Imagine you were thinking about a kitchen renovation. To establish interest, you complete the online form to ask for a brochure that will encapsulate the company’s services and offerings, and perhaps showcase the company’s best projects so you can ascertain what sort of a job they’ll do for you.

Imagine your horror the next day when you click on the “get mail” button on your email program and you see the beginnings of what ends up being a 32 minute download of one email from that kitchen company. They’re so excited to have your business, that they have bombarded you with information. A pictorial portfolio of kitchens they have designed since 1986, scanned testimonials from 30 happy customers, their terms, their procedures, their marketing brochures, current “specials”, a real-life project blueprint to describe the seamless execution of a recent kitchen project, and more. Oh so much more.

Are you happy to receive hundreds of pages of unsolicited documents, presentations and reports? After all, it was only the first approach to hear a little more and now you’ve received so much data you don’t really know where to start. In fact, it all seems rather hard doesn’t it? Perhaps you’ll revisit that later when you have the time to sort through it all. Or maybe not.

You know something? Some jobseekers make exactly the same mistake.

They are so excited about the prospect of that dream job that they want to impress just like that kitchen company. Why email “just” a resume and a cover letter when they could email pages of positive and praiseworthy testimonials from past employers? And their last performance appraisal (of course, don’t forget the chart legend that shows the reader what the numbers mean!). How could they possibly not send that PowerPoint presentation that became the global standard for the all the offices? That’s bound to impress! While they’re at it, scanned copies of recent training courses would be a good idea too wouldn’t it? Perhaps top it off with that brilliant 90-day plan that won kudos from management.

Stop the madness! Back away from the keyboard slowly.

Think.

The employer or the recruiter have not met you; frankly they’re just not THAT into you (at least, they’re not yet, but if you bombard them with information they didn’t ask for, they never will be!).

You are not doing yourself a favour by assuming that the potential recipient of this information is vitally interested in soaking you up like a sponge. In fact, isn’t it just a little bit arrogant to assume that the search consultant or hiring manager has nothing else better to do all day than to immerse himself with the splendour and wonder of you? Can you imagine if one in every ten applicants did the same thing? Would anyone ever get hired?

Or, would the search consultant simply look at that volume of information and, like the kitchen renovation brochures, just quickly lose interest and move onto the next candidate who was more considerate of the reader’s time?

Remember, as vitally interested as you are in a job and as much as you want it, your enthusiasm must be tempered with common sense and executed with business etiquette. If you’re good, you and your resume will shine without unsolicited and unwanted extras.