It’s a familiar story: you spend months perfecting your CV and endlessly refreshing your inbox in the hope that you get an interview. And when you do, all that’s left is to make sure you’re able to handle your nerves before stepping into a room where you’ll get the grilling of your life from a complete stranger who might end up becoming your boss.

Sometimes it ends up being nothing but a way to feel small and horrible. It doesn’t help that statistics, too, prove that when it comes to job hunting, the odds are less likely to be in a woman’s favour in the first place.

According to researchers at Universitat Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona, women are on average 30% less likely to be called for a job interview than men with the same qualifications. Furthermore, a study in 2018 by law firm Slater and Gordon found that nearly one in three bosses had – or would – reject a job application from a woman in case they became pregnant.

A bad job interview can be confidence-destroying. Here’s how to bounce back