5 ms·

Know your audience. As the owner of a company with single digit employees, I put a fair amount of stock in a good cover letter. IE one that shows someone under

Know your audience. As the owner of a company with single digit employees, I put a fair amount of stock in a good cover letter. IE one that shows someone understands what they're applying to and why they might be a good fit. And that they're interested enough in this specific position to make a small effort beyond firing off a resume. I don't mind people submitting bad AI-written cover letters though. It's a clear signal that I can safely ignore the application.

danaris 3y ago
How the hell are job applicants supposed to "know our audience"? The whole point of the process is that neither of us knows anything about the other. And no; we can't rely on something like "it's a small company" (there are small companies where everyone's too busy to read cover letters, or doesn't care about them), or "they say they genuinely care about cover letters" (that's about as reliable as the list of qualifications, and we all know how idiotic those can often be). We would all be better off if we could relegate that "getting to know you" part of the hiring process to the interview. It's a relic of a time when applying for a dozen or so jobs would be likely to get you hired, so you could justify putting in a solid hour or so of effort crafting an individualized cover letter for each one.
- tempestn 3y ago
  It shouldn't take an hour to write a decent cover letter, and there are many ways you can learn about the company you're applying to. Starting with the job posting, but LinkedIn and their "about us" page would be a couple more low effort ways. When someone is able to do these things and write a decent introductory letter it's a strong sign that they will also be able to deal well with challenges that come up in the course of work. Plus, as is its purpose, it gives you a chance to describe why you're a good choice for this specific role, and to address any apparent deficiencies in your skills or experience. That isn't to say that the lack of a cover letter is disqualifying (though a bad one might be), but a good one can definitely set you apart.
  - nasalgoat 3y ago
    Sorry, when you're applying to a dozen jobs a day, it's hard to put that personal spin into it. I know you think you're a special snowflake that's different from every other company out there, but looking for a job is a grind. A tough one. Why make people dance and sing even more?
    - JohnFen 3y ago
      > Sorry, when you're applying to a dozen jobs a day, it's hard to put that personal spin into it. True, it's a lot of work. But plenty of people (myself included) manage it. I'm not going to say that anyone is wrong for not writing cover letters, of course. But there are lots of people making hiring decisions that put a lot of stock in good ones, so it makes logical sense to provide one.
      - danaris 3y ago
        "I did it, so everyone should have to do it" is a mindset that denies the possibility of progress to something better.
        JohnFen 3y ago
        The mischaracterizes what I'm saying. I'm not saying everyone has to do it. Nobody has to do it -- it's your choice. What I'm saying is that doing it can give you an advantage.
      - carlosjobim 3y ago
        > True, it's a lot of work. But plenty of people (myself included) manage it. Generally what the person recruiting ate for lunch and the state of their bowel has ten times the influence on the success of your application than any amount of time you spend writing a cover letter. It's all random, and you can't know beforehand if your application will arrive at a serious recruiter or not.
    - hotpotamus 3y ago
      You know, I'm more on the side of the worker than capital a lot of the time and I despise much of modern hiring processes, but a cover letter doesn't seem like a big deal to me. I would think you could template it significantly and still avoid making it too boilerplate. Like start with some bio - as a young child, I took everything apart to see how it worked (much to my parents' chagrin). From that I learned to see the beauty of a mechanical watch ticking away, and I see a similar beauty in a RabbitMQ server ticking away messages, directing them where to go and seeing the inside of the system at work - it's been a lifelong interest of mine. That part can pretty much stay the same. Then write a paragraph or two about the job. You might not know much but try and find a connection. Like if it's a bank, talk about how you'd like to know more about how money moves over the modern global infrastructure, or if it's some service you've used, talk about how it was helpful. If it's hard to find a connection, then you can say I've got some relevant skills, but I don't know much about your industry and I'd like to learn more.
- JohnFen 3y ago
  > How the hell are job applicants supposed to "know our audience"? You don't research a company before you apply for a position with them?
  - danaris 3y ago
    a) In most cases? Hell no. I read the basics of what the company is/does, and decide from that if they look worth applying to. I'm not looking for a spouse, I'm looking for a paycheck. Now, if I actually hear back from the company, then I'll do research to get a more in-depth feel for the company's culture and history. b) How on earth do you expect me to be able to "research a company" to be able to tell whether they're genuinely going to read a cover letter and care what it says? The only way I can think to find that out is to be able to talk to people who've recently been hired there, and fuck cold-emailing random people at a company you're trying to apply to; I guarantee some significant percentage of companies would find that super creepy and shitcan your résumé out of hand.
    - JohnFen 3y ago
      > How on earth do you expect me to be able to "research a company" to be able to tell whether they're genuinely going to read a cover letter and care what it says? I don't. That's not what I was talking about when researching a company. You can't (usually) know if a cover letter will be read or valued. But it might be, so it seems worth doing anyway just to gain that possible edge.
    - quickthrower2 3y ago
      Most people probably do the intelligent thing based on probability, outcome and game theory. Sometimes you want to do a lot of legwork to apply. For example a web dev job paying $500k because AI goldrush dollarz (cough anthropic) and othertimes you need a job to tide you over and there is yet another business focusses SaaS hiring devs with cliche perks and so yeah I mean at least be polite and use GPT4.

danaris 3y ago

How the hell are job applicants supposed to "know our audience"? The whole point of the process is that neither of us knows anything about the other. And no; we can't rely on something like "it's a small company" (there are small companies where everyone's too busy to read cover letters, or doesn't care about them), or "they say they genuinely care about cover letters" (that's about as reliable as the list of qualifications, and we all know how idiotic those can often be). We would all be better off if we could relegate that "getting to know you" part of the hiring process to the interview. It's a relic of a time when applying for a dozen or so jobs would be likely to get you hired, so you could justify putting in a solid hour or so of effort crafting an individualized cover letter for each one.

tempestn 3y ago
It shouldn't take an hour to write a decent cover letter, and there are many ways you can learn about the company you're applying to. Starting with the job posting, but LinkedIn and their "about us" page would be a couple more low effort ways. When someone is able to do these things and write a decent introductory letter it's a strong sign that they will also be able to deal well with challenges that come up in the course of work. Plus, as is its purpose, it gives you a chance to describe why you're a good choice for this specific role, and to address any apparent deficiencies in your skills or experience. That isn't to say that the lack of a cover letter is disqualifying (though a bad one might be), but a good one can definitely set you apart.
- nasalgoat 3y ago
  Sorry, when you're applying to a dozen jobs a day, it's hard to put that personal spin into it. I know you think you're a special snowflake that's different from every other company out there, but looking for a job is a grind. A tough one. Why make people dance and sing even more?
  - JohnFen 3y ago
    > Sorry, when you're applying to a dozen jobs a day, it's hard to put that personal spin into it. True, it's a lot of work. But plenty of people (myself included) manage it. I'm not going to say that anyone is wrong for not writing cover letters, of course. But there are lots of people making hiring decisions that put a lot of stock in good ones, so it makes logical sense to provide one.
    - danaris 3y ago
      "I did it, so everyone should have to do it" is a mindset that denies the possibility of progress to something better.
      - JohnFen 3y ago
        The mischaracterizes what I'm saying. I'm not saying everyone has to do it. Nobody has to do it -- it's your choice. What I'm saying is that doing it can give you an advantage.
    - carlosjobim 3y ago
      > True, it's a lot of work. But plenty of people (myself included) manage it. Generally what the person recruiting ate for lunch and the state of their bowel has ten times the influence on the success of your application than any amount of time you spend writing a cover letter. It's all random, and you can't know beforehand if your application will arrive at a serious recruiter or not.
  - hotpotamus 3y ago
    You know, I'm more on the side of the worker than capital a lot of the time and I despise much of modern hiring processes, but a cover letter doesn't seem like a big deal to me. I would think you could template it significantly and still avoid making it too boilerplate. Like start with some bio - as a young child, I took everything apart to see how it worked (much to my parents' chagrin). From that I learned to see the beauty of a mechanical watch ticking away, and I see a similar beauty in a RabbitMQ server ticking away messages, directing them where to go and seeing the inside of the system at work - it's been a lifelong interest of mine. That part can pretty much stay the same. Then write a paragraph or two about the job. You might not know much but try and find a connection. Like if it's a bank, talk about how you'd like to know more about how money moves over the modern global infrastructure, or if it's some service you've used, talk about how it was helpful. If it's hard to find a connection, then you can say I've got some relevant skills, but I don't know much about your industry and I'd like to learn more.
JohnFen 3y ago
> How the hell are job applicants supposed to "know our audience"? You don't research a company before you apply for a position with them?
- danaris 3y ago
  a) In most cases? Hell no. I read the basics of what the company is/does, and decide from that if they look worth applying to. I'm not looking for a spouse, I'm looking for a paycheck. Now, if I actually hear back from the company, then I'll do research to get a more in-depth feel for the company's culture and history. b) How on earth do you expect me to be able to "research a company" to be able to tell whether they're genuinely going to read a cover letter and care what it says? The only way I can think to find that out is to be able to talk to people who've recently been hired there, and fuck cold-emailing random people at a company you're trying to apply to; I guarantee some significant percentage of companies would find that super creepy and shitcan your résumé out of hand.
  - JohnFen 3y ago
    > How on earth do you expect me to be able to "research a company" to be able to tell whether they're genuinely going to read a cover letter and care what it says? I don't. That's not what I was talking about when researching a company. You can't (usually) know if a cover letter will be read or valued. But it might be, so it seems worth doing anyway just to gain that possible edge.
  - quickthrower2 3y ago
    Most people probably do the intelligent thing based on probability, outcome and game theory. Sometimes you want to do a lot of legwork to apply. For example a web dev job paying $500k because AI goldrush dollarz (cough anthropic) and othertimes you need a job to tide you over and there is yet another business focusses SaaS hiring devs with cliche perks and so yeah I mean at least be polite and use GPT4.