The interview lasted about 40 minutes and consisted of standard questions, mostly clearly relating to the job. However, candidates were also expected to give a presentation, and instructions about this had been included in an attachment to the email which invited me for interview. There was no reference to the presentation, or to the attachment, in the body of the email message. It was clear that I was not the only candidate who had overlooked this (many attachments in messages I receive are logos or other 'footer' type material, or simply duplicate the content of the body of the message, so I have come to ignore them unless specifically referred to them). I was told it was 'fine' to omit the presentation, but it clearly wasn't, and I think I would have had a much better chance of success if I had given one. In fact if a number of candidates fell into this trap, it would have been better for them to have been invited back for a rearranged session in front of at least some of the panel, rather than risk losing someone with good presentation skills. I have learnt my lesson and will now look at all attachments in important messages. (Indeed the following month an email inviting me to interview at Bath University made the same mistake, and this time I was prepared!) But I found it ironic that the email message about a job concerned with communication should itself be so poor at communicating what was required at interview. I suspect it is yet another example of how human resources departments call the shots, in this case by setting a fixed template for the text of interview invitations, rather than letting the interview panel write the instructions. As a result candidates who might have shone at the presentation exercise could have been missed.