Resumes and Perfume Don't Mix

I work as receptionist at a large company. It is my job to sort the mail and put it in the mailboxes of the executives.

One day we received an envelope that was doused in perfume. While the scent might have been pleasant in small doses, this was just overpowering. Still, I dutifully dropped the envelope in the mailbox of the human resource department, to whom it was addressed.

While I was still sorting the mail, the human resources director came to check her box. She pulled the mail out and caught a whiff of the perfumed envelope. She frowned and wrinkled her nose. The offending envelope was easy to find. She just had to follow her nose!

She opened it, saw that it was a resume, and threw the whole envelope away without even reading it. I asked her why, but I already knew the answer. The over-perfumed envelope was annoying and did not make a good first impression.

The lesson is that if you make your resume stand out in an annoying way, employers won't even read it. Make sure that whatever steps you take to make it pop are appropriate and professional. Your resume is the first impression an employer has of you, so you don’t want it to be a bad one!