Do I or don't I write a cover letter? I’ve written posts about cover letters in the past. There was a rather detailed post entitled Cover Letter Follies, Part II. For the life of me, I can’t find Part I! There are lots of online resources giving advice on How to write a cover letter. This post is about whether or not you should "bother".
I wrote myself a note a few days ago to write another piece on the importance of cover letters, because for several weeks, I’ve been seeing very few with candidates’ resumes. I’ve always been an advocate of the cover letter’s ability to provide an additional dimension of depth and understanding that goes “beyond the resume”. I see them as complementary.
I’ve just run into an employment advisor who categorically disagrees with me. He believes that recruiters, whether in house or third party, just don’t take the time to read a cover letter. I read that and thought, he means “they won’t take the time”, not “don’t”! He talks about the huge number of applicants for any position posted online, resulting in a necessarily fast preliminary screening process. There’s simply no time for reading cover letters.
(I’m inclined to disagree with the notion that there are “so many” applicants for each position. It depends on the position. There is not a “talent surplus” in the marketing, there is without questions, a “talent shortage”).
That advisor considers cover letters to be a “distraction”, cutting into the 30 seconds or less the viewer spends reading a resume. He also contends that cover letters are frequently not even seen, because they are rarely parsed into the ATS (Applicant Tracking System) that all employers and recruiters use. He’s right about that. He also says, “If it’s not on the resume, it doesn’t exist”! He’s only partially right about that.
Since I’m a retained recruiter, my clients expect me to spend the time with each candidate to get to know them at more than a surface level. Because I’m paid a portion of the fee at the beginning of the search, I can afford to spend the time to get to know the candidate at a much deeper level than recruiters who have to rely on speed to beat the other recruiters to clients. I like to read a well written cover letter and learn more about the candidate.
That’s the reason I appreciate a candidate who takes the time to write a thoughtful and compelling cover letter, specifically for the position being applied to. It’s another opportunity to sell oneself. I’m not talking about a “generic” cover letter that candidates send for every job. Those are worse than not bothering to write one. They just scream, “I’m lazy and just don’t care”.
The advisor did have a couple of other technical suggestions, that I’ve since seen affirmed by other experts and make good sense. You should only apply online to positions using Word files that are .doc, not .docx or pdf.
Once again, it’s a matter of the ATS’ ability to parse the resume into key words, and then export the file with all its original (and proper) spacing, fonts and formatting. You should minimize imagery and unusual typefaces, as they are very possibly not universally recognized by the ATS computer interface. They can actually hurt, in that the ATS can “re-format” those graphics files and screw up the way your resume looks.
One other quick tip. Save your resume file with the same name that’s on the resume. For example, don’t have “G. Robert Bishop” on your resume and then save the file as “Bob Bishop” or worse, “BobB Resume”. The more consistent the better. It will make the database search for your name more consistent. It will help recruiters and hiring managers remember (or find) the name of "that candidate" I noticed!
I hope you find these thoughts helpful. If you have any cover letter or resume formatting horror stories, we’d love to hear them. The idea is to help my readers not make the same mistakes. Thanks for reading!