Garside, Philip, Secrets to Getting a Job, The
This book is largely irrelevant now, having been published at a time when headline unemployment figures were over 10% (they're now below 5%, employers are screaming blue murder and I have a fully-fitted dungeon with a gimp written into my graduate employment contract), but for a long-term-unemployed schmoo with few qualifications and no prospects like myself, it was a godsend. Here is the relevant, life-changing passage:

It should boost your confidence to know that the majority of people at all levels, from managers to labourers, interview very poorly. If eight people are interviewed the chances are that all eight will be poor. As a result, many decisions are made on a comparative basis: the least worst will get the job.

The least worst! I can be the least worst! I immediately stopped approaching interviews as if I was about to have my hands chopped off, and spoke like a more-or-less natural person. Obviously things like volunteer experience and the natural pick-up of the economy have helped, but you asked for a book that changed my life and this one certainly did.
(Emily Bruce-Dickinson http://jovialfellow.blogspot.com/, Thu 22 May 2008, 11:09, 3 replies)

I'm always great in interviews
But tend to get fired shortly afterwards when they realise I'm a natural pathological liar. Isn't the whole point of interviews to tell them exactly what they want to hear?
(frankspencer, Thu 22 May 2008, 11:12, closed)

I like that the phrase "It should boost your confidence to know"
... doesn't quite manage to state that the claim is true, only that your confidence should be boosted if you "know" it.

I now return you to your regularly scheduled interview fear and paranoia.
(haberman is singing in the changes, Thu 22 May 2008, 11:16, closed)

Dodgy techniques.
I read that it would ease my nerves to picture the interviewers in their undies / naked. It was very enjoyable as two of the panel were very much within the 'Really fit MILF with large, surprisingly pert baps' category.

I don't think it helped my chances though, when I explained 'Where I see myself 5 years from now' while stroking my knob.
(Greencloud Wanted to go fishing on, Thu 22 May 2008, 11:36, closed)