Thank You Notes - They Really Are Important

In Resume 101 – The Do’s and Don'ts of How to get Noticed (for the right reasons).  Part III in our III part Series, I mentioned that the lost art of writing Thank You notes needs to be resurrected.  I realize that not everyone had a mother like mine who forced me to write thank you notes to everyone who ever gave me a birthday or Christmas present the day after I received it, but it is something you need to learn how to do.  And it is OK to send an e-mail but a hand-written note goes so much further!  These do not have to be long:

Dear Mr. Jones, (Typically you want to keep these a bit more formal unless it is for a start-up or other more casual atmosphere - you can never go wrong using formalities, though.)

Thank you so much for taking the time to meet with me about the Software Engineering position you have open.  The technologies you are using are really interesting to me and I have been looking for an opportunity to hone my .Net skills.

I really appreciate your explaining to me the project you are working on right now - it sounds like it will really transform how you are running your business.  I hope that I am given the opportunity to come work with you and your team.

Very sincerely,

Mary Smith

If you Google "Professional Thank You Notes After an Interview", you will see other examples but the point is - write them promptly after the interview, and write a different note to all interviewers.  Keep in mind, the interviewers may be forwarding the notes to HR and HR will notice that you just sent the same note to everyone - that won't look good for you.  This is also why I really do recommend a hand-written note, not e-mail.  Do I need to mention that the hand-written notes should be in ink, not pencil?

Oh, and don't do what one candidate did to me recently: he wrote hand-written thank you notes to each interviewer, which was great, but he sent all of them to me in one large envelope and asked me to distribute them, which was not great.