Having difficulties landing that next role? Your good looks could be hindering your career path.

For male recruiters in particular it could be your tremendous good looks restricting your climb up the career ladder, according to research from UCL School of Management published in the latest issue of journal Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes.

Assistant professor Sun Young Lee found that in competitive workplaces, such as sales departments, good looks were associated with competence, so handsome men seemed threatening to future colleagues. If hirers expect to compete with these candidates, they would rather discriminate against them.

But Dr Lee didn’t find the same effect for pretty women, as hiring managers did not associate female attractiveness with competence.