It happens quite a bit.   Candidates, trying to strike that oh-so-delicate balance between showing enthusiasm and conveying to future employers they’re a hot commodity, play it just a touch too cool during the courting process.  Take “Joanna” for example:

I’ve been working with Joanna for the few months.  She’s a strong candidate with great, brand-name companies on her resume.  She’s sophisticated, confident, and extremely senior.  She’s also unhappily out of work and getting a touch nervous about her options; there are very few positions open at her level even in great economic times.  But something opened up and very quickly, Joanna became one of two finalists for a leaderly position in a large, well-established company with a slightly less pedigreed name than those in her background.  And that’s when things began to slip.

I told Joanna it was down to two.  I let her know what the company liked about her and what about her made them just a touch nervous.  I encouraged her to be ready for certain questions and have case-studies at hand to address some of the obstacles I expected her to face in her last rounds of interviewing.  Joanna was ready.  But she decided to overlay one more element into the mix – she wanted the company to know just how lucky they’d be to get her.  And she did this by playing hard-to-get. 

First, when we tried to book her in for her last rounds of interviews, she suddenly wasn’t available, openly noting she was interviewing elsewhere.  But when she learned their next meeting opportunity was far in the future, suddenly she made things work – it seemed those “interviews” were really coffee dates with old colleagues and could easily be rescheduled. 

Then, she called the owner of the company directly to let him know she might be heading into final rounds at another company so  her candidacy with them might be short-lived (the not-so-subtle message:  “Act Now Or Else!!).  His response was not what she was looking for:  “Oh … I’m so sorry our timing won’t work out.  We need to finish our process so just let us know if you land somewhere else.”

And a week later, she wrote to the hiring manager, offering to pull herself out of the running for other jobs if they would offer this job to her immediately.  They would avoid a bidding war, she reasoned.

In my experience, none of these strategies ever work. The first is obvious game-playing, the second is a threat and the third shows desperation.  Games, threats, desperation.  Who wants that in a new hire?

My client hired the other guy.  His calm, even demeanor showed up even better in light of Joanna’s activities.  And so will yours.  Be available, be honest, and be patient.  Be yourself.  Don’t play games and that job will come to you.

Games, Threats, Desperation: Tools for a Job-Search?