SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
All right, picture this. You are on your way to a job interview. You have prepared for the questions. Your outfit is perfect. You arrive right on time, even with enough time to spare.
JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
So you grab an iced coffee to make sure you are well caffeinated. But could that coffee end up being the reason you don't get hired?
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CAITLIN WEHNIAINEN: My Gen Z candidates are showing up to their interviews with iced coffee, iced latte in hand.
DETROW: One recruiter took to TikTok to say, this is not a good look.
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WEHNIAINEN: It is perceived, from my opinion, my hiring standpoint, that when you show up with an iced coffee or an iced latte, that this interview is just, like, a stop on your list of errands for the day.
DETROW: That's Caitlin Wehniainen in the video that kicked off a massive discussion online.
SUMMERS: And people have very strong feelings about this, so we decided to call her up. She posted the video a little over a week ago, and she said the reaction to it has been...
WEHNIAINEN: Disorienting to say the least. Like, you know, you put out, like, a tip, thinking, OK, I'm going to help job seekers because I see that this is what's occurring in my own experience. And then to see it launch this kind of generational debate and discourse - and the comments are incredible. I mean, thousands.
DETROW: What she thought was going to be a tip for people to help them land jobs has struck a real nerve.
WEHNIAINEN: One interesting thing is people trying to genderize it and say, oh, it's targeted toward women. And it's not at all. It's almost like, do guys not drink iced coffee? Because in my experience, this is not a female or male situation here, you know? Like, what?
SUMMERS: Wehniainen has 16 years of recruiting experience with large Fortune 500 companies, and she gets that some offices are more casual and says a lot of the online discussion has brought up some valid points.
DETROW: Her main point is that showing up with a drink could be distracting in any job interview.
WEHNIAINEN: When you're making that first impression, you want the focus to be on the value that you're adding and your skill set. So why bring in any other outliers into that conversation that could take the focus away from your skill set?
SUMMERS: She knows it's a tough job market, and people are really frustrated, so every detail can go a long way - things like bringing a hard copy of your resume along.
WEHNIAINEN: These are just little things that I see all the time that I recommend to my candidates. I'm doing this for a living, and it's - I think that that's been an interesting thing to see from the masses, is that people don't know how to interview, necessarily.
DETROW: And one other tip to land that job?
WEHNIAINEN: I love the thank you note after an interview, and I think if it's done with an AI chatbot and it's very buttoned-up, it can look insincere. But if you can bring up specific points that were discussed in the interview where you felt like it was a moment of connection with the person interviewing you, bring that to the thank you follow-up because that's the extra lasting impression that you're leaving behind.
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