找工作？千萬別這麼做！

We’ve all heard the stories about job interviews gone wrong, like the eager young applicant who brought a sandwich to the interview, because, after all, it was lunch time.

But a candidate’s first impression begins long before the interview. It starts with cover letter and CV or resume, which often are far from blemish-free.

BBC Capital asked recruiters, hiring managers, and career coaches to share some of the most egregious errors they see in applications — and how to fix them.

I can’t take a gamble on someone who can’t follow the first instructions I give. — Emily LaRusch

Cut and paste isn’t your friend

Matthew Lanier, a Boston-based corporate recruiter at technology staffing firm Eliassen Group, recalls the resume of an applicant in her twenties, who had mostly retail and customer-service experience. So he was surprised when lower down on the CV, he found an executive-level position with a major finance company and dates of employment spanning almost 10 years. Turns out the applicant had searched professional-looking resumes online, found one she really liked, and cut and pasted her own experiences over it. But, she mistakenly left some of the other person’s work history and personal contact information on the document.

“You have to assume that your entire resume will be looked at prior to being contacted, and that a careless mistake could be the difference between getting the job you want or being passed over,” wrote Lanier in an email.

There’s also another important reason to take the extra time—you can more easily support your story in interviews, according to Lanier.

“There is a huge difference between the candidate who can naturally apply their experience to the questions being asked of them versus one who is looking down at their resume for every answer,” he said.

Toss the form letter

When Ed Zitron, founder of EZPR, a public relations firm in San Francisco, listed an opening for a paid intern on , he received more than 100 applications. Not one contained a personal cover letter.

“Every single one was a form letter, clearly copied and pasted,” said Zitron by email. Worse, almost none of the applicants even bothered to “put my name, or the firm's name, anywhere in the body” of the cover letter.

“I'm so easy to Google: you type my name in, there's my Twitter, there's my personal and my professional website,” Zitron said. “Getting even the most basic facts… is easy.”

His advice: Don’t send a generic cover letter, ever. Instead, share a bit of who you are and how that might relate to the position for which you are applying. Spend a few minutes Googling the firm. If you have a contact’s name, Google that person, too.

Be selective

Executive career coach Irene McConnell has clients who tell her they apply to more than 100 jobs per week. This is a big mistake, according to the director of Sydney-based Arielle Careers.

“The recruiters remember your name and begin to associate it with ‘that dude/gal who spams me every time I put a job ad up’,” McConnell said.

Think of it like a house that’s on the market for too long. You start wondering what’s wrong with it and why it won’t sell.

Don’t think recruiters don’t know which applications have made the rounds. Some tell-tale signs: a resume and cover letter that are completely non-aligned, the wrong recruiter's name or an incorrect role of interest, according to McConnell. The recruiting world is a lot smaller than you might think.

“If you damage your reputation in the eyes of recruiters, it will be more difficult to get a call back even when you put a thought-through application in,” McConnell said.

Keep photos to yourself

Roy Cohen, a New York-based veteran career counsellor and executive coach, remembers when a new client included an image of herself in a bikini in her application packet.

She had come to him for job search advice and strategy because she was frustrated that she wasn’t getting beyond the first round or getting many interviews.

“In advance of our first session, I asked her to provide me with a little background, a resume, and a sample cover letter,” said Cohen in an email. “That's how I discovered her very wrong approach.”

She wanted to work in marketing for a hedge fund and told Cohen that she knew that hedge funds typically hired "babes,” so she thought the photo might give her the upper hand.

While it is quite common in Europe to include a photo of oneself when applying for jobs – and sometimes it is even requested by companies – it is not expected and is often frowned upon in the US. Even where it is expected, keep it professional and current.

Cohen counselled his client against the use of the photo, not just for its inappropriateness but also because it was quite dated. “Imagine the awkwardness when you discover that a candidate has misrepresented the facts. In this case, by submitting a photo that is 10 plus years old,” said Cohen. “In addition to feeling like a ‘bait and switch’ occurred, interviewers are likely to wonder if the candidate is delusional or simply prone to lying.”

Shikha Arora, senior recruiter with SAP Asia, who is based in Singapore, has had other photo issues. “I received [an] application from an experienced professional from Hong Kong. The file size was 14 MB and I was taken aback to see more than 10 pictures shared in the document,” she wrote in an email. Some of the images were of the applicant receiving rewards and other showed him doing a favourite hobby.

“In my opinion, not the best way to tell and sell your story,” she said.

Follow instructions

Emily LaRusch, founder of Phoenix-based virtual receptionist services firm Back Office Betties, likes to test applicants’ attention to detail right from the start. Recently, she included in a job posting two straightforward instructions and a mention that anyone who didn’t apply as instructed wouldn’t be considered.

She received more than 30 applications in two days; only three people followed the instructions, and only one of them had a good command of English grammar. She is the only one who LaRusch is even considering for the post.

“This is supposed to be where applicants put their best foot forward, so I can’t take a gamble on someone who can’t follow the first instructions I give,” said LaRusch.

Don’t be too sure of yourself

Amy Silverman, managing editor of Phoenix New Times, recently advertised a food critic opening on the newspaper’s food blog. What she quickly learned: “Everyone eats so everyone feels like they could make a great food critic.”

More troubling, Silverman found that a lot of people out there don’t take the application process very seriously. Whether it’s refusing to submit a resume or making up excuses, she’s seen it all. As one applicant put it, "I don’t have a resume. I’m a business owner and, quite frankly, have complete disregard for resumes. They’re snapshots of what a person wants you to know, not a synopsis of who a person really is. That type of understanding can only be gained through interaction."

Needless to say, Silverman didn’t give the applicant a second glance. Another applicant talked about “wetting” one’s appetite and another who mentioned her own “little to none experience in food.”

Her advice: “If you want a job writing, don’t send a cover letter with typos and grammar errors.”我們都聽過面試失敗的案例，比如一個青年應聘者覺得午餐時間到了，興沖沖地抓着一個三明治就去面試了。

事實上，應聘者的第一印象早在面試前就形成了。一封求職信、一份簡歷都會是敲門磚，而這往往又是錯漏百出的環節。

BBC Capital諮詢了招聘人員、招聘主管以及職業生涯教練，讓他們說說自己見到的簡歷中最離譜的錯誤——以及如何補救。

以下是記者伊麗莎白·加隆（Elizabeth Garone）撰文報道。

我可不敢僱傭一個連我第一條規定都做不到的人——艾米麗·拉魯希

複製粘貼？不！

來自波士頓技術人員配備公司伊萊亞森集團（Eliassen Group）的招聘人員馬修·拉尼爾（Matthew Lanier）想起他看過的一份簡歷。應聘者年紀尚淺，二十多歲，卻擁有着零售和客服方面豐富的經驗。讓他大吃一驚的是，繼續往下看，卻發現簡歷上印着一家大金融公司的行政崗，應聘日期幾乎有十年之久。原來，求職者在網上搜了一份看上去很專業的簡歷，覺得挺滿意，就把自己的經歷剪切上去。但是，她忘了把別人的工作經歷和聯繫方式刪去了。

拉尼爾在郵件中寫到：“你要想，在收到面試通知前，你的簡歷是會被仔細考量的，而這種低級錯誤可能決定了你是否能得到工作。”

拉尼爾還說，在簡歷上多花點時間還有一個重要原因——在面試時，你要對自己的工作經歷對答如流。

拉尼爾表示：“能輕輕鬆鬆用工作經歷回答面試問題的，和那些問一句，看一眼簡歷的人真的差很多。”

扔掉千篇一律的模板吧！

舊金山公關公司EZPR的創始人艾德·基特隆（Ed Zitron）在實習生求職網（）上發佈了一個帶薪實習崗後，收到了一百多份簡歷，但竟沒有一份附有求職信。

基特隆在郵件中說道：“每份簡歷長得都一樣，全是複製粘貼，”更糟糕的是，幾乎沒人想着要把“我的名字，或是公司名寫在求職信上”。

基特隆說道：“在谷歌上搜我易如反掌：你輸入我的名字，我的推特、個人和專業網站就都出來了。就連想了解一下我的基本信息也是……小菜一碟。”

基特隆的建議是：絕對不要用千篇一律的求職信。你要做的，是簡單介紹一下自己，以及這和你所申請的崗位有什麼關係。花點時間搜索一下公司。如果你有聯繫人姓名，也搜索瞭解一下。

要有針對性

行政人員教練艾琳·麥康奈爾（Irene McConnell）說，有的客戶表示，他們每週會投100多份簡歷。而據悉尼Arielle Careers公司的主管所言，這可是求職大忌。

麥康奈爾說道：“招聘人員會記住你的名字，然後覺得‘怎麼我每放個招聘廣告，這人都來，”。

聯想一下那些市面上總賣不出去的房子。你會覺得，這房子到底有什麼蹊蹺，怎麼總賣不出去。

麥康奈爾表示，不要覺得招聘人員看不出誰是費了心思，誰是隨便投的。一些細節問題往往出賣了你：簡歷和求職信的格式七歪八扭，招聘人員的名字寫錯的，又或是應聘崗位填錯了的。招聘圈子沒你想得那麼大。

麥康奈爾表示：“如果你在招聘人員那裏把名聲搞臭了。即使你以後再投一份精心準備的簡歷，想要重獲崗位恐怕也是難上加難。”

照片就自己留着吧，別貼了！

來自紐約的資深職業顧問兼行政人員教練羅伊·科恩（Roy Cohen）表示，他最近的一個客戶在自己的求職文件中放了一張自己的比基尼照。

她來向科恩諮詢求職建議和策略，是因爲她總是第一輪面試就被刷了，或者根本是石沉大海，杳無音訊，爲此她很沮喪。

科恩在郵件中寫道：“在我們見面前，我讓她先給我些背景資料、一份簡歷和求職信。我就這樣發現了她的天大錯誤。”

她想應聘市場營銷部門，負責對衝基金。她還說，對衝基金一般要的是“美女”，所以她覺得照片能給她更勝一籌。

雖說往簡歷裏附照片在歐洲還挺正常的——有時還是應聘公司的硬性規定——但在美國可沒這種習慣，甚至有時還會招致反感。就算有的公司要你附上照片，也要記得貼一張正式的個人近照。

科恩建議那位顧客不要放照片了，不僅因爲這不合適，還因爲照片看上去也過時了。科恩說道：“想想吧，如果你發現應聘者扭曲了事實，會有多尷尬。就這件事來說，那位顧客是附上了一張看上去老十歲的照片，”科恩還表示：“除了有一種‘誘導轉向法’之感，面試人員可能還會覺得，這個求職者是不是有點妄想症啊，還是本身就愛撒謊。”

來自新加坡的SAP Asia資深招聘人員施凱·阿羅拉（Shikha Arora）對照片一事也有話說。她在郵件中寫到：“我收到過一份香港的簡歷，應聘人看上去是經驗豐富的專業人士。但他傳的文件居然有14MB那麼大。看到裏面十多張照片，我真是嚇到了。”有的照片是應聘者的獲獎照片，有的是關於他個人愛好的。

阿羅拉表示：“我不覺得這是推銷自己的好方法。”

說什麼，做什麼

來自鳳凰城虛擬前臺服務公司Back Office Betties的艾米麗·拉魯希（Emily LaRusch）表示，她喜歡從一開始就考察應聘者對細節注不注意。在最近的一次崗位招聘中，她清楚地寫明瞭兩條注意事項，還提醒應聘者，凡不符合格式要求的，將不予以考慮。

短短兩天，她就收到了三十多份簡歷，但只有三個人按她要求做了，而僅有一人英語語法掌握得不錯。這也是唯一一個拉魯希考慮的人選。

拉魯希說道：“這本該是求職者最用心的環節。我可不敢用連我的第一步要求都做不到的人。”

別自視過高

《鳳凰城新時代》（Phoenix New Times）的主編艾米·西爾弗曼（Amy Silverman）最近在該報的美食博客上公開招聘美食評論家。但她很快發現一個問題：“會吃飯的人都覺得自己能成爲一個美食評論家。”

更讓人憂心的是，西爾弗曼發現，許多人不把應聘程序當回事兒。不管是拒交簡歷的，還是編造藉口的，她都見識過。有個應聘者直接說：“我沒簡歷。我是個生意人，說實話，我覺得簡歷根本沒用。簡歷上都是對方想讓你看到的，而不是這個人的真實概況。要想較爲全面地瞭解一個人，只能通過親身接觸。”

不用說，西爾弗曼肯定沒再考慮那位應聘者。另一位應聘者說起自己“破壞”他人食慾經歷，還有一位求職者甚至提到自己“對美食幾乎是一無所知”。

西爾弗曼的建議是：“如果你想找個文書崗。記住，求職信上不要出現拼寫和語法錯誤。”