Is cover letter important? Do hiring managers/recruiters read those?
Dear Hiring Manager,
I hope this message finds you well. My name is David Dodda, and I am writing to express my interest in the Software Engineer position at WIA Software Systems Inc. I am a Senior Software Developer with extensive experience in full-stack development, and I believe my skills align well with the requirements outlined in your job posting.
With a Bachelor’s degree in Electronics and Communication and over 5 years of professional experience, I have honed my capabilities in various programming languages and technologies, particularly in React, Node.js, AWS, and SQL. At Black Beard Development Group, I led the development of a privacy-focused AI platform and played a pivotal role in establishing CI/CD pipelines that improved efficiencies across our team.
Your job description emphasizes the importance of developing software solutions by studying systems flow, data usage, and work processes. In my previous roles, I have consistently evaluated user feedback to improve system designs and have successfully executed the full lifecycle of software development. Additionally, my involvement in agile methodologies and my proficiency in AWS aligns perfectly with your requirement for cloud and DevOps experience.
Furthermore, I have experience collaborating with teams to coordinate the development and integration of computer-based systems, ensuring optimal functionality and performance. My recent project involving a fantasy sports DApp required me to coordinate with various stakeholders, manage expectations, and lead technical efforts, making me well-equipped for the responsibilities at WIA Software Systems Inc.
I am particularly excited about the hybrid work arrangement offered for this role, as I believe it allows for both collaborative in-person engagement and the flexibility of remote work, which enhances productivity.
Thank you for considering my application. I have attached my resume for your review and would welcome the opportunity to discuss how my background, skills, and enthusiasms align with the goals of WIA Software Systems Inc.
Best regards, David Dodda https://daviddodda.com
Also, a bit too long. Make it shorter.
I receive cover letters with typos, the wrong word used, poor punctuation etc. If candidates could use a spell checking it would be a good start.
It just has zero value. A well written cover letter on the other hand would net you a big plus
- If the cover letter is a rehash of your resume, it's a waste of your time and mine. It certainly isn't helpful to your application, and if I have too many well-qualified applicants then it might be harmful.
- Poorly written cover letters suggest that the applicant doesn't care much about this specific opportunity, it's some sort of AI/oversees/... scam, or the applicant can't write well. They're very helpful for me when there are already other data points suggesting identity theft or similar automation (nail-in-the-coffin material). Otherwise, they're not necessarily a negative, but it's rarely advantageous to advertise a lack of some skill, and it does disqualify applicants from some roles.
- Some cover letters are especially compelling. Suppose your resume just has you as a pizza delivery driver, but your cover letter goes over the app you wrote and the data science behind it to optimize your hourly earnings. Suppose your work history is in web tech, but you're actually better at low-level optimizations and are applying here because you think that skill set is a good fit. I prefer varied backgrounds anyway, so you'll probably get some form of screening interview unless there's enough other evidence that you aren't qualified (e.g., junior experience for a senior role) -- I try to bias toward giving everyone a chance while not wasting too much of anyone's time, and I'm fine having a busier calendar to make that happen.
None of that helps you get the job though; it helps you get an interview. If your experience is that you're well qualified and usually land the job once you get into an interview, and if your cover letter has some information your resume lacks, you should definitely add one. If you normally struggle through the interview process, it'd be surprising for you to have an honest cover letter which would help you land the job in the first place, so I probably wouldn't bother.
Might be worth putting a little summary / objective in the resume file itself because of that.
The process outlined in the post also isn't a path to writing a good cover letter. You don't want to just go over your resume again you want to either talk about things that wouldn't be there (e.x. why you want this job specifically, because your 100% applying because this is the unicorn job for you, not because you need money to feed yourself) or expanding on how something on your resume uniquely qualifies you (I worked on this project that's very similar to what your doing)
If it's lining up your resume to the job description (you want someone who can write Scala, I have used Scala in my past 3 jobs) a resume is a better format for that. But that's all the LLM has context to do.
Oh yeah, ideally you'd also tune your resume to the job too.
In 99.9% of jobs in the world, there are zero applicants for who this truly holds. You might be working at a company hiring for a job that's part of the 0.1%, not sure. Otherwise, you're just selecting for those who are willing to lie as blatantly as required.
That's a pessimistic way of looking at it, but I'm not going to claim it's wrong. I think my phrasing made it very clear that in most cases I expect if someone includes something about this their interest is going to be ahem embellished.
All the same look at it from the hiring managers side. Say you have two candidates, who appear to otherwise be equal. One seems to think the job is just like any other. The other actually seems genuinely interested in the details of food brokering, knows of your companies involvement in <big name>'s success and has thoughts on how they can apply their background in data analytics to the challenges you face.
Which candidate do you hire? Or do you really just toss a coin?
I guess it depends on how much freedom an HM has. Where I've worked, the answer has been "more than enough". Which means you can easily ask e.g. a philosophical question. Ask something unrelated to the job, see what kind of person they are. Chance they'll both respond the exact same way is negligible, and you'll very likely come out preferring one of them. Only few people lie when you give them a good question that doesn't sound like it has a "wrong" answer that would get them a minus.
Does this mean you'll necessarily get the best candidate? No, but it's better than selecting on a proxy for willingness to lie, that's how you end up with people far too good at political games, to detriment of the org.
In places where the HM has little freedom, I guess there's little choice indeed. But even then, I'd try to go with whorver sounds most happen and genuine, rather than most interested in the company per se.
We're talking about a cover letter, no one's been talked to yet. The HM has 100+ candidates who have done web applications with Python or whatever qualifies one for said job, and literally doesn't have time to talk to them all. They also can't ask them random clarifying questions about their life. There's 2 data points, cover letter and resume.
I suggested two ways to make your cover letter more than a rehash of your resume and your latching onto one of them.
Here's the thing: you'll notice in my example I didn't suggest you write "I'm deeply passionate about food brokering" (an actual company I've hired software engineers for). That's not likely to move the needle, it obviously nonsense (Even the owner is didn't meet that description), and much like saying "I've got a deep mastery of Python" it's just empty words without something backing it.
Instead I suggested learning about what the company does, thinking about what the job entails beyond just "writing software according to the tickets" and what it actually accomplishes and expressing what about that interests you.
Is that person's interest going to end up exaggerated? Sure probably. But they're actually interested enough to put in the effort to think through that, and that effort, like it or not is a signal. Even the most pessimistic view means at least they were willing to work harder at it.
But look, maybe your applying at a subprime lender or something equally parasitic and are either so desperate that your doing it anyway or just cynical enough to not care, yet still have some moralistic hangup about this. Then don't. I suggested other things you can bring to your cover letter that don't fit on a resume. But if you make your cover letter your resume but in paragraph form (which is all the AI can do, since that's the only data it has), then you've reduced those data points the manager has to decide if your worth talking to from 2 down to 1. You might as well have skipped the cover letter entirely and at least saved them some time. (Actually that's not true, because often a cover letter is expected and they'll ding you for not having it, but including a bullshit rephrasing of your resume for that reason is no less performative than the expression of interest your already bothered by)