Should I send a thank you email after a job interview?

[20MayJune22]

I attended a face to face interview today. I think it went fairly well, they are interviewing other candidates today/tomorrow. I wouldn't expect to hear back till maybe Friday at the earliest. Should I send a thank you email - does it make any difference? This is my first time job hunting in 13 years, I'm not sure what is normal now.

It wouldn't sway the decision as we score on evidence against the essential criteria, but when I've received a thank you it has always made a good impression. I don't think it's weird or cringy at all.

Really? In what industry? I’ve never heard of this.

I've just been recruiting, out of 8 I called in for a first interview, 5 sent me a thank you follow up. Out of 57 that didn't get an interview, 23 thanked me for reading their application.

Goodness it was definitely the thing to do when I was looking for jobs and it wasn’t an email (didn’t exist then) but a letter. Guess times have changed!

Again, in what industry is this the norm?

I have received them before as an interviewer, but as others have said it doesn’t make any difference to the outcome. Good luck!

It's a sales role, yes? Then I think it would set you apart to send a message. I don't think it will harm your chances in any event, but it's difficult to say without knowing the personalities involved.

I've been a hiring manager before and honestly I find it cringe when candidates do this. If you're good you'll get called back or offered. Nothing you can do post interview to influence this.

I worked in finance in the city ( London) it wouldn’t help you get the job if we had decided on our candidate but it wouldn’t make us think about pushing your cv into other departments who we knew were also recruiting if we felt you had come close to securing the position. Just keep it short and professional.

That would put me off. I don't have tome to read through a deck of post interview musings!

No definitely not.

I work in Enterprise Software sales, not SaaS. Contracts $100k up to 6 figures+, base salaries £100k+.

Generally, there would be some sort of recruitment search followed by a discussion with the recruitment/HR team. That would get a thank for your time, really interesting role type follow on email.
the next stages would be with the sales management and that’s where I’d have a point of view of the business and the way I’d approach it, based on the discussions with recruitment and my research.
It may or may not be used in the interview, but if not it would be my follow up.
Generally, that has won me all my roles since about 2005, where I wasn’t being hired on the basis of being known to the hiring mgmt team, so 3 out of 6 and it got me the job each time.
My current role was a little different - large company, more structured process - recruiter (with a strong brief), tech mgmt, sales mgmt, panel with a mix of tech Snr mgmt.
The recruiter got the thanks email, I built a POV deck and used that in the mid process and they gave me a template for the panel interview.
I’d been laid off in Jan, so a bit different from that side as well, in that I was having to be proactive. 37 applications (some a bit desperate initially, tbh) generated 10 recruiter discussions, 6 sales mgmt, then three finals, of which I won 1, was preferred candidate in the other but they couldn’t move as they were hit by a restructuring. (pretty sure on the stats, but I don’t have my spreadsheet to hand) and the other I stopped the process as I was accepting my current role.

@ItsAlwaysTwins

Why would a thank you email put you off a candidate?

It looks like they are not willing to just let me make the decision - comes across as desperate to influence it. A simple thank you maybe not so much when it starts going into the whys and wherefores of why they should be appointed, it comes across like they are trying to go outside the bounds of the decision making process which the hiring team has implemented.

That's what I think anyway - but I'm only one person other hiring managers may love it.

it’s not weird or try hard in some industries. I’ve worked in three connected industries in my career. Marketing services, so agencies, tech, and now consulting. In all three it’s been extremely normal practice, and is almost rude not to once you’re past entry level jobs.

@IDontHateRainbows

Maybe you are hiring from a very different industry to my background (professional services). In my mind, the entire point of interviewing is to influence the interviewer to hire you, so an email thank you afterwards is just part of that process and to reinforce the message that you want the job.

I think its a good idea. It gives you a chance to confirm that you are enthusiastic about the opportunity

As an interviewer I think it shows enthusiasm which i value

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I would but to be polite, not in the hope of it influencing the outcome.

Someone has bothered to make time to consider you and presumably to tell you about the company so a brief line thanking that person for his or her time and saying it was interesting to learn more about the role/company might not go amiss?

No

The point of interviewing from the hiring managers perspective is to identify the best person for the job. Will writing a gushing pick me pick me email mean that a particular candidate is suddenly much better than they were before, when I interviewed them? Not in my industry.

Ah this might be where our wires are getting crossed. Everyone who interviewed my DS this summer was a director/partner/associate taking time out from their core function to do this. A short email thanking them for this doesn't seem at all weird/gushing/pick me, especially in a professional role with a lot of customer contact.

At best it would make no difference to me, at worst it would put me off. But I'm only one person, in one industry, although undoubtedly not the only one, who thinks like this.
I just can't see it affecting the outcome as that's what the interview is for, to obtain information to determine the outcome. I'd never have that as the deciding factor even in a tie break situation. So many other factors to break a tie.

I’m a bit late to the party, but I’m on the SLT of a SaaS company (though hire into CS, Support, and Sales, rather than Services). I interview about 30 people per year. I always appreciate a “thank you and next steps” email.

I notice if I don’t receive one, but don’t penalise. The only time it would affect my decision is if I had two equal calibre candidates and one did send a well written thank you email.

I think you absolutely should - especially in professional services. I would find it rude in the extreme not to receive an e-mail after I’ve interviewed someone.