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Many job seekers fail because they don't follow directions or don't keep it relevant and truthful

Tuesday, December 17, 2002

By Marc Jampole

Having just gone through the painful experience of interviewing job applicants for two professional positions at my Downtown public relations and advertising agency, I am more aware than usual that the overwhelming majority of job candidates shoot themselves in the foot, and don't even know it.

	(Illustrated by Daniel Marsula, Post-Gazette)

That's a problem for job seekers, but it's also a problem for employers, especially at small businesses. Virtually all my fellow employers tell me that hiring is the hardest thing they have to do. It's made harder by the numerous missteps that most job applicants take.

In the interests of making life a little easier for the many people seeking jobs in the current tight marketplace as well as for the businesses doing the hiring, I want to present a few tips on applying for a job. What I have to say applies specifically to seekers of professional positions, but it should help other job applicants as well.

Follow all directions. When a prospective employer asks you to provide something or do something, if you want the job, you had better follow the directions (assuming it's legal and ethical).

For example, in a recent classified ad for a public relations writer, we asked that applicants send resumes and writing samples. We received 150 responses, but only 20 of them had writing samples enclosed. The other 130 went right into the trash bin.

Make sure your application is error-free. About half of all cover letters and resumes we receive have grammatical, syntactical or spelling errors. If there is one mistake only and we like what we see on the resume, we will sometimes contact the applicant and ask that he or she find the error and resubmit. If there is more than one mistake, the resume goes into the trash bin.

	Marc Jampole of Squirrel Hill is president of Jampole Communications Inc.

Research the company. Once you learn the identity of the potential employer, find out something about the organization. Since most companies have Web sites, researching a prospective employer has become relatively easy.

Employers always appreciate it when job applicants have taken the time to understand their businesses. Knowing something about the company can help you formulate questions and guide you in answering the employer's questions. It enables you to present your experience and capabilities in terms of the employer's needs.

Never lie on the resume or in the interview. Employers detest lies, and usually can smell them. And a half-truth is considered the worst of all lies, as Alfred Lord Tennyson once observed.

When someone claims to have done something that is not associated with the job he or she held at the time, or when the applicant cannot provide details of an assignment or job, that's usually a good sign that some unhealthy fibbing has occurred.

My favorite example is a lie we didn't smell, but still uncovered through some standard checking.

After hiring an advertising professional a few years back, we called the company that he claimed was his current employer to do a standard check, only to discover that he had been laid off six months earlier.

I immediately rescinded the offer of employment, because our business operates on a basis of trust. We are trusted because we are trustworthy. It takes only one lie to a client to destroy what years of honesty has built up.

The sad thing is that being laid off from an ad agency during a recession was, and is, no big deal, and would not have affected in the slightest what we thought of the job applicant.

Focus on what you can do for the employer. In both cover letters and interviews, too many job candidates want to talk about only what they want out of a job.

One job applicant sent a press release, the lead of which was that he was sitting at home watching TV since he couldn't find a job; another compared herself to a frog on a pond waiting for the "kiss of inspiration" from an employer to turn her into a princess of creativity.

I'll leave it to the reader to determine if these were fresh, creative approaches; one thing I know is that they demonstrated a self-centeredness that does not make for a competent professional service provider.

To paraphrase John F. Kennedy, ask not what the employer can do for you, ask what you can do for the employer.

Keep it relevant. While I may personally be intrigued by the job applicant who writes poetry or paints abstract images on guitar cases, it isn't really relevant to the job we have to do every day.

Deciding what is relevant often involves a judgment call.

Participation in extracurricular activities and summer jobs are relevant when a job applicant has just graduated from college. It is no longer relevant five years later. But graduating first in your class or winning a Fulbright Fellowship is probably relevant until the end of your career.

Follow directions, avoid mistakes, do research, never lie. If you run down this list of tips for job seekers, you'll find these suggestions are precisely the skills that make for good employees. Sometimes they are called good work habits. But call them what you may, they not only increase the chance of landing the job but also help employees to thrive on the job and build successful careers.

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