve applied for in the past.

Right now, the site has about 25,000 jobs advertised and has generated almost 100,000 job-seekers.

VisualCV is a Web site that lets job seekers create digital versions of their resumes to post online.

Most of the information posted is the same as what you’d see in a traditional resume, except with pictures. But the main difference: Candidates can include links to blogs, other personal Web pages and work samples. For some jobs, especially creative ones, that’s important to have.

Employers can also set up their own profiles to attract candidates, with general information on the company as well as specific job listings.

For companies, there’s a free option and one that charges for each employee hired through the site. The paid version contains added search features, an applicant tracking tool and no limit on the number of positions listed.

Take the case of Robin: Almost a year after earning an MBA, her husband Mike still hadn’t found a job.

So she took matters into her own hands and started a Web site, www.myhusbandneedsajob.com.

The site is basically a beefed up online resume, with sections like “About Mike,” “Meet Mike” and “Mike’s Resume.” The homepage features a picture of Robin holding a sign that says “Hire my husband.”

Interesting job seeking strategies, both online and off, have become quite popular lately. Some other famous examples include the guy who rented a billboard to post his resume, and the woman who walked around in a shirt listing all her qualifications.

Would any of those tactics convince you to interview someone? Or do they come off as too desperate? Let us know your opinion in the comments section below.

These are the 10 best sites for recruiters and job seekers, according to a recent article in PC magazine:

1. Beyond.com – A combination of smaller, niche job boards that each focus on a different industry, job type or geographic area.
2. Careerbuilder.com – Though some HR experts recommend shifting money away from the big, general boards and toward more focused sites, CareerBuilder still gets more than 23 million visitors a month. That’s a lot of job candidates.
3. Craigslist.org – It’s not a very polished site, and some of the listings seem less than legitimate, but posting an ad to Craigslist is free in most areas, so experts say there’s little reason not to use it.
4. Execu-search.com – A site focused on recruiting upper level employees.
5. Hound.com – Hound lets candidates search through jobs listed on employer Web sites.
6. JobServe.com – Claiming to be the world’s first online recruiting service, JobServe advertised 2.5 million positions in 2008.
7. Jobster.com – Combining a job board with a social networking site, Jobster lets candidates create detailed profiles to help employers find and learn more about them.
8. LinkedIn.com – From searching through users’ profiles to posting job listings, LinkedIn provides a variety of ways to find candidates.
9. TheLadders.com – Only lists jobs that pay more than $100k a year, and charges job seekers to use the site.
10. SnagAJob.com – Basically the opposite of ExecSearch and TheLadders, SnagAJob focuses exclusively on hourly jobs.

What recruiting sites do you recommend? Share your advice in the comments section below.

Here are the top ten phrases and sentences to avoid, according to BuzzWhack.com:

1. “Can I see you in the conference room?” This one’s especially frightening if contact is initiated with a tap on the shoulder.
2. “Isn’t your performance review coming up soon?” No one likes being asked to defend how well they’re performing, especially in times like these.
3. “We don’t see this as a problem, but as an opportunity.” False optimism can be even scarier than the truth.
4. “I’ve always thought of us as family around here, but … ” But when the choice is between an employee and the manager’s mother, guess who the boss is siding with.
5. “You’re a great contributor, but … ” Compliments followed by “but” are a bad idea in general.
6. “Maintaining the status quo is no longer an option.” When your boss has to use a dead language to explain something, you can bet it’s going to be devastating news.
7. “We’re not planning to have layoffs, but there will be some restructuring.” No matter how often managers do it, using that euphamism doesn’t help.
8. “We’re going to refocus and concentrate on our core business.” What an employee hears: “We’re going back to the way things were before you were hired.”
9. “Due to the ongoing turmoil in the capital markets … ” No sentence with the words “turmoil” and “capital” have ever contained good news.
10. “They’ve asked everyone to come to the Employee Appreciation room for a 4 p.m. meeting.” News delivered late in the day probably means something bad for someone.

Can you think of any workplace phrases that have recently become off-limits? Share them in the comments section below.

Getting ready to comply with the COBRA changes included in the stimulus package passed last month? Here’s one online resource you’ll need.

Under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA), employees involuntarily terminated from September 1, 2008 through December 31, 2009 must pay only 35% of COBRA premiums. The federal government will pay the rest (by asking employers to pay 65% and refunding them with a payroll tax credit).

The subsidies are available for nine months, or until the ex-employee is eligible for coverage from another employer or Medicare.

The ARRA also requires employers to notify current and former plan participates about the subsidy. To help companies comply, the Department of Labor (DOL) has issued four model notices, each tailored to a specific situation:

1. General notice – Must be sent to all qualified beneficiaries who experience a qualifying event during the period from September 1, 2008 through December 31, 2009.
2. Abbreviated general notice – Goes to individuals who experienced a qualifying event on or after September 1, 2008 and currently have COBRA coverage.
3. Alternative notice – For individuals who become eligible for continuation coverage under a state law. This notice is meant to be modified to conform to different states’ requirements.
   
4. Notice in connection with extended election periods – Must be sent to employees who lost their jobs before the ARRA was signed into law and turned down COBRA coverage.

You can download the notices from the DOL’s Web site here.