It’s always soul destroying to receive a rejection when you’ve toiled over an application, and it can be really difficult when you don’t get any feedback. What should you do? Plough on and keep doing applications and hope your luck changes? Give up? No, neither of those. It’s time to take proper stock and work out a strategy for success.

If you’ve been rejected at the application stage then now’s the time to dust out your applications and re-read them. Read carefully and slowly. Then ask yourself these questions:

1. Did you answer the questions the employer asked? It’s all to easy to answer the question you thought they might have asked, or the question all their competitors have asked.

2. Was your spelling and grammar impeccable. No mistakes at all? Some large law firms stop reading at the second typo! If you can now find a number of mistakes you can be pretty sure you’ve found one reason for your lack of success.

3. Is it easy to make sense of what you wrote? Are your sentences short and clear or do they ramble around so that now you come to look back on it you’re confused too. That would be another serious problem. Always go for the simplest words you can and for short sentences. Recruiters have to read a lot of applications, they don’t have time to read  yours twice to make sense of it.

4. Did you show an insight into the role and the employer? If you were applying to be a trainee solicitor would your application also work to be a trainee banker, accountant or social worker? Can you swap out the name of the employer and put in one of its competitors and does the application still make sense? If the answer to these question is yes then you have not shown that research and commitment.

All of that perfect? No clues? Then ask for help. Try the careers service if you’re still studying and if you’ve left you may well find you’re still eligible for support. Reach out and take it – after all, you’ve paid for it! What have you got to lose?