Careers- Getting Hired— Don’t Forget the Cover Letter

Cover letter—Get a competitive edge with a cover letter.

Cover letters are a graceful way to introduce yourself, express your personality, and impress a hiring manager with your experience and writing skills.

A bonus for you:  You can tailor the cover letter to a specific company in ways you cannot with a resume.

Tips for you—

• Find the decision maker’s name and use it in the salutation. Use a colon after the salutation.
• Keep it short and no longer than three or four paragraphs.
• For first paragraph, describe why you are writing—for example answering an ad, or perhaps referred to the company through networking or perhaps you learned that the company was expanding.
• In the middle paragraph, explain why you are a good candidate and show your knowledge about the company. Convey a clear story about your career and highlight specific past achievements. Do that as a narrative or bullet points. You can also highlight qualities that may not fit in the structure of the resume.
• Finish the letter and indicate you will follow up in the near future. Sign off with a “Sincerely,” or “Thank you for your consideration,” followed by your name, and, if you like, your email address.
• Include your letter in the actual text of your email message or place it above your resume in an attachment. Don’t put it in a separate attachment since a busy hiring manager may not click on it at all.  If you place it in the text of your email message, make it shorter than if you use an attachment.

Be sure to watch our English Speech Tips videos and Accent Reduction Tip videos  for more English pronunciation and accent reduction exercise.

Check out our advanced weekly speech tip program, our new subscription called ClearTalk Weekly, www.subscription.cleartalkmastery.com

Rerun from 08/24/2016