Don’t Do This to Your Cover Letter!

As every job applicant knows, employers typically require a cover letter in addition to a resume when applying online. However, you might be wondering: why do employers want cover letters anyway?

In addition to an application and resume, employers want cover letters for several reasons. A cover letter goes beyond the basic information on the resume, providing depth and explaining how the applicant will be a good fit with the desired position. Also, a cover letter may be viewed as a sample of the person’s professional writing ability. On the flip side, failure to include a cover letter as instructed can be interpreted as proof that the candidate does not follow instructions or pay attention to detail. In fact, if any required files are missing, the employer often rejects the entire application.

Everyone Wants to Look Good

Because a cover letter may form the employer’s first impression of you, it should, of course, be well-written. Thus, smart candidates will often have friends or mentors review their cover letters. Frequently, the document file is sent back and forth via email, using the track changes features of Microsoft Word, Google Docs, or other software. This enables their trusted reviewers to read the letter and then suggest changes directly on the document. The reviewers might spot grammatical or spelling errors and suggest wording changes that could improve the content. Sounds like a good idea, right?

Be Careful!

This approach, however, also has a potential booby-trap. At times, I have opened cover letter files from applicants only to find that the track changes or comments feature is still active! So, what happens then? In this situation, I do not see a polished final version of the cover letter as the applicant might expect. No, instead I see not only the original document—errors and all—but also all the changes suggested by the reviewers! This includes comments like “beef up this part” and “fix your grammar here.” Oops…

What impression does that leave with a potential employer? First, it might mean the applicant has really poor software skills; otherwise, this wouldn’t have happened. Second, this goof might only be a simple oversight. However, even that suggests that the applicant may be careless or not pay attention to detail.  Finally, the text of the raw, unedited, original document could show that the applicant’s unassisted writing skills are… well, terrible. I am sure that if the candidate knew what had happened, they would be horribly embarrassed!

How to Avoid This

So, what can you do to avoid such a disaster? First, if you’re going to have others review your documents—which is a good thing—and use such features, make sure you really know how to use them properly. Second, pay attention to detail and test the final document before submitting it with your application. For example, send the final revised version to someone else for one last review before submitting it to the employer. Have them open the file and verify that it is indeed a “clean” copy, without visible markups. This way, the employer will only see what you want them to see: a well-written, polished cover letter!

Agree? Disagree? Please share your experience or thoughts.

Featured image courtesy of Valeriia Miller – Pexels.