The perfect professional headshot is worth $1,000, and maybe even a job

Look confident but not cocky. Assertive yet approachable. Smart instead of sexy, unless you can pull off both—and only if it’s subtle sexy.

Nailing your professional headshot seems harder and more clutch than ever at a time of record job changes and on-screen first impressions. The buttoned-up and made-up looks that once dominated business directories and professional profiles now seem stuffy in the work-from-anywhere era.