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8How to Ace a Pre-Screen

“I got a call back for a job while cooking, and ran outside to get away from my barking dogs. I had the phone, a knife, and a potato. I told the employer: ‘Sorry, sorry, hold on! I'm carving your number onto a potato.’ Still got the job!”

—Employee with great knife skills

Congratulations! You have heard back from a potential employer—maybe several potential employers—so the next step is the interview, right? Not always. At many companies you still have one more hurdle to overcome before you're sitting face-to-face with someone who has the power to hire you. Welcome to the pre-screen!

A lot of employers will pre-screen you before bringing you in for an interview. Usually done by phone, a pre-screen is fundamentally a verification exercise. Do you exist? Do you sound credible? Will you verbally affirm the same things you said on your resume.

The phone screen is frequently done by a recruiter versus the actual hiring manager. This is not an interview. In fact, the way you know the phone screen went well is if after it's over, you're scheduling the actual interview.

It is dead simple to get past this step. Yet for many, this is where their application stops. Here's how to navigate the phone screen hurdle.

“A lot of people are smart and put some of the language from our job descriptions directly into their resume. Others, however, take it too far. One candidate tried to jam our entire job description into the details of his work experience for ...