What? There's such thing as professional emails?

I work in a recruiting department.  All day I email back and forth with managers and candidates. If it were solely up to me, half of the candidates would be out of the running due to email etiquette and resume mistakes.  The obvious is spell check, but there's so much more!

1. Include a signature at the end of your email.  I'm not talking about anything fancy.  I'm saying, put your name at the end of the email.  If you're feeling fancy, add your phone number. You would not believe how many emails I get with no signature.

2.  Professional email addresses.  I think you know what I mean.  I'm not going to lie, my first email address was flighty56 and it is still used.  Its how I communicate with my friends and its so old, I hate to part with it.  But when I started looking for a job, I got myself a email account with my name.  This isn't hard. They're free!  And if you don't want to check yet another account, you can forward incoming messages to another account (just watch what account your reply comes from!).

3. This leads me to my third issue. When you start communicating using email, make sure your email account is titled something appropriate.  Not your address, your account. When I get an email, the sender shows up as Joe Smith .  I'm not lying when I say that sometimes instead of "Joe Smith" I see something like "The Dude" or "Job Account."  Try again.

4. One word emails are NOT OKAY in the midst of a job hunt.  If I email to confirm an interview time, please do not reply, "ok" and nothing else (also refer to #1 again). I'm not saying I want paragraphs in return, but it would be nice to see you regurgitate the date and time so that I know you have it correct.

5. Along the same lines as #3, I would like to see emails with complete sentences.  I know. I'm demanding.  If you cannot write an professional sounding email, why should I introduce you to the managers?  Again, I'm not talking about the five paragraph essay each time, but put a little thought into your emails. Show me you are interested and intelligent.

6. Respond properly. I do a lot of the scheduling of interviews.  Often times the emails I send ask the candidate to provide a few times they are available to talk.  It makes me want to pull my hair or throw something when I get an email back that says, "Yes I am interested" and that is all.  Just as bad is "Wednesday at 4."  No.  First, I asked for A FEW times.  Second, don't tell me when.  Do you know how many schedules I am trying to coordinate?  The likelyhood of everyone being available at that one very specific time is small. Now we have to stretch the process out longer because I have to email you again and wait for another reply.  So, read emails all the way through and answer the questions asked or could be putting your job search in jeopardy. 

7. Spell Check! Always. This is not a Facebook status (though you should spell check those too!).