How to hack your profile picture so you get more banking interviews

You keep applying for banking jobs and you keep on getting rejected. If recruiters can check you out online, your profile photo might have something to do with this.

Researchers at Amsterdam University and Erasmus University in Holland have been conducting experiments involving the profile photographs of female job candidates. In almost every case, they conclude that you are more likely to be invited to job interviews if in your profile photograph you are wearing a pair of glasses.

The researchers tested the responses to 139 candidates aged between 18 and 55 who sometimes wore glasses and sometimes didn't, as per the photographs below.

The candidates applied for three different kinds of jobs: jobs requiring expertise (an architect), jobs requiring trust (a bank cashier) and jobs requiring attractiveness (a promotion assistant).

Wearing glasses was found to 'significantly increase' the perceived credibility of candidates applying for jobs that require expertise. And perceived credibility was found to be positively correlated to subsequent job offers. They found that wearing glasses made no difference to candidates' perceived trustworthiness. And they found that wearing glasses actually increased candidates' perceived attractiveness.

In other words, wearing glasses is a win-win situation if you're a woman looking for a job. Especially if you're looking for the sort of job that requires expertise, as is the case with most jobs in finance.

What if you're a man? Should you still wear glasses in your profile picture? The researchers are less clear on this. They suggest that beards are a good way for men to enhance their perceived expertise and hypothesize that a combination of beard and glasses might be effective, but say this would require substantiation.