By David P. Willis
Originally published in The Asbury Park Press - June 24, 2009
You should think twice before you put your funny or sexy e-mail address on your resume.
That means no "IAmAllLady326" or "sosofresh6283", said Frank Wyckoff, president of Snelling Staffing - The Wyckoff Group, an Eatontown staffing firm. "You can't be taken seriously if you are going to have "mortalkombatfan" as your e-mail address."
It's unlikely to make a prospective employer smile and it may even cost you the interview and the job.
These days, with New Jersey's unemployment hitting 8.8 percent in May and many looking for work, employers hold the cards for job seekers. The impression you make to a hiring manager or interviewer is important.
"When you are looking for a job, a big part of this is about image," Wyckoff said. "You want to be able to package yourself and package the truth about yourself in the best possible light."
Take a funny or spoof e-mail address.
"What kind of poor judgment does that show somebody that here you are putting together a project to look for a job, you put together a search plan and it doesn't occur to you that you should have a professional e-mail address?" Wyckoff said. "That's sort of like wearing plaid Bermuda shorts to an interview."
Instead, a professional address should be some variation of your name, Wyckoff said.
It all comes down to this: details shouldn't be overlooked.
"Whether it's an email that you send, whether it's how you create your resume, whether it's a voice mail message to ask to speak to somebody...every single time that you reach out to engage with a prospective employer, you're marketing yourself," said Atlantic Highlands resident Michelle Moylan, human resources specialist at Checkpoint HR in Edison. "I think people have a tendency of sometimes to only take in-person interview as that's their first impression."
It can be as simple as a call to check up on whether a resume was received, Moylan said. If a caller sounds aggressive or uses slang, and the job is for a customer service position, "that's not going to be a good match."
Be prepared to give an interviewer your attention if you have a scheduled phone interview.
Moylan recalled one phone interview. "She was eating a bowl of cereal like Cheerios that was soggy and I could hear the spoon clanking into the bowl as she's slurping her cereal and talking with her mouth full," Moylan said.
Another job candidate was picking up his children from different locations during the scheduled telephone interview. Moylan asked if there was a better time to talk. "That to me shows poor judgment," she said.
Job candidates should be aware of their online image as well. "If I were looking over someone's application, I would Google them," said Red Bank workplace Donna Coulson, owner of Donna Coulson & Associates. "I would go into Linkedin, Twitter, Facebook, Plaxo."
Prospective employers will take notice of what they find. "Just make sure you would never be embarrassed by anything, a picture, a statement or whatever," Coulson said. There are other missteps to avoid:
Not being nice to the receptionist. "When you walk in and people are dismissive of the receptionist and not friendly you would be surprised at the number of times someone loses out when they are maybe in competition for a position," Wyckoff said.
He tells people the interview starts about two miles from the office. Don't even cut anyone off while you drive to the interview, he said.
Be careful about greeting on your voicemail. Prospective employers may call and hear it, said Christine Nichols, owner of Options Employment Resources in Tinton Falls.
Avoid templates and stationery designs that add art work to your e-mails to prospective employers. Keep it professional, Nichols said. "That doesn't mean you can't be creative. You just have to remember your audience and the type of job you are going for."
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