Grrr...candidates who don't show up for their interview

[Cunctator]

We're in the middle of graduate recruiting here and there's been a steady stream of candidates coming and going all week. Yet there are always a few candidates who just don't show up. We interviewers sit around, wondering how long we ought to wait before writing the candidate off. This morning we had two "no shows".

I don't really care what your excuse is:
- you're ill;
- the train's delayed
- you've accepted another company's offer

Surely it's only common courtesy to ring and tell us?

[cerberus]

Rather like the courtesy that some employers show their applicants by wasting the applicant's entire day with a series of fake, pro forma interviews, then never get back to the applicant? "Gee, thank you for serving as our stalking horse for the guy that we really want to hire."

Yeah, it goes both ways...

[Triskadecamus]

Yes, it does. And when it goes one way, you find out you don't want to hire the no call no show jerk. The other way, you learn that that company has no interest in people besides a desire to use them to the best advantage of the company without even common courtesy.

So, everyone learns what they need to know.

Tris

[mhendo]

Yeah, it goes both ways...Yeah, i pretty much agree.

Cunctator, if you're one of those interviewers/employers who actually treats your potential employees like human beings, who is honest with them during the hiring process, and who gets back to them (with good or bad news) when you say you're going to get back to them, then i feel for you. It sucks taking up a whole lot of your valuable time, only to have it wasted when someone fails to live up to their promise.

But i know too many people who've been jerked around in exactly this way by potential employers who apparently feel that the only one with any obligations or responsibilities in the whole process is the person seeking a job.

And i'm not just talking about your archetypal faceless corporation here. As a graduate student, i have many friends who are looking for work or who are actually working in academia, and many of them tell the same story. Despite academia's generally-liberal leanings and alleged concerns for fairness and openness in economic relations, university hiring committees are often just as bad as corporate ones when it comes to shafting their job candidates.

One example.

A friend of mine finished his Ph.D. a couple of years ago, and his first job was a one-year position at a university in Florida. Because it was a job with no potential for becoming full-time or tenure-track, he applied for full-time jobs and got some interviews.

In the history profession, there are usually two big cut-offs in the hiring process. First, the applications (often as many as 200 for a position) are taken in and a group of likely candidates (usually about 8-15) is selected. These candidates are asked to attend the historical profession's big meeting, the Annual Meeting of the American Historical Association, where they each have face-to-face interviews with the hiring committee, usually in a hotel suite.

After this, the field is generally narrowed down to the 3 best candidates, who are invited back for an on-campus interview, which involves actually travelling to the university and spending at least one day and often two days there. During the visit the candidate will have to give a lecture or presentation, will be given a tour of the university and the department, and will be continually grilled about research plans, class syllabi, teaching philosophy, theoretical leanings, etc., etc. It's a pretty gruelling process.

Anyway, my friend had a few interviews at the AHA, and was called back for on-campus interviews at two universities. One of them was a state university in the mid-Atlantic. He flew up from Florida, spent a day and a half doing his interview, presentation, etc., and was told that they would make a decision after the final candidate's on-campus interview the following week. The time came and went and he hadn't heard, so he got in touch with them and they told him they were still deciding. A few more weeks went by, and he still hadn't heard. Finally, he ran into a member of the faculty at a conference, and she said to him, "I was sorry to hear you didn't get the job." Well, that was news to him, and when he told her that no-one had ever even had the courtesy to contact him she was shocked.

Bear in mind that he wasn't just some guy who sent in a resume. He was one of the final three candidates out of over 100. He was considered good enough to ask to the AHA meeting, and then was was considered good enough to bring to the campus for an overnight stay. And they didn't even have the courtesy to call him and say that they had offered the job to one of the other finalists.

If this was an isolated incident, i wouldn't make too much of it, but i've heard similar stories from a whole bunch of people in my field, and in other academic and corporate fields.

This particular story had a happy ending, because about a week later my friend was offered a full-time, tenure-track job at an extremely prestigious research university in the South. It's pretty much his dream job, and much better than the one he got shafted over.

[treis]

Eh, it gives you time to do the crossword puzzle, instead of wasting that time on a canidate clearly not worthy of any sort of professional position.

[Siege]

I wonder if it varies by field. A few years ago I took temporary work as a receptionist for a social services agency after I'd been laid off for 6 months. I was appalled that two or three people who were scheduled for interviews during the few days I worked there never showed. At that point, I would have killed for an interview in my field, IT, but apparently it was fairly common for them.

[katie1341]

I was hiring an attorney for my office a few weeks ago- there was one guy who looked great on paper. He wanted me to schedule an interview for a Saturday, so he could work it around his job. He was a strong enough candidate that I didn't mind doing it. I scheduled him for 2:30, came to my office around 2, and waited. He caled at 3:30 and wanted to reschedule. Against my better judgement, I did, for the following Friday afternoon at 4:40.

He called be just before 5 to tell me he was running late, stuck in traffic in Atlanta. I've been stuck in Atlanta traffic before, so I was willing to wait for a little while longer. A little after 6, he called to say he was still in Atlanta, and could we please do it tomorrow? This is where y'all are going to question my sanity- I said, OK, one more interview. I scheduled him for the next day, Saturday, at 11. Showed up. About 11:30, I was killing time, checking my e-mail, and I had an e-mail from him telling me that he was afraid that he wouldn't make a good impression that day, so he wanted to reschedule. I e-mailed him back and said no way.

For the next week, I got several angry, rather nasty e-mails from him telling me that I was unreasonable, not being fair to him, explaining that he had health and personal problems that kept him from keeping the appointments, etc. I respended to the first 2 or 3, telling him that I couldn't hire someone who I couldn't even depend on to show up for an interview, but I wished hom luck in his job search. His e-mails got angrier and nastier after I stopped respnding to them. I forwarded all of them to our HR office. He finally quit e-mailing me, and I hired a really great guy.

Just goes to show you that anyone can look great on paper.

[Boggette]

Or the ones who show up for the interview in jeans and t-shirt, want you to sign their unemployment paper, then they want to leave without doing an interview. They were only there to say they tried. I wouldn't sign their papers. If they don't want a job, that's fine. But find somebody else to lie for your and say you tried to get work.

[GargoyleWB]

Having been an interviewer...*shrug*

No-shows just make it easier to weed down the candidate list. Go ahead and interview someone else in the waiting room in the meantime. Heck, give them extra points for showing up early!

Any data point that assists in a final selection is a good thing, IMO.

Also, like the History Dept description by another poster, I feel interviewers often take themselves far too seriously and often show a huge lack of respect for the value of the interviewee's time. As an interviewer, my golden rule starting out was "let's not jerk people around, ask your important questions the first time, and get the answers you want the first time." Call-backs, repeat marathon interviews, and ignoring travel and relocation issues just show lack of organization and respect.

[lezlers]

Ugh. We're trying to find a replacement for me at my second job (I finally get to quit, yay!) and I can't BELIEVE how many flaky people there are out there! We had two interviews scheduled for last Tuesday and neither of them showed up. These interviews were scheuled after my boss screened both applicants over the phone for about 45 minutes so you'd think the applicant would actually be interested. I was so shocked, but my co-workers all insisted it was totally normal. I was still pissed and ready to call both candidates up on the phone (do these people now know we still have their resumes with all their contact info?) and ream them out.

I didn't give a shit that they decided they didn't want the job, but they could've at least called. Both my bosses totally rearranged their schedules for these interviews.

Honestly, what the hell is wrong with people? And for those of you who try to justify it by telling tales of inconsiderate employers, how does that make it okay to sink to their level? I don't care how unprofessional someone else acts, that is hardly reason for you to act in a highly unprofessional manner yourself. Two wrongs don't make a right and all that.

[ivylass]

May I chime in with a different scenario?

We were trying to rent our condo. We had two different people call and express interest, then ask to see it. We gave them directions, and showed up 30 min early to turn on the AC, the lights, make it look nice.

The first one, Ivylad called 10 minutes after her appointment time. Again, he called her. Oh, sorry, she was running late, will be there in about 30 minutes.

45 minutes later, we kick off the fuses, lock the door and leave. She calls about 10 minutes after that to say she was on her way. Ivylad said, sorry, we waited nearly an hour for you, forget it.

The second one never showed and never answered her phone when I tried to call her. I guess it's good they never showed, because if they're late for an appointment, they'll probably be late on the rent. But yeesh, don't waste our fricking time!

(We do have it rented now, BTW.)

[wring]

Rather like the courtesy that some employers show their applicants by wasting the applicant's entire day with a series of fake, pro forma interviews, then never get back to the applicant? "Gee, thank you for serving as our stalking horse for the guy that we really want to hire."

Yeah, it goes both ways...
or, my personal favorite, after you've traveled an hour to the interview, gone through the one hour panel interview, their last question is "the person currently holding the "assistant to this position" position is also interviewing for this position - if ( :rolleyes: ) we hire that person, would you be interested in the assistant position? :mad:

[Steve Wright]

Hmph.

I don't know how many applications I've sent out, over the past several months. It's got to be numbered in the hundreds.

Even the interviews must run into dozens. (For the record, the only time I've missed one, it was because I'd fallen down a flight of stairs and done something to both my knees, so I couldn't walk. Didn't stop me ringing up to explain and apologize, though.)

I can count the number of times I've had definite feedback from an interview (as in, a reason why they rejected me). I can count those on the fingers of both hands ...

[mhendo]

And for those of you who try to justify it by telling tales of inconsiderate employers, how does that make it okay to sink to their level? I don't care how unprofessional someone else acts, that is hardly reason for you to act in a highly unprofessional manner yourself.Justifying it is different from explaining it. And the latter is what i was doing.

I agree that just because some employers are jerkoffs doesn't mean that potential employees have to be jerkoffs too. But if people have been jerked around by employers before, it's at least partly understandable that they might come to the conclusion that basic politeness and consideration are not really necessary. Two wrongs don't make a right and all that.You reap what you sow and all that.

Unfortunately, the ones that reap are not always the same ones that sow, and as i said in my previous post it could well be that the OP is one of those employers who is, in fact, considerate and reliable in dealing with his interviewees. If that's the case, then it sucks that he suffers from the lack of consideration shown by others.

Still, if what i read, and what i hear from other people looking for jobs is any indication, it seems to have become increasingly common for employers not to show even the most basic courtesies during the hiring process. Everyone except the person who actually gets the job is often ignored, and promises to call the candidate and inform them of whether or not they have been successful are broken. When the whole culture shifts away from these courtesies, it's hardly surprising that individuals do it too.

[THespos]

No-shows just make it easier to weed down the candidate list.

That's if you had a huge candidate list to start with.

There's a huge labor shortage problem in my particular business sector now (integrated media planning and buying) and our lists of qualified applicants are usually only 3-5 people to start with.

Candidates need to understand that when they blow off interviews or otherwise fail to live up to their commitments, they waste time and money. They also appear unprofessional.

[athelas]

Hey, I was stood up by my college interviewer. Fortunately, he showed up the second time, but he did not bother to call.

No, I didn't get into that college.

[matt_mcl]

Here I thought you were going to talk about something completely different... like that time during the campaign when the country's top rated morning show did a feature about my riding with all of the candidates. One of them didn't show up.

He's now the MP. :rolleyes:

[Triskadecamus]

Candidates need to understand that when they blow off interviews or otherwise fail to live up to their commitments, they waste time and money. They also appear unprofessional.No, the only thing they need to understand is that they don't get hired. Don't I wish that were true in my workplace. (Where I have nothing to do with HR at all.)

Tris

[Una Persson]

I've got something worse than that - how about people who you interview, hire, have them sign papers and go through pre-orientation, and then - they don't show up for their first day of work, or the second day, and sort of vanish off the face of the earth? These are people being hired in as $40-$50k engineers, supposedly to work in a professional environment, they've spent all this time to get to this point and signed all the paperwork, and they just walk away on the first day.

This has happened 3 times lately, and it happened a few times in the past too. One common thread is that every single one of them was a new college grad. When our HR has tried to contact them to find out why, we've had very interesting results. One person we kept getting his roommate who kept nervously saying "um, he's out, I don't know when he'll be back", another had their mommy answer and finally say "stop harassing my little girl!" Excuse me? Your "little girl" applied and was hired for a somewhat prestigious first job at a high salary which she spent time negotiating over to bump us up $5k a year, and she can't even scrape up the courage to tell us by e-mail that she's not going to show up?

I wish I could contact whoever ended up hiring them and say "you hired a person who right out of school is sorely lacking in honour and professionalism. Good luck with all that."

Oh, and putting your Livejournal link on your resume? Bad idea. These kids needs to take their blinders off and realize that the typical person looking over their resume is a crusty old adult who is only vaguely aware that this "web" exists via their experience hitting ESPN at lunch, and they are not going to appreciate your maoist lesbian wiccan poetry, bitch-fights over Idol or some other dreck, and your cute animated icons of Legolas.

Also, when including an e-mail address, here's a tip - people like me who *do* know the smallest amount about the net will put it into Google, and sometimes find out a whole lot about you from it. Like one guy who looked like a good candidate until I found his student e-mail attached to a college sports blog where he made several racist and homophobic posts, including using the rather quaint racist word of "jigaboo". Another one, a girl who looked promising, I found her LJ via her e-mail, and found her saying very disparaging things about my company in posts the day before her interview, saying how "it was a lame place but it would give her interview experience for the real job she wanted". E-mail addys are free; get a unique one for work that you never, under any circumstances, use for anything but work.

[Barbarian]

<googles self email address>

Nope, nothing. My anonymity wins again!

[Steve Wright]

... When our HR has tried to contact them to find out why, we've had very interesting results. One person we kept getting his roommate who kept nervously saying "um, he's out, I don't know when he'll be back ...I would be so tempted, in such circumstances, to report the guy to the police as a missing person ... Well, why not? He's not where he's meant to be, and his friends either don't know where he is, or are being evasive about it - time to put on your best "concerned" expression, and explain to the cops that, well, you're sure it's probably nothing to worry about, but it does seem a bit peculiar ...

Think of it this way; if he actually has been kidnapped by the militant wing of the Pork Byproducts Liberation Front, you'll have done him a favour. And if he's just skipped out on the job and can't be bothered to tell you, well, he will learn a valuable lesson about how actions have consequences, so you'll still have done him a favour. It's win-win, really.

[Lama Pacos]

Oh, and putting your Livejournal link on your resume?

:eek:

[Una Persson]

I would be so tempted, in such circumstances, to report the guy to the police as a missing person ... Well, why not? He's not where he's meant to be, and his friends either don't know where he is, or are being evasive about it - time to put on your best "concerned" expression, and explain to the cops that, well, you're sure it's probably nothing to worry about, but it does seem a bit peculiar.
Perhaps. I'll bet our HR people would think it was some violation of privacy, so we wouldn't do that. Our policy now is to attempt to call and e-mail for one week, then write them off.

We had another guy, similar situation. He signed up for a Summer Internship in engineering - a paid job ($10 an hour) to shadow engineers and work with them as an assistant, to give work experience over the Summer. Typically, any Intern worth a damn has a pretty much automatic job offer when they do graduate too. And this was in 2002, when there was a HUGE bust in the engineering market, and we typically had THOUSANDS of resumes sitting in piles from both new and experienced engineers desperate for a job. We ourselves had laid off thousands of people, and hiring an Intern was very unusual, but we felt like he was a good match - an investment for the future.

Well, we hired him as an Intern in December for the following Summer, and he asked if he could come in and work for free over Christmas break to "get more experience". And we said yes (actually, we paid him) and everyone was happy. He worked for 4 weeks, seemed decent, then went back to school.

April comes and we try contacting him to set up his Summer Internship. No reply from any e-mails or phones. We leave messages on his dorm phone and his cell phone, and get no calls back. We start getting his roommate at times who does the "oh, you just missed him..." trick. One time we called and his roommate said "he's taking a nap, he'll call you back". Finally, June arrives and we get an e-mail from the guy - sent to the wrong person, not HR, where he says he needs a "6 week leave of absence" from a Summer Internship - in June. Um, dumbshit, how many weeks does that leave in Summer?

Six weeks come and go, and nothing. We try the contact bit again, and nothing. "He's at the laundromat", "he's at a party", "he went back home for a few days", "no, I gave him all your messages". Finally, his roommate tells off our HR person, saying "stop calling and harassing him!", and then they block our number via their caller ID thing. :eek:

December rolls around, and we get a phone call - from dude. He wants to come in for a Winter Internship, but only for 2 days. The rest of the time, he has to "see family". We tell him that not only do we not want to ever see him again, but his fucking around with the previous Summer Internship cost some other potential engineer the opportunity of having a killer job experience. So then what happens? He, according to my HR person, broke down in tears on the phone and accused us all of being "anti Jewish" and that it was the raging antisemetism of his mentor and boss during last Winter "scared him too much" to come to work again. He said we were lucky that he didn't sue us, as the free legal help on his campus said he could get "millions" from us in small claims court and would represent him for free. That's right, small claims court.

But you see, that seemed unlikely from another aspect, as his mentor happened to be Jewish, devoutly, the "I won't even turn on a light switch on Saturday" sort, and his "boss" was out on the road the entire last Winter at a project site in Indiana and never actually met him in person. It also was unlikely because he had actually put on his resume under "leadership abilities" that he was very active in the Methodist youth group as a camp counselor - what the fuck was he, a atealth Jewish missionary trying to convert heathen Methodists? At that point, we started telling him "oh, they're not here, but I'll give them your message" and eventually he drifted away. I found out later he got hired by GM.

I guess we were better off not having him. It amazes me how often someone with a "stellar" resume is a raving psychopath.

[Una Persson]

:eek:
Sadly, it happens a lot. I've been seeing LJ, MySpace, and other blogging links all over resumes that have been crossing my desk as Summer approaches. And they are almost 100% the wrong freaking thing to put on. There was one exception where one guy had written some very elegant write-ups almost like SD Staff Reports of engineering problems, but other than that...shoot, just pick any LJ at random, and then imagine you're a potential employer reading through it as you hold their resume in your hands. Maybe all sorts of people do all sorts of shit after they're hired, and I certainly have no beef with any "normal" LJ which has a mix of the usual fluff and stuff and bitching and profanity and obscure inside jokes, but like I said, most of the people who look at the resume just don't understand the Net and Net culture.

At dinner a few months ago I brought up Wikipedia as a decent quick reference on some subject or another, and 5 out of 6 people who I thought were reasonably "net savvy" had never even heard of it. I showed off another vBulletin board I set up for a client to a small group at work, and half of them were scratching their heads as they didn't really understand what a "board" was, and how threading worked. They get on ESPN, maybe a day-trading site (hey kids! Remember the Clinton Era? Day-trading is back, to clog up the days with hours of unproductive employee time as dumbasses sit on the clock and start playing Gordo Gekko with the $500 they managed to scrape up via a home equity loan...), or perhaps a football or baseball "fan blog". That's it.

[Minotaurus]

Rather like the courtesy that some employers show their applicants by wasting the applicant's entire day with a series of fake, pro forma interviews, then never get back to the applicant? "Gee, thank you for serving as our stalking horse for the guy that we really want to hire."

agree 100%

by the way, I hate it when they ask the question: "tell me about your self"
why don ask questions that are more specific and questions that are related to the job

i was on an interview lately and got this question by a female employe - i felt like smacking my fist in here face

[matt_mcl]

by the way, I hate it when they ask the question: "tell me about your self"
why don ask questions that are more specific and questions that are related to the job

i was on an interview lately and got this question by a female employe - i felt like smacking my fist in here face

I guess to see whether your thoughts are organized, whether you are creative, and whether you can take the initiative in responding to goals that aren't pre-defined down to the letter fo you. And also if you have any violent or misogynistic tendencies.

[matt_mcl]

E-mail addys are free; get a unique one for work that you never, under any circumstances, use for anything but work.

And get a sober one. I would imagine that most employers are less than impressed by "legolasbuttsexx0rzrhot@hotmail.com" or "nyghtchylde@gmail.com" or "sailorbajor@yahoo.com". Just get firstname.lastname@hotmail.com, for heaven's sake. This is also a good idea for political candidates.

[Minotaurus]

you should be on alert when the interviewer start to talk about issues that aren't job-related.

[Fionn]

<googles self email address>

Nope, nothing. My anonymity wins again!

Mine too! For both of my commonly-used e-mail addresses.

[MrJackboots]

by the way, I hate it when they ask the question: "tell me about your self"
why don ask questions that are more specific and questions that are related to the job

It's really meant as an icebreaker, I think. It gives interviewers a place to start. What they really mean (in my experience) is "Tell me about yourself, in the context of this position." That is most definitely related to the job. Besides this, thinking and speaking on your feet is a tremendously important job skill. I'd put it up there with being able to write and communicate effectively.

I have to ask, though: why aren't you prepping it? You know it's coming. I haven't had an interview that didn't start with it. Take ten minutes the night before to think about it and come up with an answer; present yourself in a basically honest way that the company will like. Make yourself personable and professional; first impressions are very important.

You'd spend ten minutes in the morning getting dressed and presentable; why shouldn't you spend ten the same time to get the interview off on the right foot?

[lezlers]

agree 100%

by the way, I hate it when they ask the question: "tell me about your self"
why don ask questions that are more specific and questions that are related to the job

i was on an interview lately and got this question by a female employe - i felt like smacking my fist in here face

Anyone who has been on more than one interview in their life will have a prepared answer for this question, since it's pretty much standard in any interview.

Seriously, if you can't answer this simple question you're probably not cut out for any job requiring any amount of communication skills.

[Minotaurus]

Anyone who has been on more than one interview in their life will have a prepared answer for this question, since it's pretty much standard in any interview.

Seriously, if you can't answer this simple question you're probably not cut out for any job requiring any amount of communication skills.

the problem is that i think this question is pretty lame and unspecific. The question covers such a wide specter that i have problem where to start

[alice_in_wonderland]

the problem is that i think this question is pretty lame and unspecific. The question covers such a wide specter that i have problem where to start

It's a weeder, alright.

[FatBaldGuy]

the problem is that i think this question is pretty lame and unspecific. The question covers such a wide specter that i have problem where to startHaving been on both sides of the interview desk, I would have to say that this is THE standard question in any job interview.

It's intended to be non-specific, to allow the candidate to explain why s/he is a good fit for the job, and to relate experiences and facts that don't translate well to a resume.

If you get frustrated and annoyed by this question, you're in for a lot of grief in your job searching.

[Cat Whisperer]

We're running into the same thing all the time, too. We were joking around at work the other day, and they said I got hired just because I showed up!

Minotaurus, you will be asked many pointless, stupid questions in interviews. Look at them as your opportunity to shine, by using them as a platform to tell the interviewer in yet another way why you would be such a perfect fit with their company. If you can't answer pointless, stupid questions to put yourself in the best light, you aren't prepared for interviewing. I strongly recommend that you look up the billions of interview sites on the net and do some research for yourself.

[Cat Whisperer]

That is, *some* of the billions of sites. Not all of them. Don't have to be *that* thorough. :D

[Steve Wright]

I would like to compose a cogent, witty and articulate post at this point.

But I don't have time, I've got to get to a job interview.

If anyone asks me to tell them about myself, well, I'll just have to grin and bear it. Or, alternatively, tell them about myself.

[Nava]

And get a sober one. I would imagine that most employers are less than impressed by "legolasbuttsexx0rzrhot@hotmail.com" or "nyghtchylde@gmail.com" or "sailorbajor@yahoo.com". Just get firstname.lastname@hotmail.com, for heaven's sake. This is also a good idea for political candidates.

Can someone whose email would then be something like:

mariavictoriadelosangeles.perez-sanmartin@yahoo.com

be excused if they just go for engineer12@yahoo.com?


Me an' my long-ass, 8-word legal name.

[ElvisL1ves]

My college has an e-mail forwarding service that lets you put myrealname@alum.fancynamecollege.edu right at the top of your resume. It seemed worthwhile at the time. If yours doesn't have that, myrealname@hotmail.com is a good idea, too.

Having been a surprised/unprepared interviewer myself (Hey, Elvis, can you talk to this candidate for 20 minutes until the next interviewer's meeting is over?), I've resorted to "Tell me about yourself" too. I think it's a good one - it shows if an applicant is serious enough about the job to prepare an answer, and it shows how well s/he understands their own qualifications and how they'd fit. The rest of the interview keys off your response. It's really the same thing as the 30-second "elevator pitch", which is another absolutely necessary jobhunting tool that you'd better have ready.

I just don't get blowing off an interview, though. Even the largest industry isn't so large that word won't get around. People get around too, and the manager you blew off when you didn't feel like working for ABC Co. may be the one who won't call you later about his open position at XYZ. Even if you don't take the job, you'll still have connections made, and you may change your mind and want to go there sometime later, anyway.

[Boggette]

engineer12@yahoo.com?
Me an' my long-ass, 8-word legal name.

Yeah. That's fine. Although if I were looking for Engineering work, I might like the above as opposed to "bestactorever@yahoo.com" or some such. Make the email match the gig (or come close) at least. It's so easy to set up a free account for this type of stuff.

And while we're at it... Don't send an electronic resume call "Resume.doc" or "Myresume.doc". I get so many of them named like this and I just can't believe people don't know better.

Like the email rule above, use some form of your name as the title so I can pick it out of all the other ones.

[mhendo]

My college has an e-mail forwarding service that lets you put myrealname@alum.fancynamecollege.edu right at the top of your resume. Yeah, my grad school has that too. You get to keep your alias for the rest of your life.