Following Up and Wrapping Up
Episode #10 of the course How to ace any professional job interview by Ken Liu
Welcome to our final lesson!
Now that you’ve made it through the interview, it’s time to follow up.
Make sure you ask for a business card during your interview so you can follow up easily without having to look up your interviewer’s contact information. It is especially helpful if your interviewer’s name is hard to spell, for example.
Let’s take a look at a couple of ways you can follow up.
Handwritten Note
Sending a card through the post office is rare these days, and that’s exactly why it could be a nice touch. It shows the interviewer that you took the time to write a thoughtful letter by hand.
However, if you’re going to send a “thank you” card through the mail, you need to keep a few details in mind.
1. You need to send it with urgency. By the time the interviewer receives your letter, they could already have made their hiring decision. If your note would have made a difference in how they made their decision, you just lost out.
2. Make sure your handwriting is legible. If you have terrible handwriting that not even your mother can understand, you will want to rethink your decision to follow up with a handwritten note.
3. Do not write the card in advance. I’ve seen people write cards in advance and mail it as soon as the interview is over. It’s an amateur move. Don’t do it.
If time is of the essence, sending an email is the best way to follow up. It is the way that I prefer to follow up with the interviewer.
I am not a huge fan of sending an email ten minutes after the interview, simply because your interviewer is probably interviewing another candidate at that time.
And besides, your interviewer will be exhausted after a full day of interviews. They will not likely pay any attention to your email until the next day, anyway.
Sending an email the next morning will remind your interviewer about you when they are fresh and rested.
What to Write
Besides thanking the interviewer and telling them that you enjoyed meeting them, use this opportunity to clarify your answers to any questions that stumped you. It reinforces your interest in the job to the interviewer.
If you happened to touch upon an interesting subject during your interview, this is also a good way for you to take the discussion a little further. It shows that you were genuinely interested in the subject matter.
That’s a Wrap!
Congratulations! You have made it through all ten lessons on how to ace your next job interview.
In the past ten days, we’ve gone through the entire interview preparation process as much as possible.
We didn’t have time to go through everything in excruciating detail. But if you follow the tips and strategies from these ten lessons, I have no doubt in my mind that you will be ahead of most other candidates who are applying for the same job.
It has been a pleasure taking you through this course. I sincerely wish you the best in your job search, and I hope you will use all the tips from these ten lessons and ace your next interview.
Good luck!
Ken
Recommended book
Wait, How Do I Write This Email? by Danny Rubin
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