This Is How to Get Your Next Job

#13: Don’t Be Too Casual

“Hey man.” That’s what one young man kept saying to Eric Zuckerman during their interview.

You might imagine that displeased Zuckerman a tad.

“I don’t expect him to say, ‘Sir this and that,’ but there’s way too much informality,” says Zuckerman. “You just don’t meet people for the first time and call them ‘dude’ or ‘man.’” Especially in a job interview.

You’ll stand out all right. And not in a good way.

You can give the impression that you’re just too informal in other ways too—the clothes on your body (we’ll discuss this in Chapter 5) and things that you insist on not removing from your ears. Take the man who entered an interview with iPod earphones. “Not a great first impression during the handshake,” says Kevin Sheridan, ...