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Resume writer here that also writes cover letters for clients, converted to writing after 20 years in tech recruiting. Almost any time that a client asks for a
by fecak 9y ago
Resume writer here that also writes cover letters for clients, converted to writing after 20 years in tech recruiting. Almost any time that a client asks for a cover letter, my response is "Here it is, and I hope you never have to use it".
If you're using a cover letter to apply for a job, it means you have no human inside the company that is advocating on your behalf. Your friend wouldn't ask you for a cover letter (in most cases) if he/she was going to refer you internally. So when you are required to use a cover letter, it usually means you're applying to a job 100% 'cold' as an outsider.
Unfortunately that may be the case sometimes. If a cover letter is required, there are a few key elements
1 - prove to the reader that you actually paid a bit of attention to the job requirement. I spent 20 years in recruiting, and generic cover letters that clearly weren't written for me ("Dear Esteemed Employer") never got my attention. I want to know what interested you in this opportunity, or briefly what you know about the company (could be lots of things).
2 - Talk a bit about what you're interested in from a work perspective. What kind of work do you want to be doing (and hopefully that is the work we're offering).
3 - Maybe check off a few boxes from the job spec. If they require a degree and n years with Python, a few sentences to check off those boxes will make it easy for the reader (often a recruiter or admin with little experience and limited knowledge of the domain) to say yes to you as a candidate.
Semi-formal tone. You can link to GitHub, but usually I link GitHub and LinkedIn on a resume.
- tyingq 9y ago>Almost any time that a client asks for a cover letter, my response is "Here it is, and I hope you never have to use it". That seems kind of absolute. If I were applying to, say, an auto manufacturer, the cover letter might be the obvious place to state why I'm interested in working there. And why I'm a good choice. Like, "I've always been a car nut. I even wrote an open source library to access CAN bus data here: http://whatever http://whatever " Basically to say that a personalized, per-company, cover letter might have significant value. A generic one, perhaps not.
- bllguo 9y agoWell that assumes someone reads it. Unfortunately that seems pretty unlikely. I used to personalize stuff like that but I got worse results than when I just used a cookie-cutter template and mass fired. Anecdotal of course
- brailsafe 9y agoWere they proportionally worse? As in, did you have a higher success ratio or more successful responses in total because you were able to send out a higher amount of applications?
- estsauver 9y agoIf you're going to throw in links, I would do them as footnotes. ... I even wrote an open source library to access CAN bus data [1]... Thank you, Name [1] http://whatever http://whatever
- zhte415 9y agoI wouldn't. A pain on stream of consciousness.
- thomastjeffery 9y ago> applying to a job 100% 'cold' as an outsider. I really wish that weren't such a problem. It's difficult for many of us to get a foot in the door, and that is exasperated by the one-size-fits-all solutions that everyone seems to point to, that really aren't the best fit for many of us.