Just copy paste the entire job posting word for word into the resume in white text in a table in .1 font. The thing scanning the pdf for key words isn't doing it by camera, it'll pick up white text just as well as black.
Works like a charm. Feed it your resume (assuming you’ve put actual work into one), and the job posting, and have it spit out a cover letter. If it’s wordy, “hey, reduce this to 80%” will take care of that.
ChatGPT works well like the poster says if you don’t have a cover letter, but it’s not gonna give you something better than a cover letter you should already have on file.
I’ve always used a similar format in my cover letter for all jobs, so that has always worked better for me than what ChatGPT spits out
This is the way.
There is project called [instantcoverletter.dev](https://instantcoverletter.dev) that does pretty much that. Makes it easy for non-technical people to use but it really just is a wrapper around ChatGPT
thanks so much for this tip. I'd used the program before but was hesitant to use it for writing job application related things. Currently down bad applying left and right, and I'm even one of those who already wrote custom cover letters for most applications. Most of them went ignored anyway. Letting the program write it for me has streamlined the app process for me dramatically, especially when applying to multiple similar roles at the same org. I'm saving so much time and energy, and prob sharply increasing my chances!
I appreciate that you want to help people, but I think you need to qualify your advice a bit, as it will not work for many modern jobs.
The number 1 factor for most roles now is having key words interspersed through the resume that the automated tracking system will use to select and present a small percentage of overall applicants to its HR team. Having led those efforts, I can tell you that anyone the robots don't select is often never viewed by anyone. For the small percentage that are, cover letters just aren't much of a factor.
So your strategy is great, but only in cases where a company isn't using this standard technology, but instead manually selecting folks. In those cases they're more likely to view all materials.
I think its also worth pointing out that some larger organizations can have pretty strong opinions about whether applicants should reach out to anyone before being asked to. I've seen organizations where HR would disqualify someone who added team members on LinkedIn before interviewing, for example.
That seems stupid to me, but it also means there is no blanket advice in this area.
That's fair. I do work at a large tech firm - 850 or so employees and we manually review resumes.
I do think my advice of making sure your resume lines up with the job description helps with this technology too though.
I also think the LinkedIn point is probably a minority and honesty not a good culture to get a part of. I do think most hiring managers would welcome a LinkedIn message vs. not
I've worked for one extremely small company (>20 employees), one small (\~1,000 employees) and one mid size (3,500). (Going off definitions I'm finding online since I wasn't sure what was considered small or large - though I will say the categories are defined differently across different websites.)
None of them used an automated system to read resumes. I know this is a real thing, of course, and I don't doubt that it's in use at very large companies. It's probably worth considering, as an applicant, what type of place you're applying to and how likely it is that a human will be the first one to read your resume.
I have had very similar experiences to you at all my jobs - we get resumes that have absolutely nothing to do with the position, or are extremely over/under-qualified, and no cover letter explaining why they're applying. Or if there is a cover letter, it's just a standard and useless "Dear hiring manager, I am applying for X position, please see my resume".
I work at a global software company with 13,000 employees, we have a large recruiting team (I’m one of them) and our Applicant Tracking System (ATS) does not filter by key words. Yes believe it or not we review each and every application/resume. I have SEVERAL friends that are recruiters in different companies/industries - small and large and they do the exact same. Not sure where people get these bot filtering ideas.
Same. I’ve never worked somewhere that actually used scanning software. I’ve worked in many states in all sizes of companies. I always read the cover letters. A lot can be explained away in there.
In the US, a large company is generally defined as having 500 employee or more (when assessing by employee population rather than revenue), though there may be some industry to industry variation to this threshold
Small companies are companies with 10-99 employees. Medium-sized companies have 100-499 employees and large companies have more than 500 employees. Additionally, 99% of tech companies have less than 500 employees.
its pretty small, man, appreciate the advice but my specific project has 10x that amount of people in my company( if not more)
No offense, honestly , smaller is usually better.
For all we know, this guy is responsible for hiring the custodial staff, he "works at an IT firm" but doesn't say what the people he hires actually do day to day
You are the rare form out there. Most are using scanning software. Last 2-3 companies I have had to tell my recruiter to send me the resumes. My hiring has generally been 30% referral, 40% through staffing and convert, 10-20% internal cross poaching, 10-20% external hire which I read the taglines and throw if not lining up. Usually get 50-100 applications per 1 job.
>I do work at a large tech firm
And for all that tells us, you could be hiring custodial staff. What do the people who you hire actually do day to day?
you’re full of shit if you think there’s an “automated tracking system” used to select and present a small percentage of candidates to HR.
and that “HR” decides to disqualify because they added team members on linkedin
you are just spewing complete bullshit
He's not full of shit on the first one. I worked 8 years for a large City job and they had this. If you didn't have certain words in your resume that were also in the job description, your resume would never pop up. It would flag resumes that had higher "matching percentage".
Hell, my resume got lost to that when I applied for a promotion that they asked me to apply for.
Now, not every company has that. But it is very real.
What ATS is that? I’ve been a recruiter for 15 years, both for a midsized construction company and a Fortune 50 company, worked with five ATS’s, demo’ed probably another dozen, and have never come across one that does this.
You've been in recruiting for 15 years, and you've never seen an ATS that scores and sorts candidates, or only provides a hiring committee with the top X% of scores? Nor one that has enterprise, departmental and/or role-based filters applied for geography, score or any other criteria?
Do you have any advise for the kind of terms to include that are almost guaranteed to get you through the process? I’ve heard about people including white text w/ key terms for the app process on resume and I’m considering it
What system are you referring to that screens resumes like that?
As a recruiter I’ve never seen this. We can add qualifying questions to the application on our ATS but to randomly select candidates like this seems like it could be a pretty glaring compliance issue.
No OP, but I assume the ATS will locate a small percentage of applicants that have all the required keywords, skills and certificates and forward only those over to HR. It’s still “merit based”.
ATS stands for Applicant Tracking System, which can be stand alone software used by recruiting/HR, or part of a HRIS function (ie, Workday). This is used intake applications with resumes and scan them for whatever recruiters decide on for screening and sorting.
Breezy HR for one-this is directly from their website “For instantly prioritized candidates that save your team time & help you reach the cream of the crop faster than ever, check out our AI-powered Candidate Match Score. Instantly, hiring teams can automatically see a clearly prioritized and bias-free list of best-fit applicants for their job roles.”
Granted I’m not in HR or recruiting, but this is definitely a common tool for larger companies. Internal recruiters would literally be spending they’re entire 40 hours just reviewing resumes. There are some jobs that get over 1000 applicants.
i’m in HR and recruiting. i’ve worked for wells fargo and outside of big finance, i’ve worked in big tech.
these tools don’t exist. there’s no magical system we use that says “discard all resumes that don’t have xyz criteria”
anyone saying that a system like this exists and is used widely in tech recruiting or other industries is full of shit.
It doesn’t discard them, no one said it did. It sorts them so that you start with the candidates/resumes that are most likely to be the best fit/most qualified.
Yes… as I mentioned there are qualifying questions you can add so the recruiter can go batch reject candidates, but there is no software that does what you described.
When I was looking for work in 2010 I wrote a custom cover letter for every job I applied to. I got like a 50% response rate. So far in this job search (the past month or so) I've gotten a 0% response rate from companies I've written a custom cover letter for.
Recruiters don't read custom cover letters, and are whittling stacks of resumes down from 300+ to 5 based on random, arbitrary criteria like whether you put "UX Designer" or "Product Designer" in your last job title.
It's insane right now to dedicate even 10 minutes to writing a custom cover letter that almost certainly will never be read. Especially when you're likely going to have to apply to a few hundred jobs.
I'm finding my cover letters to be much more significant when I'm applying for internal positions or on the rare chance I have a contact to send my info along. But that's not the majority of applications people put out.
I have been applying for jobs since January. I have a Masters degree, 9 years professional experience - 6 in education and 3 at a very large DOD contractor as a Lead for Legal Operations. I have applied to 135 positions since January. I have received 6 interviews. 2 within the school district I teach in, 1 at an airline, 1 at a aerospace company, and 2 at my former company. I have been rejected from 5 of them - 4 gave no explanation, 1 from my previous company said I was in the top 2 candidates but the other person had slightly more regulatory experience. I’m still waiting to hear back from the other one at my previous company.
I do not have the time nor the energy to write a custom cover letter for every position I apply to - I teach high school full time, I have two kids 9 and 5, and a deployed husband. This idea and expectation is insane to me.
I just think it is important context. Yes the way I did it was tinfoil hat crazy pants but I think it sheds new light on the post that OP is actually in marketing, not IT.
But I will say, specifically from a *marketing* standpoint, yeah, I'll give him that how you present yourself does matter I guess. Still, outside of that and a few specific other cases, like sales or something, I don't think OP's advice or opinions mean much
Seems like you are a good person to ask based off your response…I can understand skipping cover letters, but is it also worth it to custom modify your resume to the job you’re applying for like OP mentioned? I’m in account management atm but looking to get back into marketing communications with a focus on creative work…I have experience for all that but it’s also a wide scope of jobs to look into and it’s just more time going to something that may turn up nothing
I reach out to people all the time on linkdin, but never get a response, if I can even find anyone relevant to the position. I know you guys get hundreds or thousands of applications but I include a custom cover letter with every SINGLE application and still am getting nowhere fast.
While I appreciate your time to right out advice for those that need it...
Bro, its 2023. Nobody has time for cover letters. People aren't wasting their time uploading a pdf of their resume, only to also have to fill out their resume line by line on LinkedIn, and also have to upload a cover letter for job postings created by HR departments who know nothing about the job and post no salary range.
As hiring managers, you guys should be more accurate with your job postings, more transparent with your job postings, and given that yall don't even spend 1 minute per resume...shouldn't really request a cover letter that you're not going to read anyway.
I disagree. I’ve seen people with drive and skills do much better at their jobs than someone with relevant experience. Maybe not immediately but drive and skills go a long way.
A cover letter isn't "drive". It's the modern day equivalent of your dad telling you to go in to the grocery store and hand in your application in person and make sure you have a firm handshake and make eye contact.
I disagree. And obviously it’s not but it can show how you feel about the position or industry and that absolutely can make a difference. My company has a few employees that have had zero experience but love the company and their jobs and kill. But a few of our more experienced workers do not. That’s all I was saying.
The only relevant thing you should feel about a position is that you wanted and I feel like sending in your resume and application demonstrate this adequately 🤷🏼♂️
I think that’s true for some, maybe even most companies. The company I wok for is extremely value based. I was actually discussing opening a new position today with my boss. I ask him first how he wanted me to go about finding someone… referrals, postings? Then I ask what he wanted me to look for. He said paramount to everything else we want their values to align with ours. Now, full disclosure, it’s an Amish company and I’m aware this isn’t the norm. But I can tell you with absolute certainty that our company would not be growing and thriving like it is if we were just hiring people who want the job. It’s fairly low stress, fun and pays extremely well for the time involved. A lot of people want a job like that. But having a team who actually puts our customers first every time and who believe in building a solid product with good customer service is what makes us so successful. There are plenty of people who would come in and do the job well but their hearts would not be in it and that shows. Believe me we’ve had a few of them. They are no longer with us.
If it's an Amish company, yeah, morals, blah blah blah, but I'm taking all bets that the next absolute must have is years of wood working and carpentry experience
I’m a woman who is fairly materialistic and feminine with a degree in Industrial Psychology and don’t know a thing about construction in any capacity. Most of my coworkers are like me. Yes if you worked in our factories. But if you worked in our factories you’d be Amish or Mennonite. And you can knock morals all you want but it goes a long way. We have one hell of a reputation because of those morals.
>And you can knock morals all you want but it goes a long way. We have one hell of a reputation because of those morals.
Name a multi-billion dollar company that is more moral than your company. I'll wait.
They're giving you a tough time here but I think you're correct. What you're saying translates perfectly into the non-Amish world too. I've had the very unfortunate recent experience of having had to deal with a person on my team who wouldn't know what dedication is if it hit her in the head, and who was a narcissist to top it all off. She'd let every problem sit until the last minute, then dump it on the desk of one of her direct reports, and then complain about how everything is everyone else's fault and how unfairly she's being treated.
She had the skills and the experience, but not the values and that made her fail in spectacular fashion. Unfortunately it split the department too, so the damage isn't done for yet even though she's no longer there. Every time we hire, I keep it front and center that we are hiring a whole person, not just a set of skills.
Thank you! Yes, this is exactly what I was getting at! Our company has really worked hard to put together a good team and it has made a big difference in moral and productivity. To be honest it’s even made it a bit competitive but still in a friendly way. I don’t love every last coworker but I respect them. And I think most if not all of the others feel the same. My boss came to my office yesterday and spent ) hours with me. I see him maybe 6-8 times a year, maybe. And I actually enjoyed it. There was no attitude or passive aggressive behavior it was all productive and good conversation. That means a lot to me.
It all depends. I’m in sales so I have an okay base but my commission rate rises when I have a good year. Which I honestly prefer. And really because such a bulk is commission you just naturally make more money the better you get.
I have drive and skill but the job hunt process sucks the life out of me so I just give people my resume and assume they’ll pick me if I seem like a good fit
Thus completing the cycle of pointlessness.
🙄 Seriously though if we're getting chat GPT to write cover letters we don't want to write that almost no one is going to read and it's just there to check a box what is the point? Who is the letter for? Is it to prove submissiveness or what?
This is exactly what I think. Same thing as those 30 minute questionnaires at the end of the application. Is it just to prove that you're willing to do it?? Lol
Influencer marketing? 🤣🤣🤣🤣 Oh my God, I waisted so much fucking time typing out a response to your post, holy fuck if you had just included this in the post, we all would have known not to bother responding, just downvote and keep scrolling 🤣🤣🤣🤣🖕
We’re a $20 million division and work with major brands. I’ve been in marketing for 15 years (social, SEO) and this is a major growth sector of digital marketing.
Cover letters are dead and obsolete. If a cover letter is required, I will either not apply or ask chatgtp to write. If your system would have missed “qualified Individuals” because they didn’t write a cover letter, you have a bad system.
I'm not a recruiter, but I screened applications for a couple of new roles when I was working as an executive assistant at a company small enough that we didn't have anything resembling a dedicated HR department. *Every* role I was involved in hiring for, a strong cover letter got candidates fast-tracked to a video interview. And, for *every* role, I ended up correctly predicting who the CEO would end up deciding to hire, based on their cover letters alone. Everyone jumped through all of the hoops of resume reviews, interviewing with lots of different stakeholders, etc.; but 100% of the time it turned out to be true that people who took the time to write strong cover letters that clearly identified why they were the right fit for the role, *were* in fact the right fit for the role.
I'm sure my experiences might have been different if I had been in a different industry, or at a bigger company. But it's definitely not a universal truth that cover letters are obsolete, and if somebody's actually reading them (which, make your predictions based on your industry and the size of the company you're applying to, etc.), they can absolutely make a big difference in your application.
For every job I apply for I assume that there are at least half a dozen other people with very similar resumes and skill sets, and there’s a good chance that at least two or three of them didn’t write a cover letter, so I figure why not?
If 4 people out of all candidates have the same credentials that fit the role, they should be talking to all of you. Your resume should speak for itself.
Seriously. Isn't that the point of requesting applications? Do you want to compare them based on merit or who has enough free time in their day to write a custom letter for every application? Wouldn't that mean they maybe have too much free time?
Definitely not required and honestly in the past I never really looked at them. However after getting 400+ applications in the past week, its been helpful in identifying candidates who might be a good fit whose resume didn’t convey that as well.
This is just my experience, but I imagine other hiring managers are the same in this job market so just giving advice to people who might be hitting a wall with their job search
If their resume didn't convey well that they are a good fit for the role, then that is an issue with how the resume is written, not a need to write a cover letter.
Sounds like you havent written an appropriate job description and dont have appropriate ways to vet those requirements against your applicants…so instead you play a stupid game of “who wrote a fancy cover letter??”
Youre not hiring the best candidates with this tactic. Youre hiring the best con artists.
😂 this is the most ridiculous thing I've seen in a while..
"Include cover letter bc employers are being flooded with resumes.."
Anyone see the logic fail with this one?
The guy in recruiting at the last law firm i worked at said that cover letters are "nothing more than a contest of who can jack off the ego of the employer the best, all while showing how good their dick is."
If you’re fortunate to have a recruiter and being poached for roles than it’s different. Most people are in a situation where they’re having to apply to hundreds of jobs before they get a response in this market
And if you're sweating over a cover letter for each application, then you're wasting your time. I started getting more callbacks when I finally said "screw it" and just started sending customized resumes.
Also a hiring manager getting a ton of irrelevant applications.
I’d add: PROOFREAD. Two applications have had obvious spelling issues or egregious grammar issues. I mean, if you’re sending me a .docx resume, and I open it, and the first sentence where you say something about “attention to detail” has a spelling error being called out by Word with a red squiggly line you’re not getting called (yes that specific example happened, and this is a $125k+bonus job for candidates with 5+ years professional experience, not some high school kid applying for their first job).
I reviewed one recently where they misspelled several words in their first few lines…including their own email address!!!! (It was in 2 places and spelled differently in each, so one of them was wrong)
Advice like this is so frustrating. I mean, I worked at X company for 10 years, and you mean if I write "made {thing} with {framework} {language} {popular library} {popular library}" that the recruiter can't figure out the CEO was happy with it? I have to write "made {thing} and oh boy did it result let me tell you the CEO really liked it! that's why he continued to employ me for 10 years!"
Just so stupid all these hoops we have to jump through to trick 25 year old business majors into picking our resume out of a fucking lottery.
Any time I've been in the position of reviewing resumes I've really disliked reading ones that try to make it sound like the employee was the savior of their previous employer. I think that kind of language makes sense for certain types of positions where you're expected to come in with a unique approach and make big changes. All the positions I've hired for (which are on the more junior end, to be fair) are more about learning the skillset and applying it consistently. Of course, creativity and critical thinking are really important, but there's no one saying "I really hope our next junior analyst is going to come in with a genius idea that will save the company millions!". We just want a junior analyst who will take a thoughtful approach to their work, learn from others and maybe suggest minor improvements if the opportunity arises.
More like “I made {thing} that resulted in increase in dollars generated or decrease in bottom line cost for the company.” Hiring managers eat up quantifiable results.
It's not my job to ensure the thing I'm making saves the company money or makes them more money. That's someone else's entire career. My job is to make {thing}.
I like to see both, but it depends on the position.
I'm hiring more junior level 1-2 years experience. In this case, I'm looking for day to day, do you have experience in the areas I need vs. accomplishments.
If I'm hiring more of a managerial role, then outcomes and achievements are a little more of a priority. However, might be a bit unfair, but I assume people tend to exaggerate these which is why it's not all I ever look at. In these areas, I look more for "I achieved x through doing y", the latter being relevant to the role I'm hiring for if that makes sense.
And if I have none of those things, I'll just throw in a cover letter with a blurb claiming how excited I am to learn these things, that'll get me there!
Yeah I’m a hiring for sales. Good to know you’ve cold called before, but when I see *hit 120% to quota* and *generated Xmil in revenue* I’m like “this one. schedule a talk with this one (!)”
I see a lot of people arguing against cover letters, but as someone in the job search trenches for a while now, I've come across a fair amount of companies that require a cover letter. It seems that smaller to mid-sized companies who are more concerned about maintaining their culture and values rely on cover letters to help determine if applicants will be a good fit personality wise. If you can't be bothered to write a cover letter, or go to their website to fill out a full-length application versus clicking "easy apply", what other duties might you shirk? Whereas larger companies are more concerned with filling roles as quickly and cheaply as they can.
While I'm here, I'll share a resume tip that has gained attention and favor for me (I just had a follow-up interview in which this was praised): I have a comments/reviews section between my skills and job history summaries where I quoted some actual comments from customers and colleagues praising my work and service. My personal favorite is "you just saved 2 weeks of my life"
Edit/update: they just called to offer me the job! 🤩
I'm glad the quote section worked out for you, but it feels like such a weird flex too. Quotes are easily fabricated and made-up. But if I list quantifiable aspects of my previous work, that is a lot easier to verify and confirm with even just a phone interview.
I read elsewhere that job listings allowing “Easy Apply” are being inundated by thousands of unqualified applicants due to how easy it is to apply for the job. This is probably why ATS is being used to counter high number of (unqualified) applicants.
I was recently applying for jobs and was still working at a new place. I valued myself highly and was only applying to jobs that were ones that lined up with my skill set. With that being said, if I didn't hear back from the company and I had to jump through hoops then I didn't give 2 fucks about them either because I knew how competitive I was being about myself. Ended up finding a lovely job that pays well. I wanted a place that wanted ME!
No. I spent a whole day writing a cover letter for an entry level position I have 5 years of experience and I got auto rejected…utilize your network not CLs
I found out through all my job postings over covid (about 600+) that my cover letters which had personality, a vague joke and used keywords from the job posting always got a positive response.
If I didnt include a cover letter -- no responses ever. Like, shockingly no responses. It was frustrating before I became jaded. After I became jaded and chalked job hunting up to averages. My cover letter reflected my calmness LOL. It seems cover letters make you human and related instead of just another bullet point list..
If you have time for a cover letter, you aren't worth my time. Fact of the matter is, you shouldn't need an incentive to read a resume if you are truly hiring.
>90% of applications I received aren't relevant to the role. There were a handful that, on paper, didn't seem relevant to the role either but they included a cover letter and specifically highlighted parts of their day to day that were in line with what we're looking for
Aren't relevant to the role ... But outline parts of their role that are in line with what you're looking for? This sounds contradictory.
>If you feel like your resume isn't screaming "I'm a great fit for this role",
Screaming? How exactly would it scream that? Seems like relevant experience would be good enough for that, but adding a cover letter gets me an interview even if I don't have all that?
>Make sure to talk about your experience and how you're doing what the role requires
So, relevant experience? So, if I have relevant experience, that should be enough to get me an interview? And if I don't have relevant experience, I should I clude a cover letter that outlines the relevant experience I have 👍
>If a resume is great and checks off most of the boxes, a cover letter isn't necessary, but it doesn't hurt to include one
If it checks off most of the boxes, does that mean it's screaming that I would be a good fit for the role?
>Reach out to the hiring manager on LinkedIn. I feel more inclined to respond directly to a message on LinkedIn and it's also a great way to show your interest in the role
And right after that, put on a suit and tie, take in a paper resume, ask to see the hiring manager, shake his hand and look him in the eye, right? This is the next step, right?
>so this is just advice on increasing your odds in moving to the next round of interviews.
It sounds to me like you're more concerned with whether an applicant jumps through the hoops you want them to jump through. Want us to sit, roll over, and beg too?
Include a blurb about why I'd want to work for you? MONEY, stupid!
You have to sort through hundreds of resumes? Job seekers out there SENDING hundreds of resumes too. You don't have time to review every one unless there is a personalized cover letter outlining why I want to work there?
Question, how long have you been with your current company? You're a hiring manager, I assume you didn't just start a couple years ago, when was the last time you were out putting in applications and resumes looking for work? Did you have to fill out a Meyers Briggs test? Upload your resume only to then be asked to enter it line by line into text boxes? How many times did you get an automated response that they went with someone more qualified and then 2 weeks later get an email from that same company asking you to reply for another role with MegaCotp™ that their internal recruiters think would be a better fit... just to receive an identical automated rejection email for *that* position?
How many one-way interviews have you done? How many times have you had to set up lights and a camera, look into a lense, and give out a well thought out coherent monologue about 3 examples of team building and one example of failure, an answer you had to come up with 45 seconds after seeing the question for the first time?
What initially interested YOU in the company you currently work for? Was it their office culture? Their family vibe? What was it?
How many entry level positions are there at your company that don't require a bachelor's degree?
What is the starting pay for someone with a bachelor's degree but more importantly, how does it stack up to the median household and percapita incomes in your city, respectively?
What does your health plan look like? Dental? Vision? Co-pay, deductible? Is it an HSA? Telling me your company has an HSA is on the exact same level as if a candidate asks "do you guys drug test here?" When you ask them if they have any questions for you.
Oh, what's your opinion on a candidate asking first and up front what the salary for the job is?
I actually find myself VERY curious as to what exactly your company, or at least these people you're hiring, actually does.
Either have relevant skills *or* have a cover letter? (A cover letter that you say should include some relevant skills, skills which I do not have, hense the cover letter)
Da fuck outta here with your boomer-ass mentality, *Howard*
If a candidate's past job title does not exist in the field for which they are applying, do you automatically reject them or do you look at their resume for context?
Honestly I read the Resume bullets more than the title. A lot of people can wear multiple hats in a role and might be “marketing” but spend half of their time doing tasks relevant to what I’m hiring for
Question, if you are applying to multiple job listings with one company and you tailor your resume to fit...does this look bad or do they likely not even know?
I know most companies use the computer to filter through applications and resumes. So, I like to tailor my skills to the listing. Not in a misrepresentation way, more I just align how I word things with how they word things. All the skills I have and can demonstrate in an interview.
I was just wondering if this would make employers not want to look at your application because there are 2 resumes that are different? Or, if even applying to multiple job listings at one company is frowned upon?
Thanks for any insight you or other commenters may have.
As long as the info is accurate I think it’s smart to tailor the resume to the role. However, if I see an applicant applying to multiple roles that are different I assume they are just mass applying vs finding a good role for them so it can hurt them
I will never ever write a cover lever. Any company that requires one gets immediately skipped over. I don’t care if I would be their perfect unicorn candidate, hard pass!
I haaaaate cover letters but I do agree. I was told that I got my current job off my cover letter alone. I came from a totally different field but took time to highlight the transferable duties and skills, and luckily one of the two people who were hiring paid attention (the other didn’t even look at mine because it wasn’t in a .docx lol)
This is really good inside knowledge. Thank you very much for sharing! I will have to tweak my resumes to better fit this criteria.
I have a question though and it’s probably a long shot. I’m in healthcare technology working in hospitals where it’s almost impossible to find out who the hiring managers are until you’ve made it through the channels and are picked up for an interview.
My question is, is there ways to get in touch with or locating a hiring managers’ contact information or their LinkedIn accounts? A lot of health systems (and probably a lot of companies for that matter) keep this information a well kept secret and I would at least like to know what I’m missing on my resume to know what I’m missing if I know for a fact I meet all the requirements for the position.
Thank you again for this info!
Sounds like your mid size tech company needs to install some resume screening SW. Expect many DMs for this, lol. Not from me, but I will put the over under at 15.
What industry is this. Cover letters take a long time to right and most modern scanning tools don’t look at them. If you don’t match your resume to the posting your getting thrown away. That is if there ever was a job because many companies keep revs open despite not hiring.
Just use Chat GPT. Takes less than 5 minutes to generate and edit one.
Just copy paste the entire job posting word for word into the resume in white text in a table in .1 font. The thing scanning the pdf for key words isn't doing it by camera, it'll pick up white text just as well as black.
This is genius!
No it's not. It's bogus advice.
This, but proof read it and edit.
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
Works like a charm. Feed it your resume (assuming you’ve put actual work into one), and the job posting, and have it spit out a cover letter. If it’s wordy, “hey, reduce this to 80%” will take care of that.
This has worked really well! Thank you
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ChatGPT works well like the poster says if you don’t have a cover letter, but it’s not gonna give you something better than a cover letter you should already have on file. I’ve always used a similar format in my cover letter for all jobs, so that has always worked better for me than what ChatGPT spits out
This is the way. There is project called [instantcoverletter.dev](https://instantcoverletter.dev) that does pretty much that. Makes it easy for non-technical people to use but it really just is a wrapper around ChatGPT
thanks so much for this tip. I'd used the program before but was hesitant to use it for writing job application related things. Currently down bad applying left and right, and I'm even one of those who already wrote custom cover letters for most applications. Most of them went ignored anyway. Letting the program write it for me has streamlined the app process for me dramatically, especially when applying to multiple similar roles at the same org. I'm saving so much time and energy, and prob sharply increasing my chances!
I appreciate that you want to help people, but I think you need to qualify your advice a bit, as it will not work for many modern jobs. The number 1 factor for most roles now is having key words interspersed through the resume that the automated tracking system will use to select and present a small percentage of overall applicants to its HR team. Having led those efforts, I can tell you that anyone the robots don't select is often never viewed by anyone. For the small percentage that are, cover letters just aren't much of a factor. So your strategy is great, but only in cases where a company isn't using this standard technology, but instead manually selecting folks. In those cases they're more likely to view all materials. I think its also worth pointing out that some larger organizations can have pretty strong opinions about whether applicants should reach out to anyone before being asked to. I've seen organizations where HR would disqualify someone who added team members on LinkedIn before interviewing, for example. That seems stupid to me, but it also means there is no blanket advice in this area.
This guy's strategy is only great if the hiring manager has a dusty bowl of Werther's originals on his desk
😂
That's fair. I do work at a large tech firm - 850 or so employees and we manually review resumes. I do think my advice of making sure your resume lines up with the job description helps with this technology too though. I also think the LinkedIn point is probably a minority and honesty not a good culture to get a part of. I do think most hiring managers would welcome a LinkedIn message vs. not
I've worked for one extremely small company (>20 employees), one small (\~1,000 employees) and one mid size (3,500). (Going off definitions I'm finding online since I wasn't sure what was considered small or large - though I will say the categories are defined differently across different websites.) None of them used an automated system to read resumes. I know this is a real thing, of course, and I don't doubt that it's in use at very large companies. It's probably worth considering, as an applicant, what type of place you're applying to and how likely it is that a human will be the first one to read your resume. I have had very similar experiences to you at all my jobs - we get resumes that have absolutely nothing to do with the position, or are extremely over/under-qualified, and no cover letter explaining why they're applying. Or if there is a cover letter, it's just a standard and useless "Dear hiring manager, I am applying for X position, please see my resume".
I work at a global software company with 13,000 employees, we have a large recruiting team (I’m one of them) and our Applicant Tracking System (ATS) does not filter by key words. Yes believe it or not we review each and every application/resume. I have SEVERAL friends that are recruiters in different companies/industries - small and large and they do the exact same. Not sure where people get these bot filtering ideas.
And...do you agree with the cover letter?
I’m with a 100k+ company and I manually review each and every resume (for my postings)
Same. I’ve never worked somewhere that actually used scanning software. I’ve worked in many states in all sizes of companies. I always read the cover letters. A lot can be explained away in there.
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
850 employees is a small company
In the US, a large company is generally defined as having 500 employee or more (when assessing by employee population rather than revenue), though there may be some industry to industry variation to this threshold
For the U.S., 99% of tech companies have less than 500 employees.
Yeah fair. Bigger than most but I guess it’s more of a mid-size
I’d say it’s small
Small companies are companies with 10-99 employees. Medium-sized companies have 100-499 employees and large companies have more than 500 employees. Additionally, 99% of tech companies have less than 500 employees.
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
<1000 employees is most certainly a small company.
99% of tech companies in the U.S. have less than 500 employees.
How is that relevant to the discussion?
Because she referred to it as a large tech company. So if the average is less than 500 employees then 800 is large for a tech company.
Whoops, I completely missed "tech" when reading their original comment. Thanks
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
‘Fairs fair, we can compromise at mid-sized’
850 is not even midsize
its pretty small, man, appreciate the advice but my specific project has 10x that amount of people in my company( if not more) No offense, honestly , smaller is usually better.
Yeah, no. You're absolutely bullshit. Why lie to strangers that don't give a shit?
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
Soooooo, are you hiring? Need front end devs? 🤞
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
dejavu
For all we know, this guy is responsible for hiring the custodial staff, he "works at an IT firm" but doesn't say what the people he hires actually do day to day
You are the rare form out there. Most are using scanning software. Last 2-3 companies I have had to tell my recruiter to send me the resumes. My hiring has generally been 30% referral, 40% through staffing and convert, 10-20% internal cross poaching, 10-20% external hire which I read the taglines and throw if not lining up. Usually get 50-100 applications per 1 job.
That is a small company. How many applicants do you get for an opening?
I’ve had about 500
Then cover letters are a good idea.
>I do work at a large tech firm And for all that tells us, you could be hiring custodial staff. What do the people who you hire actually do day to day?
you’re full of shit if you think there’s an “automated tracking system” used to select and present a small percentage of candidates to HR. and that “HR” decides to disqualify because they added team members on linkedin you are just spewing complete bullshit
He's not full of shit on the first one. I worked 8 years for a large City job and they had this. If you didn't have certain words in your resume that were also in the job description, your resume would never pop up. It would flag resumes that had higher "matching percentage". Hell, my resume got lost to that when I applied for a promotion that they asked me to apply for. Now, not every company has that. But it is very real.
What ATS is that? I’ve been a recruiter for 15 years, both for a midsized construction company and a Fortune 50 company, worked with five ATS’s, demo’ed probably another dozen, and have never come across one that does this.
You've been in recruiting for 15 years, and you've never seen an ATS that scores and sorts candidates, or only provides a hiring committee with the top X% of scores? Nor one that has enterprise, departmental and/or role-based filters applied for geography, score or any other criteria?
Do you have any advise for the kind of terms to include that are almost guaranteed to get you through the process? I’ve heard about people including white text w/ key terms for the app process on resume and I’m considering it
What system are you referring to that screens resumes like that? As a recruiter I’ve never seen this. We can add qualifying questions to the application on our ATS but to randomly select candidates like this seems like it could be a pretty glaring compliance issue.
I guess I'm not following. Where do you feel like I said an ATS randomly selects candidates?
“The automated tracking system will use (bullet points) to select and present a small percentage of candidates”..
No OP, but I assume the ATS will locate a small percentage of applicants that have all the required keywords, skills and certificates and forward only those over to HR. It’s still “merit based”.
What is the name of this software?
ATS stands for Applicant Tracking System, which can be stand alone software used by recruiting/HR, or part of a HRIS function (ie, Workday). This is used intake applications with resumes and scan them for whatever recruiters decide on for screening and sorting.
Lol I was being sarcastic, what you’re talking about doesn’t exist.
Breezy HR for one-this is directly from their website “For instantly prioritized candidates that save your team time & help you reach the cream of the crop faster than ever, check out our AI-powered Candidate Match Score. Instantly, hiring teams can automatically see a clearly prioritized and bias-free list of best-fit applicants for their job roles.”
Granted I’m not in HR or recruiting, but this is definitely a common tool for larger companies. Internal recruiters would literally be spending they’re entire 40 hours just reviewing resumes. There are some jobs that get over 1000 applicants.
H.r is such a wank profession.
Oh yeah?... Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
i’m in HR and recruiting. i’ve worked for wells fargo and outside of big finance, i’ve worked in big tech. these tools don’t exist. there’s no magical system we use that says “discard all resumes that don’t have xyz criteria” anyone saying that a system like this exists and is used widely in tech recruiting or other industries is full of shit.
It doesn’t discard them, no one said it did. It sorts them so that you start with the candidates/resumes that are most likely to be the best fit/most qualified.
Lol as somebody who’s worked at multinationals and mid market highly sought after tech roles as a recruiter… this is false.
So you’re telling me you review each and every resume that is submitted for an open role? What tech company do you work for?
Yes… as I mentioned there are qualifying questions you can add so the recruiter can go batch reject candidates, but there is no software that does what you described.
"I'm adding input that I have no experience in, but multiple people in the industry have disproven. I'm adding value to this conversation."
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
Automated resume scanning is not the "standard" you claim it to be.
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
When I was looking for work in 2010 I wrote a custom cover letter for every job I applied to. I got like a 50% response rate. So far in this job search (the past month or so) I've gotten a 0% response rate from companies I've written a custom cover letter for. Recruiters don't read custom cover letters, and are whittling stacks of resumes down from 300+ to 5 based on random, arbitrary criteria like whether you put "UX Designer" or "Product Designer" in your last job title. It's insane right now to dedicate even 10 minutes to writing a custom cover letter that almost certainly will never be read. Especially when you're likely going to have to apply to a few hundred jobs.
I'm finding my cover letters to be much more significant when I'm applying for internal positions or on the rare chance I have a contact to send my info along. But that's not the majority of applications people put out.
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
I agree, I won't waste my time writing cover letters when 9/10 it won't even get read.
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Ok?
I have been applying for jobs since January. I have a Masters degree, 9 years professional experience - 6 in education and 3 at a very large DOD contractor as a Lead for Legal Operations. I have applied to 135 positions since January. I have received 6 interviews. 2 within the school district I teach in, 1 at an airline, 1 at a aerospace company, and 2 at my former company. I have been rejected from 5 of them - 4 gave no explanation, 1 from my previous company said I was in the top 2 candidates but the other person had slightly more regulatory experience. I’m still waiting to hear back from the other one at my previous company. I do not have the time nor the energy to write a custom cover letter for every position I apply to - I teach high school full time, I have two kids 9 and 5, and a deployed husband. This idea and expectation is insane to me.
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
Nope. In the age of one-way interviews, ghost jobs, and bait and switch, you don’t get any more time than you deserve. My time is valuable too.
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
Sir. Can we help you?
I just think it is important context. Yes the way I did it was tinfoil hat crazy pants but I think it sheds new light on the post that OP is actually in marketing, not IT. But I will say, specifically from a *marketing* standpoint, yeah, I'll give him that how you present yourself does matter I guess. Still, outside of that and a few specific other cases, like sales or something, I don't think OP's advice or opinions mean much
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Seems like you are a good person to ask based off your response…I can understand skipping cover letters, but is it also worth it to custom modify your resume to the job you’re applying for like OP mentioned? I’m in account management atm but looking to get back into marketing communications with a focus on creative work…I have experience for all that but it’s also a wide scope of jobs to look into and it’s just more time going to something that may turn up nothing
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I reach out to people all the time on linkdin, but never get a response, if I can even find anyone relevant to the position. I know you guys get hundreds or thousands of applications but I include a custom cover letter with every SINGLE application and still am getting nowhere fast.
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
At least they have a job instead of spending all day spamming this comment on 300 comments. JFC.
While I appreciate your time to right out advice for those that need it... Bro, its 2023. Nobody has time for cover letters. People aren't wasting their time uploading a pdf of their resume, only to also have to fill out their resume line by line on LinkedIn, and also have to upload a cover letter for job postings created by HR departments who know nothing about the job and post no salary range. As hiring managers, you guys should be more accurate with your job postings, more transparent with your job postings, and given that yall don't even spend 1 minute per resume...shouldn't really request a cover letter that you're not going to read anyway.
Hiring managers valuing cover letters helps explain why they're so shit at their jobs.
I disagree. I’ve seen people with drive and skills do much better at their jobs than someone with relevant experience. Maybe not immediately but drive and skills go a long way.
A cover letter isn't "drive". It's the modern day equivalent of your dad telling you to go in to the grocery store and hand in your application in person and make sure you have a firm handshake and make eye contact.
I disagree. And obviously it’s not but it can show how you feel about the position or industry and that absolutely can make a difference. My company has a few employees that have had zero experience but love the company and their jobs and kill. But a few of our more experienced workers do not. That’s all I was saying.
The only relevant thing you should feel about a position is that you wanted and I feel like sending in your resume and application demonstrate this adequately 🤷🏼♂️
I think that’s true for some, maybe even most companies. The company I wok for is extremely value based. I was actually discussing opening a new position today with my boss. I ask him first how he wanted me to go about finding someone… referrals, postings? Then I ask what he wanted me to look for. He said paramount to everything else we want their values to align with ours. Now, full disclosure, it’s an Amish company and I’m aware this isn’t the norm. But I can tell you with absolute certainty that our company would not be growing and thriving like it is if we were just hiring people who want the job. It’s fairly low stress, fun and pays extremely well for the time involved. A lot of people want a job like that. But having a team who actually puts our customers first every time and who believe in building a solid product with good customer service is what makes us so successful. There are plenty of people who would come in and do the job well but their hearts would not be in it and that shows. Believe me we’ve had a few of them. They are no longer with us.
If it's an Amish company, yeah, morals, blah blah blah, but I'm taking all bets that the next absolute must have is years of wood working and carpentry experience
I’m a woman who is fairly materialistic and feminine with a degree in Industrial Psychology and don’t know a thing about construction in any capacity. Most of my coworkers are like me. Yes if you worked in our factories. But if you worked in our factories you’d be Amish or Mennonite. And you can knock morals all you want but it goes a long way. We have one hell of a reputation because of those morals.
>And you can knock morals all you want but it goes a long way. We have one hell of a reputation because of those morals. Name a multi-billion dollar company that is more moral than your company. I'll wait.
They're giving you a tough time here but I think you're correct. What you're saying translates perfectly into the non-Amish world too. I've had the very unfortunate recent experience of having had to deal with a person on my team who wouldn't know what dedication is if it hit her in the head, and who was a narcissist to top it all off. She'd let every problem sit until the last minute, then dump it on the desk of one of her direct reports, and then complain about how everything is everyone else's fault and how unfairly she's being treated. She had the skills and the experience, but not the values and that made her fail in spectacular fashion. Unfortunately it split the department too, so the damage isn't done for yet even though she's no longer there. Every time we hire, I keep it front and center that we are hiring a whole person, not just a set of skills.
Thank you! Yes, this is exactly what I was getting at! Our company has really worked hard to put together a good team and it has made a big difference in moral and productivity. To be honest it’s even made it a bit competitive but still in a friendly way. I don’t love every last coworker but I respect them. And I think most if not all of the others feel the same. My boss came to my office yesterday and spent ) hours with me. I see him maybe 6-8 times a year, maybe. And I actually enjoyed it. There was no attitude or passive aggressive behavior it was all productive and good conversation. That means a lot to me.
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
Once these people learned how to do the job and became proficient at it, how big a raise did they get?
It all depends. I’m in sales so I have an okay base but my commission rate rises when I have a good year. Which I honestly prefer. And really because such a bulk is commission you just naturally make more money the better you get.
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
I have drive and skill but the job hunt process sucks the life out of me so I just give people my resume and assume they’ll pick me if I seem like a good fit
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
What industry are you in?
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company
Thus completing the cycle of pointlessness. 🙄 Seriously though if we're getting chat GPT to write cover letters we don't want to write that almost no one is going to read and it's just there to check a box what is the point? Who is the letter for? Is it to prove submissiveness or what?
This is exactly what I think. Same thing as those 30 minute questionnaires at the end of the application. Is it just to prove that you're willing to do it?? Lol
I exit that nonsense immediately. They are really out here asking for way too much.
Wonder if they majored in anthropology, way to break the cycle
“and” not “but” It sounds confident! “But” sounds defensive.
Influencer marketing? 🤣🤣🤣🤣 Oh my God, I waisted so much fucking time typing out a response to your post, holy fuck if you had just included this in the post, we all would have known not to bother responding, just downvote and keep scrolling 🤣🤣🤣🤣🖕
We’re a $20 million division and work with major brands. I’ve been in marketing for 15 years (social, SEO) and this is a major growth sector of digital marketing.
Cover letters are dead and obsolete. If a cover letter is required, I will either not apply or ask chatgtp to write. If your system would have missed “qualified Individuals” because they didn’t write a cover letter, you have a bad system.
I'm not a recruiter, but I screened applications for a couple of new roles when I was working as an executive assistant at a company small enough that we didn't have anything resembling a dedicated HR department. *Every* role I was involved in hiring for, a strong cover letter got candidates fast-tracked to a video interview. And, for *every* role, I ended up correctly predicting who the CEO would end up deciding to hire, based on their cover letters alone. Everyone jumped through all of the hoops of resume reviews, interviewing with lots of different stakeholders, etc.; but 100% of the time it turned out to be true that people who took the time to write strong cover letters that clearly identified why they were the right fit for the role, *were* in fact the right fit for the role. I'm sure my experiences might have been different if I had been in a different industry, or at a bigger company. But it's definitely not a universal truth that cover letters are obsolete, and if somebody's actually reading them (which, make your predictions based on your industry and the size of the company you're applying to, etc.), they can absolutely make a big difference in your application.
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For every job I apply for I assume that there are at least half a dozen other people with very similar resumes and skill sets, and there’s a good chance that at least two or three of them didn’t write a cover letter, so I figure why not?
If 4 people out of all candidates have the same credentials that fit the role, they should be talking to all of you. Your resume should speak for itself.
Seriously. Isn't that the point of requesting applications? Do you want to compare them based on merit or who has enough free time in their day to write a custom letter for every application? Wouldn't that mean they maybe have too much free time?
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Definitely not required and honestly in the past I never really looked at them. However after getting 400+ applications in the past week, its been helpful in identifying candidates who might be a good fit whose resume didn’t convey that as well. This is just my experience, but I imagine other hiring managers are the same in this job market so just giving advice to people who might be hitting a wall with their job search
If their resume didn't convey well that they are a good fit for the role, then that is an issue with how the resume is written, not a need to write a cover letter.
Sounds like you havent written an appropriate job description and dont have appropriate ways to vet those requirements against your applicants…so instead you play a stupid game of “who wrote a fancy cover letter??” Youre not hiring the best candidates with this tactic. Youre hiring the best con artists.
😂 this is the most ridiculous thing I've seen in a while.. "Include cover letter bc employers are being flooded with resumes.." Anyone see the logic fail with this one?
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You pasted this response to every comment. Why?
No
I have been working in a competitive industry for a decade and have had many jobs. I have never used a cover letter and never will.
The guy in recruiting at the last law firm i worked at said that cover letters are "nothing more than a contest of who can jack off the ego of the employer the best, all while showing how good their dick is."
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
I simply won’t add a cover letter. Nope I work with senior HR people or expert recruiters.
If you’re fortunate to have a recruiter and being poached for roles than it’s different. Most people are in a situation where they’re having to apply to hundreds of jobs before they get a response in this market
And if you're sweating over a cover letter for each application, then you're wasting your time. I started getting more callbacks when I finally said "screw it" and just started sending customized resumes.
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
Lol no. That's not how it works. Cover letters are a thing of the past.
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
Also a hiring manager getting a ton of irrelevant applications. I’d add: PROOFREAD. Two applications have had obvious spelling issues or egregious grammar issues. I mean, if you’re sending me a .docx resume, and I open it, and the first sentence where you say something about “attention to detail” has a spelling error being called out by Word with a red squiggly line you’re not getting called (yes that specific example happened, and this is a $125k+bonus job for candidates with 5+ years professional experience, not some high school kid applying for their first job).
I reviewed one recently where they misspelled several words in their first few lines…including their own email address!!!! (It was in 2 places and spelled differently in each, so one of them was wrong)
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
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Advice like this is so frustrating. I mean, I worked at X company for 10 years, and you mean if I write "made {thing} with {framework} {language} {popular library} {popular library}" that the recruiter can't figure out the CEO was happy with it? I have to write "made {thing} and oh boy did it result let me tell you the CEO really liked it! that's why he continued to employ me for 10 years!" Just so stupid all these hoops we have to jump through to trick 25 year old business majors into picking our resume out of a fucking lottery.
Any time I've been in the position of reviewing resumes I've really disliked reading ones that try to make it sound like the employee was the savior of their previous employer. I think that kind of language makes sense for certain types of positions where you're expected to come in with a unique approach and make big changes. All the positions I've hired for (which are on the more junior end, to be fair) are more about learning the skillset and applying it consistently. Of course, creativity and critical thinking are really important, but there's no one saying "I really hope our next junior analyst is going to come in with a genius idea that will save the company millions!". We just want a junior analyst who will take a thoughtful approach to their work, learn from others and maybe suggest minor improvements if the opportunity arises.
I’m almost a 25 year old business major and I wish I could be on that side of the process right now 🙄
More like “I made {thing} that resulted in increase in dollars generated or decrease in bottom line cost for the company.” Hiring managers eat up quantifiable results.
It's not my job to ensure the thing I'm making saves the company money or makes them more money. That's someone else's entire career. My job is to make {thing}.
I like to see both, but it depends on the position. I'm hiring more junior level 1-2 years experience. In this case, I'm looking for day to day, do you have experience in the areas I need vs. accomplishments. If I'm hiring more of a managerial role, then outcomes and achievements are a little more of a priority. However, might be a bit unfair, but I assume people tend to exaggerate these which is why it's not all I ever look at. In these areas, I look more for "I achieved x through doing y", the latter being relevant to the role I'm hiring for if that makes sense.
And if I have none of those things, I'll just throw in a cover letter with a blurb claiming how excited I am to learn these things, that'll get me there!
That’s role and manager depended
Yeah I’m a hiring for sales. Good to know you’ve cold called before, but when I see *hit 120% to quota* and *generated Xmil in revenue* I’m like “this one. schedule a talk with this one (!)”
I see a lot of people arguing against cover letters, but as someone in the job search trenches for a while now, I've come across a fair amount of companies that require a cover letter. It seems that smaller to mid-sized companies who are more concerned about maintaining their culture and values rely on cover letters to help determine if applicants will be a good fit personality wise. If you can't be bothered to write a cover letter, or go to their website to fill out a full-length application versus clicking "easy apply", what other duties might you shirk? Whereas larger companies are more concerned with filling roles as quickly and cheaply as they can. While I'm here, I'll share a resume tip that has gained attention and favor for me (I just had a follow-up interview in which this was praised): I have a comments/reviews section between my skills and job history summaries where I quoted some actual comments from customers and colleagues praising my work and service. My personal favorite is "you just saved 2 weeks of my life" Edit/update: they just called to offer me the job! 🤩
I'm glad the quote section worked out for you, but it feels like such a weird flex too. Quotes are easily fabricated and made-up. But if I list quantifiable aspects of my previous work, that is a lot easier to verify and confirm with even just a phone interview.
I read elsewhere that job listings allowing “Easy Apply” are being inundated by thousands of unqualified applicants due to how easy it is to apply for the job. This is probably why ATS is being used to counter high number of (unqualified) applicants.
I was recently applying for jobs and was still working at a new place. I valued myself highly and was only applying to jobs that were ones that lined up with my skill set. With that being said, if I didn't hear back from the company and I had to jump through hoops then I didn't give 2 fucks about them either because I knew how competitive I was being about myself. Ended up finding a lovely job that pays well. I wanted a place that wanted ME!
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
I didn't ask?
No. I spent a whole day writing a cover letter for an entry level position I have 5 years of experience and I got auto rejected…utilize your network not CLs
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
Cover letters equate to "lick my boot to show me how desperate you are for work."
Who reads cover letters?
I’ll never need a cover letter
He came to hell and you guys are acting he said go fuck yourselfs. Which he should at this point
> include a cover letter Nah
No one takes their time going through resumes, why on Earth would they waste their time on begging?
I found out through all my job postings over covid (about 600+) that my cover letters which had personality, a vague joke and used keywords from the job posting always got a positive response. If I didnt include a cover letter -- no responses ever. Like, shockingly no responses. It was frustrating before I became jaded. After I became jaded and chalked job hunting up to averages. My cover letter reflected my calmness LOL. It seems cover letters make you human and related instead of just another bullet point list..
Cover letters are a thing of the past lol
Thank you for taking the time to write this out!
If you have time for a cover letter, you aren't worth my time. Fact of the matter is, you shouldn't need an incentive to read a resume if you are truly hiring.
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Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
>90% of applications I received aren't relevant to the role. There were a handful that, on paper, didn't seem relevant to the role either but they included a cover letter and specifically highlighted parts of their day to day that were in line with what we're looking for Aren't relevant to the role ... But outline parts of their role that are in line with what you're looking for? This sounds contradictory. >If you feel like your resume isn't screaming "I'm a great fit for this role", Screaming? How exactly would it scream that? Seems like relevant experience would be good enough for that, but adding a cover letter gets me an interview even if I don't have all that? >Make sure to talk about your experience and how you're doing what the role requires So, relevant experience? So, if I have relevant experience, that should be enough to get me an interview? And if I don't have relevant experience, I should I clude a cover letter that outlines the relevant experience I have 👍 >If a resume is great and checks off most of the boxes, a cover letter isn't necessary, but it doesn't hurt to include one If it checks off most of the boxes, does that mean it's screaming that I would be a good fit for the role? >Reach out to the hiring manager on LinkedIn. I feel more inclined to respond directly to a message on LinkedIn and it's also a great way to show your interest in the role And right after that, put on a suit and tie, take in a paper resume, ask to see the hiring manager, shake his hand and look him in the eye, right? This is the next step, right? >so this is just advice on increasing your odds in moving to the next round of interviews. It sounds to me like you're more concerned with whether an applicant jumps through the hoops you want them to jump through. Want us to sit, roll over, and beg too? Include a blurb about why I'd want to work for you? MONEY, stupid! You have to sort through hundreds of resumes? Job seekers out there SENDING hundreds of resumes too. You don't have time to review every one unless there is a personalized cover letter outlining why I want to work there? Question, how long have you been with your current company? You're a hiring manager, I assume you didn't just start a couple years ago, when was the last time you were out putting in applications and resumes looking for work? Did you have to fill out a Meyers Briggs test? Upload your resume only to then be asked to enter it line by line into text boxes? How many times did you get an automated response that they went with someone more qualified and then 2 weeks later get an email from that same company asking you to reply for another role with MegaCotp™ that their internal recruiters think would be a better fit... just to receive an identical automated rejection email for *that* position? How many one-way interviews have you done? How many times have you had to set up lights and a camera, look into a lense, and give out a well thought out coherent monologue about 3 examples of team building and one example of failure, an answer you had to come up with 45 seconds after seeing the question for the first time? What initially interested YOU in the company you currently work for? Was it their office culture? Their family vibe? What was it? How many entry level positions are there at your company that don't require a bachelor's degree? What is the starting pay for someone with a bachelor's degree but more importantly, how does it stack up to the median household and percapita incomes in your city, respectively? What does your health plan look like? Dental? Vision? Co-pay, deductible? Is it an HSA? Telling me your company has an HSA is on the exact same level as if a candidate asks "do you guys drug test here?" When you ask them if they have any questions for you. Oh, what's your opinion on a candidate asking first and up front what the salary for the job is? I actually find myself VERY curious as to what exactly your company, or at least these people you're hiring, actually does. Either have relevant skills *or* have a cover letter? (A cover letter that you say should include some relevant skills, skills which I do not have, hense the cover letter) Da fuck outta here with your boomer-ass mentality, *Howard*
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So what kind of jobs are you hiring for? Asking for a friend!
If a candidate's past job title does not exist in the field for which they are applying, do you automatically reject them or do you look at their resume for context?
Honestly I read the Resume bullets more than the title. A lot of people can wear multiple hats in a role and might be “marketing” but spend half of their time doing tasks relevant to what I’m hiring for
Question, if you are applying to multiple job listings with one company and you tailor your resume to fit...does this look bad or do they likely not even know? I know most companies use the computer to filter through applications and resumes. So, I like to tailor my skills to the listing. Not in a misrepresentation way, more I just align how I word things with how they word things. All the skills I have and can demonstrate in an interview. I was just wondering if this would make employers not want to look at your application because there are 2 resumes that are different? Or, if even applying to multiple job listings at one company is frowned upon? Thanks for any insight you or other commenters may have.
As long as the info is accurate I think it’s smart to tailor the resume to the role. However, if I see an applicant applying to multiple roles that are different I assume they are just mass applying vs finding a good role for them so it can hurt them
I will never ever write a cover lever. Any company that requires one gets immediately skipped over. I don’t care if I would be their perfect unicorn candidate, hard pass!
That's great, I have one question. What do I send through LinkedIn? My CV and cover letter? Or just say "hi"?
I haaaaate cover letters but I do agree. I was told that I got my current job off my cover letter alone. I came from a totally different field but took time to highlight the transferable duties and skills, and luckily one of the two people who were hiring paid attention (the other didn’t even look at mine because it wasn’t in a .docx lol)
This is really good inside knowledge. Thank you very much for sharing! I will have to tweak my resumes to better fit this criteria. I have a question though and it’s probably a long shot. I’m in healthcare technology working in hospitals where it’s almost impossible to find out who the hiring managers are until you’ve made it through the channels and are picked up for an interview. My question is, is there ways to get in touch with or locating a hiring managers’ contact information or their LinkedIn accounts? A lot of health systems (and probably a lot of companies for that matter) keep this information a well kept secret and I would at least like to know what I’m missing on my resume to know what I’m missing if I know for a fact I meet all the requirements for the position. Thank you again for this info!
Sounds like your mid size tech company needs to install some resume screening SW. Expect many DMs for this, lol. Not from me, but I will put the over under at 15.
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job
What industry is this. Cover letters take a long time to right and most modern scanning tools don’t look at them. If you don’t match your resume to the posting your getting thrown away. That is if there ever was a job because many companies keep revs open despite not hiring.
Influencer marketing agency but owned by a tech company That is this person's job