The biggest mistake you can make when applying for a job is to not be bothered to read any special instructions to employer provides.

I had a few interesting responses over the past week to several job positions and freelance tasks and posted on different job boards.

For one job opening about 50% of responders followed the directions. Many of the candidates were very well qualified. With a quick glance at their application I could tell whether or not they really read my post. If they didn’t, they had no chance of winning the project.

For a freelance job opening, the person who “won” the project failed to follow instructions for the test project. Oops.

Finally, I had an opening where not a single responder followed the directions. Kind of sucks because it was a very well paying job for something that wasn’t exactly rocket science. And I spent a decent amount of money on the posting’s placement.

In 2009 I learned a lot about hiring people. Biggest lesson: most people are idiots.