Secret to Getting the Job: a Firm Handshake

• ted
  May 7th, 2008 at 9:58 pm

  Wow. Nice to see an entire industry built on analyzing body language.

  As long as we have people who make money rating handshakes, we’ll have people being hired for all the stupidest reasons.

• Jerse
  May 7th, 2008 at 10:00 pm

  Yes! I’ve been told that I have a firm handshake - which means I am totally qualified for the job of whatever…

• Sofar
  May 7th, 2008 at 10:41 pm

  This is as bad as people whom judge your character based on whether or not you salt your food before first tasting it. I can’t stand people whom think they can boil down the richness of human experience to how well you can squeeze, or how you wear your tie, or how you take your tea. And what’s the deal with the first impression nonsense? I’ve got such a terrible memory I forget how I met the people I’ve met within the week.

  Type “never trust a man who” in quotes into google and read all the ridiculous results.

• Idil
  May 7th, 2008 at 10:42 pm

  Why 98? That’s really bugging me. They should have just gotten 2 more students… the data would have been a billion times easier to analyze, and it would be much more consistent… what’s wrong with them?

• hoola girl
  May 7th, 2008 at 10:47 pm

  Sad for me, then. I have hyperhidrosis.

• jenny
  May 7th, 2008 at 10:51 pm

  im not sure its just the handshake…
  im guessing people who have a firmer handshake are more confidant, which is of course more desirable when being hired…
  it just goes hand in hand i think, no pun intended

• Leah
  May 7th, 2008 at 11:06 pm

  Yeah, this study is interesting, but it doesn’t look into cause and effect, it only proves a correlation. As the previous commenter said, the handshake is probably related to over-all demeanor.

• bean
  May 7th, 2008 at 11:06 pm

  Having a firm handshake is a great way to alienate a female recruiter and lose the job. Not to mention staring at the chest if she’s wearing a deep plunging neckline and Wonderbra.

  Not that I’m bitter or anything.

• Dan
  May 7th, 2008 at 11:09 pm

  How much do you want to bet that the students that were rated well by the businessmen were simply more SURE OF THEMSELVES and because of this were the best handshakers, but still not necessarily the best workers?

  I’ve seen some people that were sure pretty full of it.

  Of course you probably also had a few body-builders in there to…

  D-oh!!!

• Alex
  May 7th, 2008 at 11:52 pm

  @bean: too much information!

  I’ve been told that I “interview well” whatever that is - and I do have a pretty good handshake. Ergo, the two *must* be related

  So, here’s my tip for you poor handshakers: a good handshake does not mean you have to grip and squeeze till the other person’s hand goes white from lack of circulation. Nor is it a limp handshake (where the other person doesn’t even grip your hand).

  Grip the other person’s hand, firmly (softer if you’re shaking hands with a woman or an older person), shake twice lightly, then disengage. Maintain eye contact at all times, smile, and say “nice to meet you.”

  How firm? Test it on your own hand (shake your left hand) - if it hurts, then it’s too hard

• * Miss Universe
  May 8th, 2008 at 12:25 am

  Wonder if there were any differences between perceptions of women versus men when it comes to firm hand shakes.

  A firm handshake from a woman may not be perceived in the same positive light

  What is a ‘trained handshaker’?

• Will G
  May 8th, 2008 at 2:25 am

  Absolutely 100% true. There’s nothing worse than a clammy, limp handshake, and it’s amazing how many people don’t realize this.

  Whether or not you actually are, a firm handshake gives the impression being confident. It’s as important as looking the person in the eye when you say hello.

• roger
  May 8th, 2008 at 2:35 am

  I’ve met a lot of guys who take the “firm handshake” principle way, way too far. He-men of the grip, who attempt to grind the bones in your hand to a fine powder. I also worked at a company that brought in a trainer who (among other things) instructed us in the ways of the proper handshake: “Web-to-web, thats the key!”. While an appropriately firm handshake is a good thing, if you make business decisions based on a person’s grip, you deserve to go bankrupt and are probably well on your way.

• Sara
  May 8th, 2008 at 3:49 am

  A good handshake is like a good friendly hug - good contact, a pleasant amount of pressure, not too brief but not lingering to the point of looking like attraction.

  Indeed, it’s got to be that people more likely to interview well will naturally have better handshakes due to confidence and comfort in themselves.

• Magicmike
  May 8th, 2008 at 4:14 am

  I think jenny is on target, something I am sure the experimenters are aware of.

  I hope they did some controls (I’m sure they did) - concluding that hirability follows from handshake is just bad science. Correlation does not mean causality. That is one reason you always try to disprove H0 first.

• Angstrom
  May 8th, 2008 at 4:58 am

  To get a really firm handshake simply use your thumb to press on their middle knuckle so it flips in… then squeeze like crazy.
  Now say in a confident voice “I want your job, give it to me NOW!!!”. They will do whatever you say.

  You can easily get to be CEO with this technique.

  See? All that time wasted in business school should have been filled with crushology studies. Sign up at my Crushology school TODAY an take your first steps on the road to psychotitude.

• Greg from Nerd Beach
  May 8th, 2008 at 7:17 am

  I wonder how gloves would affect the results?

• SciencePunk
  May 8th, 2008 at 7:32 am

  This explains why all people missing their right hand are unemployed.

• plainswalker75
  May 8th, 2008 at 12:22 pm

  Idil,

  Studies like this usually have several participants who, for whatever reason, have data that is unusable, or otherwise cause their results to be discounted. It could be, for example, that the students showed up for the handshake analysis, but couldn’t make it to the job interviews and so, they were not counted in the data.

• Alecks
  May 8th, 2008 at 12:49 pm

  This is absolute and utter BS. Even if this were a double blind study (which I’m assuming it is, or else it’s already flawed), in order for the Trained Professional Handshake Raters to get a sample of the interviewees’ handshakes, they had to look at them, talk with them, and basically interact with them in addition to getting their handshake.

  In a few seconds, people can make a judgement of new teachers that is the same one they make after the end of the semester. With a brief, audio-less videoclip of a person’s face, viewers guess– more than chance– whether the person is gay or straight. And these Trained Professional Handshake Raters will see if these people are going to have a good interview, and even though, consciously, they rely on their training and its quantitative measures, they’re bound to be influenced by their meeting.

  And anyways, interviewers look for a good firm handshake ANYWAYS as a way of judging character. People who prepare for their interviews know this and are prepared to give a good handshake. I know that this study only looks at hireability anyways, but if you wanna look at fitness for the job, a handshake tells you nothing. Likewise, some interviewers who believe in mystical-magical color psychology will look favorably on people with red ties, just because they read somewhere that red means confident, and the well-prepared interviewee will take advantage of this.

• kid_icarus
  May 8th, 2008 at 2:58 pm

  i wonder if tickling the palm of the interviewer with your ring finger as you shake hands helps……try it sometime….it feels super creepy….baby face tile creepy.

• Eve
  May 12th, 2008 at 12:14 pm

  Could it also be that the people who work hardest at being hired also focus on a good handshake because of the thought that handshakes make people hireable?

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