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> “No one will read this,” my advisees lament, often as I am reading their cover letter right in front of them. I know they mean that no one important will read

> “No one will read this,” my advisees lament, often as I am reading their cover letter right in front of them. I know they mean that no one important will read it. I think what they mean is "no one who is in a position to give me the job I want is going to read this", they clearly went to the author because they think his help will increase their chances of getting that job. When writing a cover letter, which is quite common when doing direct applications in Switzerland, I never know who I'm addressing, and knowing your audience is a key factor when designing poignant communication. Will it be a HR person? A tech lead? A team lead? Will they appreciate the ugly-but-hard-to configure LaTeX template I used, the hand-coded postscript to generate the symbols for the telephone and the letterbox? Will they know that if I write "C" in the list of programming languages, that does not mean I am proficient in C++? That a seemingly tangentially related job I am mentioning is actually solving the same problem, but in a different industry? The result of this is that most cover letters I have written contain generic platitudes, to the point where I now have a makefile and just make minor adjustments like company names and addresses, plus some tweaking, before sending it out, with a reasonable success rate. Now that I'm thinking about it, maybe it is true that nobody is reading these.

notagoodidea 6y ago
This. In fact, I am currently in the process and I finally chose to have a generic one with a LaTeX to adapt to company names and recruiters and I wrote specialized when I can see who is going to read my cover letter. The third option I use is when I contact the recruiter by mail, I provide the generic one as attachment and in the mail provided more specific motivation and experience related to the job offer. And most of the time now, companies don't want you to upload your cover letter but use a form with a textarea box the size of a stamp to write your cover letter without any formatting option.
timthorn 6y ago
The cover letter is essential for me as a hiring manager. When I have a pool of ~100 applicants for a graduate role, I need something to differentiate between the candidates beyond the list of courses they've undertaken and summer jobs they've had. I'll filter first on only those applications that have cover letters attached. Any cover letter shows that they're willing to put the effort into applying rather than just spraying the same CV to lots of employers, but a good one shows that they've researched my company and are motivated to work there. Doesn't need to be in great depth, but a line talking about one of our products and how its use in a specific industry is interesting to the applicant speaks volumes. There are bad cover letters too, including those written for a different company but carelessly sent to mine...
- dhosek 6y ago
  I've never had HR send me anything but the resume when I've been involved in hiring. For that matter, I don't know that I've ever sent anything other than a resume in forty years of working in IT.
  - Mc91 6y ago
    Yes, 25 years in IT and reading resumes, I was never passed anything other than a resume by HR.
- okprod 6y ago
  Same, but the value/need for a cover letter partly depends on size of organization, sector, etc. I know very large firms that use something like LinkedIn for job applications and automate the initial screen through that/resume-only. I tend to work in management with sub-100-employee companies and prefer having a cover letter as part of the hiring process, which is also more manual.
vsareto 6y ago
>Now that I'm thinking about it, maybe it is true that nobody is reading these. Considering that a lot of hiring managers complain of too many resumes, not enough qualified candidates, and lengthy interview processes, it's not unreasonable to assume they've stopped reading cover letters because they don't have the time.
- postalrat 6y ago
  Cover letters are shorter. Maybe instead of trying to read all those resumes they should just skip that and only read the cover letters.

notagoodidea 6y ago

This. In fact, I am currently in the process and I finally chose to have a generic one with a LaTeX to adapt to company names and recruiters and I wrote specialized when I can see who is going to read my cover letter. The third option I use is when I contact the recruiter by mail, I provide the generic one as attachment and in the mail provided more specific motivation and experience related to the job offer. And most of the time now, companies don't want you to upload your cover letter but use a form with a textarea box the size of a stamp to write your cover letter without any formatting option.

timthorn 6y ago

The cover letter is essential for me as a hiring manager. When I have a pool of ~100 applicants for a graduate role, I need something to differentiate between the candidates beyond the list of courses they've undertaken and summer jobs they've had. I'll filter first on only those applications that have cover letters attached. Any cover letter shows that they're willing to put the effort into applying rather than just spraying the same CV to lots of employers, but a good one shows that they've researched my company and are motivated to work there. Doesn't need to be in great depth, but a line talking about one of our products and how its use in a specific industry is interesting to the applicant speaks volumes. There are bad cover letters too, including those written for a different company but carelessly sent to mine...

dhosek 6y ago
I've never had HR send me anything but the resume when I've been involved in hiring. For that matter, I don't know that I've ever sent anything other than a resume in forty years of working in IT.
- Mc91 6y ago
  Yes, 25 years in IT and reading resumes, I was never passed anything other than a resume by HR.
okprod 6y ago
Same, but the value/need for a cover letter partly depends on size of organization, sector, etc. I know very large firms that use something like LinkedIn for job applications and automate the initial screen through that/resume-only. I tend to work in management with sub-100-employee companies and prefer having a cover letter as part of the hiring process, which is also more manual.

vsareto 6y ago

>Now that I'm thinking about it, maybe it is true that nobody is reading these. Considering that a lot of hiring managers complain of too many resumes, not enough qualified candidates, and lengthy interview processes, it's not unreasonable to assume they've stopped reading cover letters because they don't have the time.

postalrat 6y ago
Cover letters are shorter. Maybe instead of trying to read all those resumes they should just skip that and only read the cover letters.