Dressing for Your Job Interview

The phrase "dress appropriately" is easy to grasp if you think of it this way: if you dress for your interview in the clothing you will wear on the job, then you are under-dressed for the interview. If you dress one level up from what you would wear if you work for them, you are dressed appropriately.

For example, for a man, if the normal workday clothing is jeans and work boots (as in construction or trades), or just casual clothing (as in a shopping mall retail store) then one level up is a dress shirt and complementary tie, and chinos or Dockers slacks.

If the workday rule is business casual (as in most office work) then one level up is a suit.
The only exception to "one level up" is if the workday attire is a suit (as in more formal office environments). In this case you just need to wear a suit—not a tuxedo!—for your interview.

Guys, make sure your hair and facial hair is trimmed, your shoes are polished, and do not wear any cologne, after-shave, or scented hair-gel. Many people are very sensitive to various scents, and what you think smells wonderful could make your interviewer nauseous. You don't want to be turned out of the interview right after you walk in.

If you are a woman applying for a professional or management position, wear a neutral- or darker-color suit and high heels. If you are applying for a retail or any customer-facing position you have an almost infinite number of options from dresses to pant suits, and from high-heels to low-heels. Make sure your shoes are polished, and please do not wear any perfume! None! Not even a smidgen! Remember your make-up may have a perfumed scent in it.

Ladies, the quickest path to not even finishing the interview, much less getting a job offer, is to wear clothing that is too tight, too short, too revealing, or just too provocative. In other words, "too anything." If you have any question about whether an item is "too anything," then it probably is.

Body Ornamentation

Body adornment is common today in the under-30 age group, but most office or retail environments are focused on their clients and customers, not on your epidermal artwork. Unless you are applying for a job in a tattoo parlor, or as a bouncer in a Rave club, cover all of your tattoos with clothing or concealment-grade makeup. Remove all piercing jewelry. Women can still wear pierced ear rings, but both men and women should remove every other visible piercing.

Dealing with Job Gaps in Your Resumé

All potential employers look for evidence of job stability and progress in a candidate. But not everyone has a continuous job history. In these turbulent times, employment gaps are no longer the stigma they were in earlier, more economically stable times. Since job gaps are impossible to hide in the recommended reverse chronological resumé format, you need to think carefully about how to handle these on your resumé.

I know a woman who made a number of spectacularly bad decisions in her young adult life. As a result she did not have a continual working history. She had some very large gaps between the jobs that she could safely list on her resumé. How did she resolve this so potential employers would not immediately toss her resumé into the trash?

We talked about what was going on in her life during these times, and what her current goals were. She had resolved to get her life back on track even if she had to start in entry-level jobs until she learned new skills. So, we recast her sparse resumé to focus on the jobs she had held successfully and the accomplishments she could honestly talk about in an interview. For the three-year period when she was not working, we simply stated "Out of job market." No explanation of why, no spin to make up some justification—just an honest statement that between date X and date Y she was not working.

Why was this a good decision? Remember that the purposes of the resumé are to create interest in you as a candidate and as a person, and to lead to a face-to-face interview. Stating "Out of the job market" was both accurate and honest. The reader would perceive that she did not try to hide the gap. Now it was guaranteed to be one of the first areas explored during a face-to-face interview, so she just needed to be properly prepared to answer that inevitable question. If you have gaps in your job history, be honest and list them. And be prepared to give an explanation when you get your interview.