Do they have to be hand written and mailed in? Or emails are good enough? I’m interviewing for an internal position.
What do people usually do?
I have been of the opinion that thank you letters are pretty pointless. I just cant see it getting you any job nor making you lose it. In fact, every job i sent a thank you letter for I got denied, and i got offered on the ones I didnt. they have their minds already made up and a sappy, obligatory letter isnt going to change it. If i was going to send it, id do just email for sure and not handwritten
Limited sample size and personal experience only, of course. May be different for an internal position or experienced positions, as mine is only with entry level
IMO thank you letters make you look like a wiener, especially if they are hand written. I think a short email is sufficient. But that’s just my opinion, do what you feel is best.
Half the jobs i interviewed for I heard back before a handwritten one woul even have time to get there. But it is indeed nice if it makes it in time, i suppose.
I stopped sending thank you letters after my 1st job. I let my face to face meeting do the talking.
I recently went through this process a couple of months ago. I was making a move from retail advisor to junior PM so I really wanted this job and there were several highly qualified candidates to battle against. I killed the in-person interviews and during my debrief sessions with the external recruiter they suggested a hand written thank you. I told the recruiter that I thought the hand-written note is a little cheesy but he said that he made the same suggestion to every other candidate and they complied so I would be the one who didnt look eager enough to put pen to paper. I acquiesed and ended up sending a personal thank you that reiterated my interest in the position.
I ended up getting the offer and accepted after some negotiation. I doubt it had anything to do with the letter but it almost became a requirement, like getting a bachelors degree, to keep up with everyone else. If you do go with a personal letter do not buy a hallmark thank you card or anything like that. I used my personalized corporate notepad letterhead so it was smaller than a sheet of paper which I feel came across casual but personal.
^well done
I disagree. i’ve seen a thank you letter work. we hired a person who didnt have the typical econ/finance/bus degree and no exp because she wrote a thank you letter. it was handwritten and everything. honestly thats what sealed the deal, we were about to start the search again then bam handwritten letter. then that was close. a year later she is doing sum impressive bookeeping work. btw i didnt kno bookeepers made bank.
The guy you didn’t hire because he didn’t write you a thank you note is making your competitors a lot of money. The shop down the street thanks you for using the filtering method you are currently using.
thank you letter is pointless,
If in some hypothetical world, by some weird miracle, there were two finalists that were idential in every single detail and we are literally about to decide with a coin toss (BTW, this has never. happened. ever.) then yes maybe a thank you letter will push you over
^ exactly
besides its not really a filtering method we use. its juss the person went above and beyond and wrote a letter to show how much they wanted it so they went from not being considered at all to being hired ultimitely. key here is no matter the upside or downside, a thank you note is courteous and costs you practically nothing, so juss do it. the idea that you shouldnt do it because you will sound desperate is kinda immature. laziness, on the other hand, i can understand. amirite.
There is something wrong with your hiring process if someone goes from not even being considered to hired because of a thank you letter. Either the other people weren’t properly filtered or the original person wasn’t properly assessed.
I agree. I call total BS on this “example”. If indeed true, it must have been something else.
I’ve received hundreds of thank you’s now and it’s never come remotely close to a change from not-a-chance to you’re-hired.
Are we using “Thank you letters” to refer to snail mail specifically or Thank you emails as well? I was told you always send those.
I think you always send an email. Snail mail is a pass IMO.
a ton of factors but its what pushed it. we were about to scrap and start over (which means another month of interviewing). but she seemed solid enuff to me so i argued for it. letter sealed it. Of 5 candidate interviewed, 4 sent a ty email, but 1 wrote a letter. wth do you do that u’d have to interview hundreds of ppl? i frankly hate the process.
I write thank you letters on paper, but it’s not about strategy, it’s about class. I don’t expect a written note to make a big difference to the result.
I also write an email thank you, just in case a decision is made before a mailed letter can arrive. Not sending a thank you at all can definitely be a strike against you if you are close to the running with someone else who does, many times I’ve heard “and that guy didn’t even send a thank you note after we interviewed him all that time, so I don’t like him.” Perhaps the guy wasn’t liked for other reasons, but the lack of a thank-you letter just gave people a voiceable excuse to dislike them more.
If you’ve blown away the competition, then the notes don’t make much of a difference, but if you are in close running with someone, it can.
If you are in the relationship side of the business (as opposed to the analytic or the trigger-pulling part of the business), I can see a written note carrying more weight. However, the ER, PM, and trading sides of the business are all bottom-line oriented, so the written note is often jeered as pointless, because that side of the house doesn’t really see much value to relationships.