You’ve successfully completed your job interview, which ended with the interviewer telling you, “Ok, it’s been great to meet you! We’ll follow up with you regarding the next steps.” Now you’re at home, anxiously waiting for a follow-up phone call or email. There’s not much you can do at this point, so you may as well sit and wait, right?
Actually, there are things you can do to make a positive impression on the hiring manager even once the interview is over. In this post, we’ll address the low-hanging fruit. It’s a very easy and effective job hack.
It goes without saying that after your interview, you should send a follow-up thank you email on that same day, or the next day at the latest. But the job hack is to also send a handwritten thank you card or note via snail mail as well. Send the thank you card right after your interview, so it can get to the hiring manager as soon as possible. If you’ve met with several interviewers, send a separate thank you card to each of them.
The content of the thank you card can simply consist of three sentences (in addition to the greeting and signature):
Sentence #1: Thank the hiring manager for taking the time to meet with you.
Sentence #2: Mention something specific from the interview that impressed you or stood out to you.
Sentence #3: Mention that you look forward to hearing from the interviewer soon.
By sending this thank you card, you will stand out from the other interviewees, as most other interviewees do not bother to send a physical thank you note. I’ve heard directly from hiring managers themselves on how impressed they were when they received a thank you note from an interviewee.
Now, one might object, “But won’t the hiring manager know that you’re sending the thank you note to increase your odds of landing the job? Isn’t it more self-serving than thoughtful?”
If the point of sending the thank you note was to purely demonstrate thoughtfulness, there would be merit to this objection. However, as we’ve repeatedly emphasized, the key to job hacking is to get into the head of the employer.
Imagine that you’re the hiring manager, and you receive a handwritten thank you note from a recent interviewee. At first, you’ll be touched. It will then dawn upon you that the interviewee has sent the thank you note to increase their odds in landing the job. However, that is a great thing, because it demonstrates how excited the interviewee is to get this job. And if you’re an employer, you only want to hire people who are eager for the job. You don’t want to hire people just looking to collect a paycheck.
If this interviewee went out of their way to do something extra thoughtful and send a handwritten thank you letter, it strongly signals that the interviewee is very interested – perhaps even excited – to get this role and work for this organization. It is the eagerness, even more than the thoughtfulness, that will get the employer to be excited to hire you.
So if you are indeed really interested in the position you just interviewed for – go ahead and send that thank you note! You’re welcome.