ARNIE SHERR, PRESIDENT AND CEO - THE RESUME STORE DECEMBER 22, 2011
From About.com
Effective cover letters explain the reasons for your interest in the specific organization and identify your most relevant skills or experiences (remember, relevance is determined by the employer's self-interest). They should express a high level of interest and knowledge about the position. READ MORE
6. Identify your most relevant skills and experiences. Don't just duplicate your resume. Rather, include the skills that most match the job. READ MORE
From eHow.com/money
Each cover letter must be written for a specific employer. You can recycle some of the text for cover letters within the same industry, but each letter should contain a reference to a specific detail about the employer or company. You should research important business or technological trends within your industry, significant recent transactions, hiring trends and popular terms, phrases and subject matter.
Learn all you can about the history of any company to which you apply. Identify its major clients, review any important recent transactions, and study its hiring trends and employment needs. The more you know about an industry and a particular company, the more effective your cover letter will be. READ MORE
Above are two of many misguided answers to what message cover letters should tell!
The facts are abundantly clear; employers do not make hiring decisions based on resume content. From them they make only interview decisions. Albeit there are rigorous rules and guidelines for writing resumes, rules that although content is important are restricted to formatting and relevance. However important is resume content, the word relevance is paramount.
To be succinct, resumes are brag sheets. Perhaps that is why it is challenging to write one’s own resume. Most people own varying degrees of humility; therefore, telling others how great they are may be an uncomfortable position. Most fear being thought of as arrogant or egotistical, two disparaging human characteristics, at best. Since employers have, no viable way of discerning how well applicants perform that to which is written to resumes, they look to identify other means of determining those attributes and characteristics that by there very nature, resumes fail in exhibit. Such attributes and characteristics provide insight into personal credibility, integrity, believability, competence, confidence and more. Such characteristics and attributes become apparent from the manners in which candidates participate within the interview process.
An example may be the interview performance of a candidate vying for a sales management position. To understand the following, it is important to know that of the best salespersons, in order to make sales, the single most important attribute is the ability to control the sales process. That said; the best way to reinforce this single most important resume declaration is to take control of the interview process. If such candidates successfully demonstrate this important selling attribute through their actions at interviews, it makes sense that interviewers tend to believe that all or most other resume declarations are credible and accurate. Such demonstrations solidify other such resume ‘bragging’ points in addition to ‘control’ and succeeds remarkably in increasing job offer probabilities which, brings me back to the original purpose of this writing, “the real reasons with which employers make hiring decisions and how that relates to cover letters.”
The two excerpts about cover letters from About.com and eHow.com/money above, exemplify that which most, if not all, job seekers send along with their resumes to demonstrate interest in respective job postings. It is akin to every applicant showing up for interviews following identical cover letters and resumes as well as wearing the exact same outfits, color and all. Essentially, there is nothing to raise one above the other. How challenging a hiring decision is this to make? WOW, which of these five identical candidates’ best meets our needs? Perhaps we may toss a coin!
In advertising, a media in which the objective is to promote one thing over another, there are two objectives proved most effective as memory inducers, unique and obnoxious. Certainly, it is agreed that obnoxious in the job search is counterproductive; however, unique works as well in the job search as it has historically in advertising. Who among us does not recall, “Where the Beef” or “This Bud’s for You?” Considering the aforementioned, what within your cover letter depicts you as unique and clever, a step or so above the competition, so to suggest? Certainly expounding upon resume content, no matter how relevant to the posting, places you not ahead of the pack, but well within its mediocrity.
What has proved successful for The Resume Store’s customers are cover letters that allude to those attributes and characteristics that interviewers dig deep to ascertain. The kinds of information with which they may consider as demonstrated evidence that particular candidates are, with a high degree of certainty, more qualified than others interviewed; that indeed, their ‘brag’ sheets are true to a fault.
Just as in the advertising arena, cover letters, which are synonymous to print, radio, TV, or internet ads, must create a call to action. Just as, it is hoped, that print, radio, TV, or internet ads induce calls of inquiry or better yet, visits to the advertiser’s place of business to properly investigate the subject of the ad, cover letters must also create a call to action. For cover letters, such calls to action begin with directing them to accompanying resumes after which they engage respective applicants in phone interviews, or invite them to attend mutually convenient in-person interviews. I am beleaguered to understand how repeating or expounding upon "resume content" does anything more than accentuate boasting or bragging. Furthermore, it is redundant.
The following are excerpts of actual cover letters that have proved effective in successfully genererating interviews :
Please note: Passion, a vigorous kind of enthusiasm felt deep within, is not easy to explain or define. For me it is an indefinable phenomenon; one that propels in directions that seem motivated by forces beyond my control. Many support my assertion that passion drives faster and farther than simply knowledge and experience. Merge all three and success is inevitable.
Coming from an entrepreneurial background, I offer remarkably unique attributes, the kind of attributes that grow and reinforce self-ruling passion driven achievement beyond personal expectations.
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Please note: Florence Nightingale said, “I stand at the altar of the murdered men, and, while I live, I fight their cause.”
Few career choices offer employment potential and security as does nursing. With the onset of the baby boomers, the demand for qualified nurses is certain to limit nursing resources needed to serve the US Military at home and abroad. As a career-nursing professional, I am enthusiastic at the prospect of providing exemplary healthcare to DOD (Department of Defense) beneficiaries at Aviano Air Base, Italy. Feeling strongly about serving Americas’ military, I too continue, as a dedicated nurse professional, “to fight their cause.”
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The quote that headlines this Cover Letter
“There are no traffic jams along the extra mile”
ROGER STAUBACH
Please note: Peter Drucker (1909-2005) who known as the father of modern management said, “Quality in a service or product is not what you put into it; it is what the client or customer gets out of it.”
I think what I have come to love about retail is how easily customers can be satisfied. Yet, many leave feeling mistreated or neglected by retail staff that fail to grasp the importance of excellent customer service, regardless of how focused or unfocused management is with respect to training store staff on ensuring positive shopping experiences for Gap Customers. As a Gap, Inc. retail troubleshooter, many of the challenges I face emanate from issues related to customer service. Working with management teams, we come together to set forth strategies that remove perceived traffic jams and detours, etc. Since April 2004, I along with many Gap managers have proven that going that extra mile provides avenues to growth, prosperity and advancement.
Ask others to read your cover letter. Does it create an emotion response? Does it create a call to action? If not, then others whose cover letters do are passing you by.
In order for The Resume Store’s experienced writers to create highly motivating cover letters, a 45-minute to 1- hour consultation is required. Our in-person, by Webcam or over the phone consults, allow us to derive that which we need to know to put our creative juices to work writing cover letters that create a call to action.
Of course, there are those that disagree with our methods. Among them are, surprisingly, a minority of human resource personnel. That said; when our cover letters come before their eyes, they are driven as are most others, to action.
If you are happy with your present resume, we are available to discuss your cover letter independently. You may contact us via our website: www.TheResumeStore.info
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