What Color Is Your Parachute? (25 page)

Every expert on interviewing will tell you two things: (1) Thank-you notes
must
be sent after
every
interview, by every job-hunter; and (2) most job-hunters ignore this advice. Indeed, it is safe to say that
it is the most overlooked step in the entire job-hunting process
.

If you want to stand out from the others applying for the same job, send thank-you notes—to
everyone
you met there, that day. If you need any additional encouragement (
besides the fact that it may get you the job
), here are six reasons for sending a thank-you note, most particularly to the employer who interviewed you:

First, you were presenting yourself as one who has good skills with people. Your actions with respect to the job-interview must back this claim up. Sending a thank-you note does that. The employer can see you
are
good with people; you remember to thank them.

Second, it helps the employer remember you.

Third, if a committee is involved in the hiring process, the one man or woman who interviewed you has something to show the rest of the committee.

Fourth, if the interview went rather well, and the employer seemed to show an interest in further talks, the thank-you letter can reiterate
your
interest in further talks.

Fifth, the thank-you note gives you an opportunity to correct any wrong impression you left behind. You can add anything you forgot to
tell them, that you want them to know. And from among all the things you two discussed, you can underline the main two or three points that you want to stand out in their minds.

Last, if the interview did not go well, and you lost all interest in working there, they may still hear of other openings, elsewhere, that might be of interest to you. In the thank-you note, you can mention this, and ask them to let you know if they hear of anything anywhere. Thus, from kindly interviewers, you may gain additional leads.

In the following days, rigorously keep to all that you said, and don’t contact them except with that mandatory thank-you note, until after the
latest
deadline you two agreed upon, in answer to question #4, above. If you do have to contact them after that date, and if they tell you things are still up in the air, you must ask questions #2, #3, and #4, all over again.

Incidentally, it is entirely appropriate for you to insert a thank-you note into the running stream, after
each
interview or telephone contact. Just keep it brief. Very brief.

There is no magic in job-hunting. No techniques work all the time. I hear regularly from job-hunters who report that they paid attention to all the matters I have mentioned in this chapter and this book, and are quite successful at securing interviews—but they never get hired. And they want to know what they’re doing wrong.

Well, unfortunately, the answer
sometimes
is: “Maybe nothing.” I don’t know
how often
this happens, but I know it does happen—because more than one employer has confessed it to me, and in fact at one point in my life it actually happened to
moi
: namely,
some
employers play despicable tricks on job-hunters, whereby they invite you in for an interview despite the fact that they have already hired someone for the position in question, and they know from the beginning that they have absolutely no intention of hiring you—not in a million years!

You are cheered, of course, by the ease with which you get these interviews. But unbeknownst to you, the manager who is interviewing you (we’ll say it’s a
he
) has a personal friend he already agreed to give the job to. Only one small problem remains: the state or the federal government gives funds to this organization, and has mandated that this position be opened to all. So this manager must
pretend
to interview ten candidates, including his favorite,
as though
the job opening were still available. But, he intended, from the beginning, to reject the other nine and give the job to his favorite. You were selected for the honor of being among those nine.

You will of course be baffled as to
why
you got turned down. Trouble is, you will never know.

On the other hand, if you
never
get invited back for a second interview, there is always the chance that no games are being played. You are getting rejected, at place after place, because there is something really wrong with the way you are coming across, during these hiring-interviews.

Employers will rarely ever tell you this. You will never hear them say something like, “You came across as just too cocky and arrogant during the interview.” You will almost always be left in the dark as to
what
it is you’re doing wrong.

If you’ve been interviewed by a whole bunch of employers, one way around this deadly silence, is to ask for
generalized
feedback from whoever was the
friendliest
employer that you saw. You can always try phoning, reminding them of who you are, and then asking the following question—deliberately kept generalized, vague, unrelated to just
that
place, and above all,
future
-
directed
. Something like:
“You know, I’ve been on several interviews at several different places now, where I’ve gotten turned down. From what you’ve seen, is there something about me in an interview, that you think might be causing me not to get hired at those places? If so, I’d really appreciate your giving me some pointers so I can do better in my future hiring-interviews.”

Most of the time they’ll
still
duck saying anything hurtful or helpful. First of all, they’re afraid of lawsuits. Second, they don’t know how you will use what they might have to say. (Said an old veteran to me once, “I used to think it was my duty to tell everyone the truth. Now I only give it to those who can use it.”)

But
occasionally
you will run into an employer who is willing to risk giving you the truth, because they think you will know how to use it wisely. If so, thank them from the bottom of your heart, no matter how painful their feedback is. Such advice, seriously heeded, can bring about just the changes in your interviewing strategy that you most need, in order to win the interview.

In the absence of any such help from employers who interviewed you, you might want to get a good business friend of yours to role-play a mock hiring-interview with you, in case they immediately see something glaringly wrong with how you’re “coming across.”

When all else fails, I would recommend you go to a career coach who charges by the hour, and put yourself in their tender knowledgeable hands. Role-play an interview with them, and take their advice seriously (you’ve just paid for it, after all).

I have left out the subject of salary negotiation in this chapter. It requires a chapter of its own (next!).

Hopefully, however, with these tips you will do well in your interviews. And if you do get hired, make one resolution to yourself right
there on the spot. Plan to keep track of your accomplishments at this new job, on a weekly basis—jotting them down, every weekend, in your own private diary. Career experts recommend you do this without fail. You can then summarize these accomplishments annually on a one-page sheet, for your boss’s eyes, when the question of a raise or promotion comes up.
⁵

Click
here
to view a PDF version of The Ten Commandments for Job-Interviews.