Write a Thank You Note After Being Interviewed

Candidates often ask whether and how they should follow-up after an interview. Overwhelmingly, employers advise candidates to follow-up quickly and courteously. The Minneapolis Star Tribune quotes Marni Hockenberg of Minneapolis-based job search firm The Hiring Experts, as stating that thank you notes set candidates “…apart from their competitors, and I am more likely to contact them regarding a future job opportunity,” says Hockenberg. “It says to me this is a professional person that sets high standards for themselves, and my clients need to hire this type of a candidate.”
I’ve heard some recruiters dismiss thank you notes as a waste of time. They indicate that they’re too busy to read thank you notes so advise candidates not to write them. But they’re wrong. Unless a candidate knows that a recruiter does not want to receive a thank you, the candidate should quickly write and send it. Why? Because there is unlikely to be any harm in writing a thank you note to a recruiter who is too busy to read it. The note may end up in the trash, but it won’t harm the candidate’s chances of being hired.
Most recruiters, however, are like Hockenberg. They understand that spending more time with fewer candidates yields better results. It isn’t about receiving or reviewing the greatest number of resumes. It is about hiring the best candidates. After all, recruiters aren’t employed to read resumes and interview candidates. They’re employed to hire the best candidates. And if you’re the recruiter who interviewed two well qualified candidates and one sent a thank you note to you within one business day of being interviewed and the other one didn’t, which one would you hire? I thought so.
Mail a short, courteous thank you note to everyone with whom you interview within 24 hours. Take a stack of thank you notes and pre-stamped envelopes with you to every interview. Leave them in your car or briefcase. As soon as you leave the building, find someplace where you can write the note. Reinforce the points that you want the recruiter to remember and address those that you felt were missed but which you want them to consider. Then put the letter into the closest mailbox that you can find that still has pick-up that same day. If there aren’t any, take the letter to the nearest post office and mail it there. The chances will then be excellent that your thank you note will arrive the very next day. If you were the employer, wouldn’t that impress you? Again, I thought so.